In Nebraska, the death penalty remains, however, the state is left with no means to execute people. AP notes:

Nebraska lawmakers rejected an attempt to repeal the death penalty on Tuesday, a month after courts left the state with no way to execute its killers.

Twenty senators in the unicameral, officially nonpartisan Legislature voted for the bill to change the maximum penalty to life in prison without possibility of parole. It would have taken 25 votes to advance the debate.

The state Supreme Court ruled in February that the electric chair, the state’s sole means of putting inmates to death, amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.. . .

Ten men now sit on Nebraska’s death row.

In Connecticut efforts to reform that state’s failed eyewitness ID procedures failed. Gideon notes:

Just to show you how skewed the priorities of legislators are, let us compare two bills side by side.

On the left, we have the eyewitness id reform bill and on the right, the “collect DNA from the innocent” bill.

One is clearly needed, the other could be a significant violation of due process. (Yes, I do know that some states have held such DNA collection to not be a violation of the 4th. I disagree with them.)

As EyeID points out, the bill, while missing some legs, would have been a significant step in the right process. Alas, it was not to be. However, the esteemed legislators have deemed it worthy to collect DNA samples from people arrested of crimes. The argument behind this piece of legislation is that collection of DNA at the time of arrest would permit law enforcement to solve more crimes…because, you know, if you’re arrested, then you’ve probably committed a crime in the past.

Another rationale put forth by the State [pdf]- and I do love this – is that collection of DNA at the time of arrest would not only serve to solve unsolved crimes, but also prevent wrongful convictions.

The irony here, lest it be lost on you, is that the very same State opposed [pdf] the eyewitness ID reform bill, when DNA exonerations have shown that in 75% of wrongful conviction cases faulty IDs have been the culprit. Apparently, in eyewitness ID reform, there is a “pilot program” and the “jury is still out” on whether sequential or simultaneous lineups are better. Yes, you read that right. Apparently, no one knows how to use Google. There is some heavy citing of the Mecklenburg Report, which permits law enforcement to continually bury its head in the sand. The State’s testimony then quotes Gary Wells out of context (I’ve read about this being done in other states too) and ignores his response to this misquoting (I’m going on memory here – I’m sure the guys at EyeID know what I’m talking about – or if I’m imagining this whole thing, I’ll take it down).