Capital Punishment
Essay No. 01
The death sentence looks cruel and absurd in this age of modern science, liberal thinking, knowledge, space, and technology. The age of barbarism is gone when capital punishment worked as a deterrent against heinous crimes. In my humble opinion, we must not use hangman’s noose anymore. We can try the modern civilized treatment of reforms and psychological repair.
No one is born criminal. Situations and circumstances force one into crimes. Chambal dacoits are true examples of this. We can bring about changes in criminals by understanding their psychology, and mental disorders. By using reformative measures/their behavior and thinking can be set right with love and sympathy. Everyone deserves a break. Let us give criminals a chance to become valuable citizens and prove that we are humans.
Essay No. 02
Capital Punishment
Problems with Capital Punishment Dead Man Walking! This sound rings through each and every death row inmate a thousand times a day, but should it? Capital punishment is one of the most controversial topics among Americans today. Since every person has their own opinion on this topic, either for or against, the question always raised is Is it morally right.? The number of problems with the death penalty is enormous, ranging from innocence to racism, and these problems will never be resolved unless the death penalty is abolished. The problems with capital punishment stem as far back as the ritual itself.
The number of occurrences on why the death penalty is racist is uncountable. A 1990 report released by the federal government’s General Accounting Office found a pattern of evidence indicating racial disparities in the charging, sentencing, and imposition of the death penalty after the Furman decision.
Professor David Baldus examined sentencing patterns in Georgia in the 1970s. After reviewing over 2,500 homicide cases in that state, controlling for 230 non-racial factors, he concluded that a person accused of killing a white was 4.3 times more likely to be sentenced to death than a person accused of killing a black. The Stanford Law Review published a study that found similar patterns of racial despair, in Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, and many other states.
For example, in Arkansas “findings showed that defendants in a case involving a white victim are three-and-a-half times more likely to be sentenced to death; in Illinois, four times; in North Carolina, 4.4 times, and in Mississippi five times more likely to be sentenced to death than defendants convicted of murdering blacks”. There is also the issue of Capital Punishment as a deterrent. Does the death penalty really deter crime? The death lobby wants you to believe the answer to that question is yes. But, in fact, it is a resounding no.
Consider this, the US is the only Western nation that still allows the death penalty, and we also have one of the highest crime rates. During the 1980s, death penalty states averaged an annual rate of 7.5 criminal homicides per 100,000, while abolition states averaged a rate of 7.4 per 100,000. That means murder was actually more common in states that use the death penalty. In a nationwide survey of police chiefs and sheriffs, capital punishment was ranked last as a way of reducing violent crime. Only twenty-six percent thought that the death penalty significantly reduces the number of homicides.
The theory behind the deterrence doctrine is flawed in itself. Murderers do not examine risk/reward charts before they kill someone. Being a criminal is inherently irrational life imprisonment ought to deter a rational person itself.
Besides, no criminal commits a crime if he believes he will be caught. The next issue that deserves some observation is that of capital punishment being economically correct, meaning will it save the U.S. and its taxpayers money. The death penalty is not now nor has it ever been, a more economical alternative to life imprisonment. A study informed that reintroduction would involve a first-year cost of more than $11 million.
And the Miami Herald reported that Florida, with one of the nation’s largest death rows, has estimated that the true cost of each execution is approximately $3.2 million, or approximately six times the cost of a life imprisonment sentence. The last issue that should be observed is that of innocence. Are there really innocent people on death row? At least twenty-three people have been executed who did not commit the crime they were accused of. And that’s only those that we know.
And here lies an inherent danger of capital punishment…when we execute an innocent person; the real killer is still on the streets, ready to victimize someone else. But when an innocent person is arrested, he is often the driving reason behind the further investigation, and if he is executed, then the case remains closed forever.
Or, at least, until someone else gets killed by the real perpetrator. Capital punishment is a power that no man or woman deserves to make for another human being. The Constitution clearly states that everybody deserves, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; But if you kill that person how can any of this be attained? Capital punishment is just plain wrong and has no place in today’s society. There are too many flaws in the death penalty; therefore, the only reasonable solution is to abolish the death penalty
