George Pataki
Polls showed that the majority of New Yorkers wanted the state's death penalty laws restored. A bill to restore the death penalty passed the Legislature several years in a row, only to be vetoed by Mario Cuomo. Pataki made the issue a top priority of his and when the bill reached his desk he signed it into law in 1995. The state's Court of Appeals later ruled the death penalty unconstitutional in the form in which it was written (in the case of People v. LaValle), and the State Legislature has not passed a bill to restore it in a new form. During Pataki's 12 years as governor, not a single person was executed in New York State.
Green Haven Correctional Facility
Green Haven Correctional Facility is a maximum security prison in New York. The prison is located in the Town of Beekman in Dutchess County. The New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision lists the address as Route 216, Stormville, NY 12582. This prison housed New York's execution chamber during the time the state briefly had the death penalty (but never used it) in the post-"Furman" era. New York's electric chair "Old Sparky" was moved here from Sing Sing Correctional Facility. It was originally a federal prison and now houses maximum security inmates. Green Haven Correctional Facility also operates a Hot Kosher Food Program; because of this, the prison has a large Jewish population. Yale Law School operates the Green Haven Prison Project, a series of seminars among Yale law students and Green Haven inmates on law and policy issues concerning prisons and criminal law.There have been at least two deaths of correction officers in the line of duty.