California voters early Wednesday decisively decided to strengthen capital punishment in their state, by declining to repeal the death penalty and choosing to expedite appeals to quicken the pace of executions.
Proposition 62 was voted against by 54 percent of California voters.
The legislation would have repealed capital punishment in California and replaced it with life imprisonment without parole. If passed, the legislation would have applied retroactively to people already on death row, and required prisoners serving life sentence without parole for murder to work while in behind bars.
Proponents had pushed that it would save innocent people from execution, as well as save taxpayers up to $150 million annually.
California voters then narrowly voted to pass Proposition 66, with a 2-percent margin: 51 percent to 49 percent. The legislation changes the procedures for how California court challenges death sentencing.
Initial death sentence appeals would be directed to a superior court judge, and the number of successive appeals would be limited.
Supporters say it will fix up a broken death penalty system and speed up executions to help bring justice to victims’ families. It will also save taxpayers millions in incarceration costs, advocates said.
California’s last execution was in 2006. Executions have been halted because of a 9th Circuit ruling requiring a medical professional to administer lethal injection drugs because its current method caused “cruel and unusual punishment.” A new one-drug method is currently under review.
Since 1978, only 13 people have been put to death in California. Nearly 750 are on death row.
A measure to repeal the death penalty in California was rejected by a 52 percent-48 percent margin in November 2012.
