The Florida Supreme Court had indicated it would not allow anyone to be put to death unless he had adequate representation to file post-conviction appeals.

It's unfair to the defendant to wait forever to get an answer on a post-conviction appeal.

In Virginia, a capital defendant cannot raise a claim in post-conviction appeals if it already has been raised and decided at trial or on direct appeal.

A third of the lawyers handling post-conviction appeals here come from somewhere else.

Mr. Morales said that his office had supported legislation to appoint and compensate counsel for post-conviction appeals, but that the resource center had opposed the measure.

But New Jersey differs from many other states in that it provides financing through post-conviction appeals, and death sentences always have many appeals.

Under the committee proposal, states would have the option of joining the new streamlined process for handling what are known as "post-conviction appeals" in death penalty cases.

In Virginia, he said, a death row inmate was writing most of the post-conviction appeals for other inmates.

They noted that Georgia was the only state that did not provide lawyers to death row inmates for their post-conviction appeals.

"But it will bring about an end to the seemingly never-ending proceedings whether it be future court appearances, or be the future filing of the various post-conviction appeals."