Re: Hmmm....
Well, if they did have the death penalty in NJ, they wouldn't put it to work on a jailbreak unless they killed guards getting out, would they. And if they were already under murder rap and looking to be offed by government, what do they have to lose? Killed twice as much? Tortured to death? The Comfy Pillow???
The death penalty is showing that sometimes murder is valid, which makes it harder to justify the death penalty for it. And if you get it wrong, you can't unkill them, so your level of proof has to be "certain" rather than "nearly certain", so in cases where the evidence is thin, you're letting a murderer go free rather than risk a mistake. If you incarcerate them, if more evidence to exonerate them comes forward, you can reverse the decision.