N.H. Governor Vetoes Death Penalty Repeal

The governor vetoed a bill Friday that would have repealed the death penalty, something no state has done since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment in 1976.

The veto by Gov. Jeanne Shaheen, which was expected, came a day after the Senate passed the measure, 14 to 10.

“Our statute is designed to make the carrying out of the death penalty extraordinarily difficult,” Shaheen said, citing safeguards that include automatic appeals.

“There are some murders that are so brutal and heinous that the death penalty is the only appropriate penalty,” she said.

She cited the 1997 case of loner Carl Drega, who tracked down and killed a judge, a man who tried to save her and two state troopers. She noted that Drega’s property was extensively booby-trapped with explosives “designed to kill and maim countless people.”

“If Carl Drega had not been killed that day, I believe an indictment on capital murder would have been appropriate for his coldblooded, brutal murders,” Shaheen said.

The Senate vote fell short of the 16 votes needed to override a veto. The 400-member House approved the repeal in March, 191 to 163, also well short of the two-thirds necessary for an override.

The New Hampshire Legislature was the second to vote to repeal the death penalty since the Supreme Court’s 1976 decision. A repeal passed in 1979 by Nebraska lawmakers was vetoed.

The Legislature’s vote was largely symbolic. No one is on death row in New Hampshire and the state hasn’t executed anybody in 61 years. It had the lowest murder rate in the nation in 1998.

In vetoing the bill, Shaheen brushed off appeals from former President Carter and his wife, Rosalyn, and Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu.

“As you know, there is no evidence that the death penalty deters heinous crimes . . . ,” the Carters wrote.

New Hampshire’s death penalty applies to a short list of crimes, including murder of a law enforcement officer and murder during rape or attempted rape.