A bill that would repeal the death penalty in South Dakota is in front of the Senate State Affairs Committee this morning.
The sponsor is former circuit judge, and current Senator Arthur Rusch of Vermillion.
He says while three men have recently been executed in the state, those were under exceptional circumstances….

Rusch says another big concern is the extraordinary costs of a death penalty case, saying the Donald Moeller case cost Lincoln County over one point five million dollars….

Rusch says in his years on the bench, he didn’t see that the death penalty was a deterrent……

There were seventeen people that signed up to testify on the bill.