how many prisoners in the us have life sentences
Life imprisonment in the United States Over 159,000 people were serving life sentences as of 2012, with just under a third—nearly 50,000—serving life without a chance of parole.[1] In 1993 the Times survey found, about 20 percent of all lifers had no chance of parole. By 2004 the number rose to 28 percent.[23]
Capital punishment in the United States From 1976 to July 1, 2018, there were 1,477 executions, of which 1,302 were by lethal injection, 158 by electrocution, 11 by gas inhalation, 3 by hanging, and 3 by firing squad.[47] The South had the great majority of these executions, with 1,207; there were 181 in the Midwest, 85 in the West, and only 4 in the Northeast. No state in the Northeast has conducted an execution since Connecticut, now abolitionist, in 2005. The state of Texas alone conducted 552 executions, over 1/3 of the total; the states of Texas, Virginia, and Oklahoma combined make up over half the total, with 777 executions between them.[48] 3 executions have been conducted by the federal government, the last in 2003. Executions increased in frequency until 1999; 98 prisoners were executed that year. Since 1999, the number of executions has greatly decreased, and the 20 executions in 2016 were the fewest since 1991.[6]