I'm another gransnetter who is opposed to the death penalty. I'm also glad I wasn't born and don't live, in the USA. Their treatment of prisoners is barbaric. So far as I can see, all prisoners are shackled at the ankle and wrists for legal visits etc.
I find the American religious right to be a scary bunch of people. Shooting doctors who perform abortions, seeing universal health care as some kind of socialist/communist plot, not accepting that some people are born heterosexual and others may be gay or lesbian - this list just goes on. They seem stuck in "an eye for an eye", rather than a more liberal interpretation of their Christian faith. Dreadful