Religious Organizing Against the Death Penalty

http://www.deathpenaltyreligious.org/
The Religious Organizing Against the Death Penalty Project was organized in an attempt to bring religious bodies together to fight against the death penalty. This statement says that more and more nations are abolishing the death penalty, but somehow the United States, known for its human rights awknowledgements, has 3,500 people sitting on death row; the statement says that "Many suffer from mental illness or mental retardation. A disproportionate number are people of color. And some are innocent of the crimes for which they have been condemned to die." Although I understand the arguments against the death penalty, the argument that some of the people are innocent does does fly by me- in our court system I find it very difficult to believe that many people at all who are sentenced to the death penalty are in fact innocent, and that is not a reason to abolish it altogether. Also, maybe I am wrong, but I was under the impression that the people who are mentally ill are put into mental wards...? I am not sure where I stand on capital punishment yet, but the religious arguments do not seem strong enough for me to sway me one way or another; the one thing that gets me is that life in prison seems worse to me than death. However, I do not understand the whole compassion side of the argument becuase the people on death row do not deserve compassion in my opinion- they have commited atrocious crimes and do not deserve peoples' sympathy.