By Matthew Santoni
The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
GREENSBURG, Pa. — The Allegheny County Office of the Public Defender has budgeted $30,000 for doctors to analyze Talon Perozich and investigators to meet with his friends, family and associates in Pennsylvania, Florida and Chicago — all just in case a jury finds him guilty of murder and he is eligible for the death penalty.
Perozich, 22, of White Oak is on trial on charges that he shot a McKeesport man and his girlfriend in their bed — killing him and wounding her — over a $230 drug debt. He is one of nine defendants on trial or preparing to go to trial in Allegheny County for whom the District Attorney’s Office is seeking the death penalty.
Allegheny County spent more than $290,000 over the past five years prosecuting seven death penalty cases, according to figures compiled by the Fifth Judicial District for the Pennsylvania Interbranch Commission for Gender, Racial and Ethnic Fairness.
That does not include the cost of attorneys’ fees, forensic experts, evaluations, court-appointed investigators, judicial staff time and jury costs, needed to obtain a conviction. It does not include the cost associated with appeals.
Allegheny County has nine death penalty convictions under appeal.
Westmoreland County has five death penalty cases under appeal and no active cases. The judicial report on costs did not include Westmoreland County.
Although no one has produced detailed studies of the statewide cost of death penalty cases in Pennsylvania, the Washington-based Death Penalty Information Center estimates the state spends $46 million per year for prosecution, mitigation and appeal of death penalty cases.
Yet a death penalty conviction in Pennsylvania rarely ends in execution.
In the 37 years since Pennsylvania reinstated the death penalty, only three people have been executed — and they volunteered, waiving their rights to appeal.
It’s a topic that divides Americans. A 2013 survey by Pew Research Center found 55 percent said they supported the death penalty for people convicted of murder.
High-profile DNA exonerations of people on death row brought attention to the penalty.
In his Sept. 24 speech to Congress, Pope Francis pushed to abolish the death penalty globally, saying, “Every life is sacred, every human person is endowed with an inalienable dignity, and society can only benefit from the rehabilitation of those convicted of crimes.”
As of Thursday, Pennsylvania had 181 death row inmates, according to the Department of Corrections, including Greensburg torture slaying ringleader Ricky Smyrnes and accomplice Melvin Knight, convicted in 2013; Stanton Heights cop killer Richard Poplawski, convicted in 2011; and spree killer Richard Baumhammers of Mt. Lebanon, convicted in 2001.
Given the cost and the marked lack of executions, some question the ultimate penalty’s effectiveness.
Then-Gov. Ed Rendell in 2011 expressed frustration when signing his final execution warrants.
“Executions 15, 20, 25, 30 years after a crime took place make absolutely no sense,” Rendell, a former prosecutor, told PennLive. “To the criminals on the street, the death penalty in Pennsylvania is simply not a reality. For victim’s families and survivors, it’s ... agonizing. For the police who did the original investigation, it creates frustration. And for we the taxpayers, the endless appeals cost us significant amounts of money that could be put to use in other parts of the criminal justice system.”
Rendell suggested the legislature streamline the process or consider scrapping the death penalty.
Why pursue it?
Prosecutors pursue the death penalty because its proper application, despite the costs, is the best way to guarantee public safety and bring a sense of justice to victims’ families, said Richard Long, executive director of the Pennsylvania District Attorneys Association.
Gov. Tom Wolf imposed a moratorium on executions in February, using his power to grant reprieves to inmates until a Senate panel established in 2011 to study the death penalty delivers its long-overdue report.
“We believe the governor’s overstepped his constitutional authority by imposing the moratorium,” Long said. “If someone wants to end the death penalty in Pennsylvania, there’s a process for that; that needs to move through the legislature.”
Long said the association filed a friend of the court brief in a challenge of Wolf’s moratorium before the state Supreme Court and made arguments three weeks ago. The task force looking at the death penalty and whether it has been applied fairly across racial, gender and socioeconomic lines was stacked with death penalty opponents, Long said, and it had not delivered its report nearly two years past its deadline.
A moratorium has not changed the law, said Mike Manko, spokesman for Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr.
“The costs associated with seeking the death penalty are not extraordinary to our budget and do not divert resources from other areas of the office,” said Manko. “One of the many tenets of this office is to seek justice for the victims of violent crime, and it is a concern that the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections is unable to take death penalty cases to their ultimate conclusion.
“This and the seemingly endless appellate process have the effect of forcing the families of homicide victims to constantly be reminded of the violence that has entered their lives and, as such, they never achieve the justice that they deserve.”
Westmoreland County District Attorney John Peck said he will continue to seek the death penalty when he believes it is warranted, and cost does not factor into his decision.
“It is the law, and it is supported by the majority of the citizens,” he said.
Defendants’ rights
Once a prosecutor seeks the death penalty, it triggers a long and sometimes expensive process of evaluating a defendant’s background for anything that would indicate he or she should not be executed.
“You’re looking at not just their life, but you’re also required to look two generations back — to look for a history of mental health issues, a history of abuse or criminality,” said Carrie Allman, manager of training for the Allegheny County Public Defender’s Office. “It takes a lot of time and a lot of attention, and you end up with a lot of paper and a lot of people.”
Defendants in a death penalty case have a right, guaranteed by the Supreme Court and American Bar Association procedures, to “mitigation specialists” who delve into defendants’ histories for things such as mental illnesses, disabilities or traumas that might weigh on whether a jury imposes the death penalty, Allman said.
“It’s a lot of costs up front for the just-in-case,” she said. “It’s the commonwealth’s choice to take that route.”
The death penalty is sought in cases in which a homicide is accompanied by “aggravating factors,” such as the killing of police officers or multiple victims, a defendant’s history of felony convictions, or a killing’s association with the drug trade.