California death row inmates number about 589 as of April 2025, the largest condemned population anywhere in the Western Hemisphere, yet none of them face an imminent execution date. The state has not put anyone to death since January 2006, a governor’s moratorium has shut the execution chamber, and most condemned people have been moved out of segregated death row housing into general population units at prisons across California.
Why No One Is Being Executed
In March 2019, Governor Gavin Newsom signed Executive Order N-09-19, imposing a formal moratorium on executions. The order granted a reprieve to every person under a death sentence, repealed the state’s lethal injection protocol, and directed the immediate closure of the execution chamber at San Quentin.{1California Governor. Executive Order N-09-19
The death penalty itself was not repealed. It remains in the Penal Code, juries can still impose it, and prosecutors can still seek it. What the state lacks is any mechanism to carry a sentence out. The last person executed was Clarence Ray Allen, put to death by lethal injection at San Quentin on January 17, 2006.{2California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Executed Inmate Summary – Clarence Ray Allen Only 13 people have been executed in California since the death penalty was reinstated in 1978.
Because the moratorium rests on executive authority rather than a legislative repeal or constitutional amendment, a future governor could rescind it. The executive order contains no expiration date and no provision governing its own removal, but a successor could issue a new order reinstating execution protocols and reopening the chamber.{1California Governor. Executive Order N-09-19 That would still require developing a new lethal injection protocol and surviving the legal challenges that follow. The last time California attempted that, it took more than a decade.
Who Is On California’s Death Row
CDCR’s most recent summary report counts 578 people with condemned sentences. Of those, 560 are men and 18 are women.{3California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Condemned Inmate Summary The population has been shrinking. It peaked above 740 in the mid-2010s and has fallen steadily since, driven by natural deaths, successful appeals, and a recent surge in resentencings.
The racial and ethnic breakdown, according to CDCR data:
- Black: 191 people, about 33 percent
- White: 178 people, about 31 percent
- Latino (Mexican and Hispanic combined): 160 people, about 28 percent
- Other backgrounds: 32 people, about 6 percent
- American Indian or Alaska Native: 9 people
- Asian or Pacific Islander: 8 people
These figures reflect decades of sentencing patterns. Los Angeles County has historically produced more death sentences than any other county in the state by a wide margin, followed by Riverside, San Bernardino, and Orange counties.{3California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Condemned Inmate Summary Some individuals have been incarcerated under a death sentence for more than four decades; the longest-serving condemned person in California has been on death row since the early 1980s.
New death sentences have become rare. Only three were imposed statewide in 2024, all from Riverside and San Bernardino counties.
What Crimes Lead To A Death Sentence
California reserves the death penalty for first-degree murder committed under at least one “special circumstance” listed in Penal Code 190.2. The jury must find both guilt and a special circumstance true before the penalty phase begins. The statute lists more than 20 qualifying factors. Among the most commonly charged:
- Multiple murders in the same proceeding, or a prior murder conviction
- Murder for financial gain, including insurance proceeds
- Murder of a peace officer or firefighter killed in the line of duty
- Murder of a witness to prevent or retaliate for testimony
- Murder involving the intentional infliction of torture
- Murder committed during a robbery, kidnapping, carjacking, rape, or other specified felony
When a jury finds a special circumstance, the penalty phase offers two choices: death or life in prison without the possibility of parole.{4California Legislative Information. California Code, Penal Code – PEN 190.2 – Penalty for First Degree Murder Most eligible cases end in life without parole.
Where Condemned Inmates Actually Live
For most of the death penalty’s history in California, condemned men were housed at San Quentin and condemned women at the Central California Women’s Facility. That changed in 2024, when the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation launched the Condemned Inmate Transfer Program. Under regulations that took effect January 31, 2024, condemned individuals are being moved out of segregated death row housing and into general population at facilities across the state.{5California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Condemned Inmate Transfer Program
The program now spans 25 prisons, from Pelican Bay near the Oregon border to Calipatria in the Imperial Valley.{6California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Condemned Inmate Transfer Program Placement decisions are driven by each person’s classification score, a security rating that accounts for criminal history, institutional behavior, and gang affiliation. Inmates identified as security threat group members are subject to additional screening and management protocols.{5California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Condemned Inmate Transfer Program The regulations don’t publish a checklist of automatic disqualifiers. Placement is decided case by case based on the inmate’s overall risk profile.
