By Sam Stumpf.
The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office’s (MCAO) persistent pursuit of the death penalty reveals the costs and inefficiencies of overzealous prosecution. A joint investigation published in June 2025 by ABC15 Arizona and ProPublica revealed that when MCAO prosecutors seek death, they succeed only 13% of the time. Yet taxpayers have spent $289 million since 2007 on capital litigation defense costs alone. These staggering figures raise critical questions about discretion, transparency, and fiscal accountability within the MCAO.
Earning Outlier Status
Between 2007 and 2023, the MCAO initiated hundreds of death penalty prosecutions. Out of the 350 cases where a death notice was filed, 13% ended with the death penalty. Most of these concluded with plea deals or prosecutors ending their pursuit of capital punishment. However, even in the 76 cases that reached jury deliberation, only 54% produced death verdicts. Compared with other counties, such as Harris County, Texas, that success rate is low. from 2004 to 2023, Harris County prosecutors pushed far fewer cases but achieved a death sentence rate in 75% of cases where it was sought. Federal prosecutors also achieved the death penalty at a higher rate than in Maricopa County.
The issue is clear: the MCAO is doing a poor job at achieving the results that they actively push for. This may stem from overzealous prosecutions. Between 2010 and 2015, Maricopa County had 28 death sentences—a rate approximately 2.3 times higher than the Arizona average—and those returned were disproportionately low compared to the national average. Currently, Arizona has 107 inmates on death row, 79 of whom were from Maricopa County. The next most populous Arizona county, Pima County, has only 15.
These high charging rates combined with low success rates lead legal professionals, including former county attorney Rick Romley, to wonder “whether prosecutors are seeking death in the appropriate cases.” The stakes of MCAO’s overzealous death penalty tactics are clear: innocent people may be convicted, and defendants who do not deserve death may be overpunished.
Overcharging and Overspending
The economic costs of capital litigation in Maricopa County are staggering. Local reporting estimates that each death penalty case can cost between $3 and $4 million. This number can include costs of investigation, expert testimony, trial-level litigation, post-conviction relief, and appellate litigation. Since 2007, defense costs of capital litigation have hit $289 million, with the true cost—factoring in prosecution and court expenses—likely much higher.
The Jodi Arias case offers a vivid example of the costs of the MCAO’s failures. Jodi Arias’ first trial alone cost over $3 million in defense costs, and she ultimately received a life sentence as opposed to state-sanctioned execution. Had the state not sought the death penalty, taxpayers would have saved millions.
The high expenses of death penalty litigation can be attributed to a wide range of factors. Capital defendants are typically assigned two lawyers to represent them in court. Additionally, someone must foot the bill for investigations, pre-trial procedures, a hefty jury selection process, a lengthy trial, and appeals. However, the costs do not stop with litigation. Death row inmates in Arizona are kept in specialty units, and their stays are only increasing. From 1937 to 1991, Arizona death row inmates spent roughly 12 years incarcerated. From 2013 to 2024, the average stay of death row inmates was over twice that length, hitting 25.56 years.
Arizona has also spent an exorbitant amount of money on its preferred method of killing its own citizens—lethal injections. In October 2020, in the midst of a budget crisis, the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation & Reentry paid $1.5 million for 1,000 vials of barbiturate pentobarbital, enough to kill 200 people. Arizona also allegedly paid $20,000 to each executioner, plus costs for other staff.
Reform: Attempted, Discarded, and Proposed
Practices for capital case recommendations vary across the United States, but Maricopa County has stood out to reporters “as an outlier for obscuring nearly every aspect” of the committee’s process. In Maricopa County, a review committee evaluates cases and makes recommendations to the County Attorney for which cases to file death notices. Governor Katie Hobbs appointed former federal magistrate Judge David Duncan to perform an internal review of Arizona’s execution protocol. Duncan reported the Department of Corrections’ mishandling of 1099 tax forms for executioners as well as poor execution methods and training.
Ultimately, Duncan concluded that lethal injection was not viable as a reliable method of execution. His concerns were not new—Arizona previously paused all executions for eight years after Joseph Wood’s “botched” execution. Ultimately, Hobbs fired Judge Duncan before the official report was released.
Maricopa County’s approach to the death penalty reflects a fundamental injustice stemming from prosecutorial ambition and a lack of accountability. The MCAO’s record demonstrates how local discretion can massively impact a state’s death penalty policy. Legal scholars, such as Honorable Kent Cattani and Honorable Paul McMurdie, have proposed a statewide, overarching method for death penalty processes that incentivizes death penalty proceedings brought with the Arizona Attorney General’s approval.
Proposals like these ignore the simplest way to abate costs and poor prosecutorial decision-making in capital cases—abolishing the death penalty altogether. However, that is an unlikely reality. Death penalty cases are often politically and emotionally charged, with voters and lawmakers viewing them as necessary for deterrence.
Conclusion
Death penalty reforms provide valuable and meaningful change by introducing transparency and fiscal discipline into the decision-making process. By instituting thoughtful change, Arizona and the MCAO can align its death penalty practice with efficiency and equity. It remains to be seen whether Maricopa County can abandon its pursuit of the death penalty as an end in itself and instead choose meaningful prosecutorial action.
Sam Stumpf is a current 2L at ASU Law with a passion for trial advocacy and criminal justice reform. She is active within the law school community, participating in ASU’s Trial Team, the American Constitution Society, and the Food Law Society.