[gridlock]

But given the way the courts work in California, there's no telling whether Peterson will ever receive that lethal injection. Most deaths on death row in California happen as a result of natural causes, or at the hands of other inmates. Peterson will likely sit for more than five years before he is appointed an attorney for his first, mandatory appeal to the California Supreme Court.

Of the 38 states with the death penalty, California moves the slowest toward executions.

A big reason for the delays is that there are too many inmates with too few lawyers willing to volunteer for the relatively low-paying job. A condemned Peterson would join about 120 others who do not yet have lawyers. And even when an attorney is appointed, there are no deadlines for California's high court to act.

I would wager that if they took up a collection, they could raise enough money to hire a top notch private attorney to handle Scot Peterson's mandatory appeal, just to move the process along...

[Howlin]

There is a problem with that theory: there aren't enough appeal lawyers to go around; he may not get an attorney for five years plus.