What's the confusion? The US is a federated system, each state is responsible for determining and carrying out the punishments for crimes committed within that state. Some offenses will result in federal charges, in addition to or instead of state-level charges, so those sentences and punishments would be handled by the federal government instead. Prisoners charged with crimes at the state level will typically be held in prisons in that state. Prisoners convicted of a capital offense (one that can result in the death penalty) in some state will be held in a prison in that state on "death row" (colloquial term meaning a section of a prison dedicated to inmates sentenced to death).
The quoted bit is just literally saying that CA has more death row inmates than other states. That doesn't mean they sentence more people to death, a large part of the reason is that they haven't carried out an execution in 20 years. So the numbers will continue to grow instead of shrinking until the inmates die from some other cause (age, illness, suicide, etc.). This is in contrast to states like FL and TX that continue to carry out death sentences, so the numbers will grow as people get sentenced but shrink faster than in CA as they carry out the executions.
> That doesn't mean they sentence more people to death, a large part of the reason is that they haven't carried out an execution in 20 years. So the numbers will continue to grow instead of shrinking until the inmates die from some other cause
Ah, that explains it, thanks!
I was wondering why one of the most "liberal left" states, with a strong opposition to the death penalty would have so many death sentences - but it makes sense that the large number of inmates is instead a consequence of them not carrying out the sentence.
Many more comments at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50384133.
> California has more death row inmates than any other state
As a non-American, could someone explain this to me?
What's the confusion? The US is a federated system, each state is responsible for determining and carrying out the punishments for crimes committed within that state. Some offenses will result in federal charges, in addition to or instead of state-level charges, so those sentences and punishments would be handled by the federal government instead. Prisoners charged with crimes at the state level will typically be held in prisons in that state. Prisoners convicted of a capital offense (one that can result in the death penalty) in some state will be held in a prison in that state on "death row" (colloquial term meaning a section of a prison dedicated to inmates sentenced to death).
The quoted bit is just literally saying that CA has more death row inmates than other states. That doesn't mean they sentence more people to death, a large part of the reason is that they haven't carried out an execution in 20 years. So the numbers will continue to grow instead of shrinking until the inmates die from some other cause (age, illness, suicide, etc.). This is in contrast to states like FL and TX that continue to carry out death sentences, so the numbers will grow as people get sentenced but shrink faster than in CA as they carry out the executions.
> That doesn't mean they sentence more people to death, a large part of the reason is that they haven't carried out an execution in 20 years. So the numbers will continue to grow instead of shrinking until the inmates die from some other cause
Ah, that explains it, thanks!
I was wondering why one of the most "liberal left" states, with a strong opposition to the death penalty would have so many death sentences - but it makes sense that the large number of inmates is instead a consequence of them not carrying out the sentence.
California also has the largest population in the US (Wikipedia: CA 35 million, TX 32 million, FL 23 million, as of 2025).
This is kind of a huge deal.