Capital punishment in Singapore
In 2012, a couple of American elected officials and office-seekers have suggested that Singapore's success in combating drug abuse should be examined as a model for the United States. Michael Bloomberg, a former Mayor of New York City, said that the United States could learn a thing or two from nations like Singapore when it came to drug trafficking, noting that "executing a handful of people saves thousands and thousands of lives." The last execution in New York took place in 1963. Several courts have ruled that the death penalty violates the New York Constitution (see "People v. LaValle"). In 2007, the state of New York abolished the death penalty. 20 states, plus Washington D.C., have abolished the death penalty, with the most recent being Washington state in 2018. However, certain states, such as Texas, still have similar or even higher rates of execution than Singapore.
Capital punishment in New Mexico
Both Allen and Fry have filed petitions for writ of habeas corpus asserting that the death sentences in their cases are unconstitutional, both generally, and as applied to them individually. The conundrum is that if the New Mexico Supreme Court (or, later, the U.S. Supreme Court) happens to agree with Allen and Fry, their sentences will automatically become "life sentences." That is, they will both be subject to serving a term of 30 years before becoming eligible for parole. This is because, at the time each of their crimes for which they were convicted and sentenced to death New Mexico law provided only two options for sentencing in a capital offense: Life with the possibility of parole after 30 years, or Death. In 2009, the New Mexico legislature prospectively eliminated the death penalty, replacing "death" with a "true life" sentence—meaning, life without the possibility of parole. But the "ex post facto" clause of the constitution (art. 1, sec. 10) prevents the application of the life-without-the-possibility-of-parole to cases where capital crimes were committed in New Mexico before July 1, 2009.