The transfers are tied to plans for San Quentin itself. In March 2023, Governor Newsom announced that San Quentin would be reimagined as a rehabilitation-focused facility, and an advisory council presented its final recommendations in January 2024.{7California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. San Quentin Rehabilitation Center Transformation Emptying the old death row housing units is a prerequisite for that transformation.
Daily Life, Work, and Pay
Once transferred into general population housing, condemned individuals live under essentially the same rules and routines as other long-term inmates. They have access to educational courses, vocational training, recreational areas, and common spaces. Medical and mental health care comes through the standard prison healthcare system rather than the more isolated services available in the old segregated units. For many, the transfer represents a significant improvement in access to programming.
Proposition 66, the ballot measure California voters approved in 2016, requires every person under a death sentence to work while in state prison. The measure further mandates that 70 percent of any money a condemned individual earns go toward court-ordered debts owed to victims.{8California Secretary of State. Proposition 66 Title and Summary and Analysis Available jobs range from facility maintenance and laundry to clerical work within the prison.
Behavioral expectations mirror those of the general population. Violating facility rules can result in lost privileges, housing reassignment, or disciplinary segregation.
Visitation Rules
Visitation rights for condemned individuals depend on their conduct grade. Those classified as “Condemned Grade A,” meaning they have maintained good behavior, are eligible for contact visits in the same room as their visitors without a physical barrier. Those classified as “Condemned Grade B” are restricted to non-contact visits through a partition.{9California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Types of Visits
Visits are escorted. The inmate is brought to the visiting area in handcuffs, and visits typically last one to two hours. One restriction does not change with the transfer to general population: condemned individuals are excluded from family visits, the private overnight visits available to some other inmates in apartment-like facilities on prison grounds.{9California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Types of Visits That exclusion applies regardless of behavior, housing assignment, or time served.
Why The Population Keeps Shrinking
California’s condemned population dropped sharply in 2024. Courts resentenced at least 45 people from death to life sentences or less in a single year, driven largely by district attorneys who invoked their authority under Penal Code 1172.1 to recommend resentencing “in the interest of justice.” Santa Clara County’s district attorney was particularly active, moving to resentence multiple cases at once. The trend reflects a broader shift among some prosecutors who view maintaining death sentences as impractical given the moratorium and the cost of ongoing litigation.
Resentencing does not mean release. Most of these individuals receive life without parole, the same sentence they would have received if the jury had chosen the alternative at trial. A few get sentences that make them eligible for eventual parole consideration, but only after serving decades.
Appeals account for much of the rest of the attrition. Every death sentence in California triggers a mandatory direct appeal to the California Supreme Court, which cannot be waived. Those direct appeals have averaged roughly 10 to 12 years to resolve in recent decades, and state and federal habeas proceedings add further years. A typical California death case spends 20 to 30 years working through the courts before all appeals are exhausted.
What Would Have To Happen For Executions To Resume
Even if a future governor lifted the moratorium, carrying out an execution would require more than reopening the chamber. The state would need a working lethal injection protocol, which would face legal challenges of its own.
Each individual case would also require a competency evaluation. Under Penal Code 3700, the warden must notify the Secretary of CDCR, who then appoints three psychiatrists or licensed psychologists from the department’s medical staff to examine the condemned person. Their written report must be delivered at least 20 days before the scheduled execution and shared with the inmate’s attorney, the Attorney General, and the original sentencing county’s district attorney.{10California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 3700
California law bars executing someone who cannot rationally understand the punishment and why it is being imposed. Penal Code 3701 defines “permanent incompetence” as a condition in which the mental illness is so severe that competency is unlikely ever to be restored. Advanced dementia, severe psychotic disorders, and traumatic brain injuries can all be grounds for a finding of incompetence. The condemned population is aging, with many now in their 60s and 70s after decades of incarceration, so competency would be a significant hurdle even if the political and procedural barriers to executions were cleared.