A year after an effort to lower the bar for implementation of the death-penalty in Colorado failed in the Senate Judiciary Committee, a move to repeal the state’s death penalty failed this week in the same committee.

As we noted when Berthoud Sen. Kevin Lundberg’s bill failed last year, it’s unfortunate that Sen. Lucia Guzman’s bill didn’t advance this session, because this is a public policy discussion that requires the state’s attention.

There are practical reasons for eliminating the death penalty. Boulder County District Attorney Stan Garnett has noted that prosecuting a death penalty case through a verdict can cost the prosecution more than $1 million, about a fifth of the annual budget of the district attorney’s office.

But saving money is a far lesser concern than questions about whether the death penalty, as applied now, is just.

Read more at The Loveland Reporter Herald.