Theres been an ongoing debate in the US about death penalty V life imprisonment costs

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyphillipserb/2014/05/01/considering-the-death-penalty-your-tax-dolla...

"While those complex debates rage on, some like to point fingers at perhaps the most simple reason to support the death penalty: It’s cheaper to kill an inmate than to keep an inmate alive."

"That may not, however, be true. “It’s 10 times more expensive to kill them than to keep them alive,”says Donald McCartin, known as The Hanging Judge of Orange County. McCartin knows a little bit about executions: he has sent nine men to death row"