Arizona spends millions on the death penalty. Victims’ families want it spent on cold cases.

Family members of homicide victims urged Arizona lawmakers to redirect funding from capital punishment and heavy sentencing toward cold-case units, violence prevention and survivor support, citing unsolved murders dating back to 1988. The group, Arizonans for Effective Public Safety, says the state has invested heavily in punitive policy that neither prevents nor solves crime.

Arizona logged 18,826 homicides from 1965 to 2025, with 6,787 still unresolved, according to the Murder Accountability Project. Families described inconsistent contact from detectives, ranging from responsive to essentially absent, and called for dedicated cold-case staffing.

Attorney General Kris Mayes launched a cold-case unit in January 2025 that recently identified a suspect in a 1987 murder using DNA evidence, though a spokesperson noted the Legislature has not specifically funded cold-case work and even cut the AG's budget by 2.5% last year.

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