"Death row" is a term which refers to the section of a prison that houses individuals awaiting execution.
After individuals are found guilty of an offense and sentenced to execution, they will remain on Death Row while following an appeals procedure, if they so choose, and then until there is a convenient time for execution. Due to the lengthy, expensive and time consuming appeals procedure that must be followed in the US before an execution can be carried out, prisoners may wait years before execution; the leading cause of death on Death Row in the US is in fact natural causes.citation needed]
In Great Britain, before it abolished capital punishment, prisoners were conventionally reprieved if they were not executed within 90 days of being sentenced to death.citation needed] In some Caribbean countries which still authorize execution, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council is the ultimate court of appeal. It has upheld appeals by prisoners who have spent several years under sentence of death, stating that it does not desire to see the death row phenomenon emerge in countries under its jurisdiction.
Opponents of the death penalty claim that a prisoner's isolation and uncertainty over their fate constitute a form of mental cruelty and that especially long-time death row inmates are liable to become mentally ill, if they are not already. This is referred to as the death row phenomenon.
As of January 1, 2007, there were 3,350 prisoners awaiting execution in the United States. Of these, seven were officially on Death Row in more than one U.S. state.