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The death penalty is the most inhumane, cruel and degrading form of punishment. The effectiveness of the death penalty has never been proven to be a deterrence of crime then any other form of punishment. Execution is irreversible and can be inflicted on the innocent. The cost of one person on death row far exceeds that of a person in prison for life.
Race is also a factor in sentencing a person to death. Lastly political influence is a factor in which a person lives or dies. Since the founding of our government, putting a person to death for murder and until recently rape, has been the only cure. More than 13, 000 people have been legally executed since colonial times. As many as 150 people were executed a year by the 1930 s. By 1967, legal challenges and public outrage halted executions, pending several courts challenged outcomes.
During that time the rise or fall in murders did not change. In the 1972, Furman vs. Georgia, the Supreme Court retracted hundreds of scheduled executions, citing state laws were applied in an unjustly manner violating the Eighth Amendments prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment, and the Fourteenth Amendments guarantees of equal protection of the laws due process. In 1976, in Gregg vs. Georgia, the Court reinstated the death penalty: It ruled that the penalty does not invariably violated the Constitution if it is administered without prejudice. Capital punishment laws were reenacted in several states.
Thirty-seven states have laws authorizing the death penalty, including the military. In the mid-west and northeast a dozen states have abolished capital punishment. Most executions are taken place in the Deep South, Texas being the leader. Social science research has illustrated that the death penalty does not deter crime.
States that have reenacted the death penalty have the same crime and murder rate as those who have chosen to abolish the death penalty. There have been several cases in which a person has been sentenced to death and was innocent of the crime. According to a Stanford Law Review study, 23 innocent Americans have been executed since 1900. The Death Penalty Information Center reported a total of 69 people have been released from death row since 1973 after evidence of their innocence emerged. " In a period of twenty years between 1973 and 1993, there was an average of 2. 5 releases of innocent defendants per year. To think of killing an innocent person would always be on my conscience if I were a juror in their trial. The real killer could still be out looking to kill again.
The average cost to house one prisoner for life is $ 25, 000 per year, which is six times less then the average cost for one person on death row. The defense of a death row inmate is a hard task and requires specialized skills. The inmate in most cases is poor and has to rely on a court-appointed attorney. A careful analysis of race and the death penalty in Philadelphia published by the Death Penalty Information Center in 1998, uncovered that African Americans were executed more than any other race: The odds of receiving a death sentence were nearly four times higher if the defendant was black. The study controlled for case differences such as the severity of the crime and the background of the defendant.
Studies of the relationship between race and the death penalty have been conducted in every major death penalty state. In 96 % of these reviews there was a pattern of either race-of-victim or race-of-defendant discrimination, or both. It is human nature to seek vengeance in the form of a harsh punishment for people who have committed a violent crime. It is also in our nature to change and heal. There have been several cases in which, relatives, friends and jurors felt deep remorse after witnessing an execution. A stay of execution depends on several factors: if it is an election year, the politicians have to make a choice where they stand on Capital Punishment.
If they are against the death penalty then stays-of-executions are possible, if they are for the death penalty then executions will continue to go on. There are other alternatives to punishing a killer. Imprisonment for life is a better way than execution. Most of the money that is used to fund a death row inmates court cost could go to programs designed to deter at-risk youth and adults.
Inmates could be put on work assignments in which they would be paid, these moneys could go into a fund for victims of violent crime and their survivors, and the rest would go to the cost of incarceration of that inmate. Life is a gift from God and no man has the right to give it or take it way. I think we as a society need to stop wasting valuable time and money on executions. Instead figure out ways to deter such violent crimes. American Civil Liberties Union Briefing Paper Number 8 Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (CUADP) Bibliography:
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Research essay sample on Death Penalty Information Center Form Of Punishment
