is connected to a maximum security facility, part of which was remodeled and expanded to accommodate condemned prisoners.





In 1986, when the CSU had 22 male prisoners and one female, Corrections Commissioner William H. Fauver in a report to Governor Kean estimated that the total personnel cost of operating the CSU was $465,355 a year. This included the cost of someone holding the rank of Sergeant or Lieutenant and 16 senior corrections officers. In addition, a support staff of a chaplain, head nurse, clinical psychologist and social worker is assigned to the unit. They devote 10 percent of their time to the service of the CSU. If it were not a Capital Sentence Unit and instead housed 24 general population inmates, the custody team would consist of a superiorsomeone in a single cell at the highest security level for 40 years. (This assumes a cost of just over $19,000 a year for incarceration.)39

Washington

In a review of capital cases from 1999 to 200340, the Washington Death Penalty Assistance Center estimated that a death penalty trial cost more than double the amount spent on non-death penalty trial. The report found that Washington counties sought nearly $35 million from a state fund established under the Extraordinary Criminal Justice Costs Act, adopted in 1999 to alleviate some of the burden on county budgets.





Nearly 50 percent of the total money requested for reimbursement was from death penalty cases—which make up 21 percent of all cases. The report estimated that if the sentence of death was not an option, the state could