Gov. Martin O'Malley is urging members of the Maryland House of Delegates to abandon their effort to repeal the death penalty and instead adopt an alternative that limits capital cases.
Even though a majority of the House appears to back repeal, key delegates are joining the governor's call, including the speaker of the House and the lead sponsor of a death penalty abolition bill. Their support could mark the end of the repeal effort for at least the next two years.
O'Malley, a Democrat who made repeal a top priority this year, acknowledged yesterday that abolishing the death penalty would not be possible unless the closely divided Senate gained new members after 2010 elections. The chamber rejected a repeal this month, choosing instead to restrict the kinds of evidence permissible in such cases.
The governor said he is "prepared to go forward" with new lethal injection regulations that a court said were needed before executions in Maryland could resume, and that he would begin looking at the cases of the five men on death row.
"The Senate has spoken," O'Malley said in an interview yesterday. "I would have preferred that we repeal the death penalty, but we have made considerable progress with the Senate's version. I plan to testify in favor of that rather than going back to a deadlock."
The House Judiciary Committee meets Tuesday to debate both the repeal and the Senate proposal, but death penalty opponents and House leaders said it has become clear that the Senate's reforms are the only option this year.
House repeal proponents at first vowed to forge ahead, since the support was much greater in that chamber. The repeal bill includes almost 60 co-sponsors from among the 141-person chamber.
In a critical switch, Del. Samuel I. Rosenberg of Baltimore, the lead sponsor of the House's legislation and a Judiciary Committee member, said yesterday that he will ask his colleagues to choose the Senate plan instead. A week ago, he said delegates shouldn't settle for less than a repeal.
Rosenberg, a Democrat, said legal experts have convinced him that "we would be making significant progress in reducing the risk of an innocent person being executed" under the Senate plan.
"There's also the political reality of this is the best bill we can pass this term," he said. "So I decided to support the Senate bill, period."
