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Capital Punishment Should Be Abolished

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Every day, thousands of people around the world commit crimes. For a society to be kept well-maintained, people have to be punished for the crimes they commit. There are various ways people can be punished for their wrongful actions. Crimes that are less serious can result in jail time, house arrest, and/or having to pay fines. Crimes that are severe can lead to greater punishment, like spending life in prison. The most severe crimes can lead one to an equally severe punishment known as capital punishment. Capital punishment is the authorization to kill someone for the crime he or she has committed. Capital punishment, commonly referred to as the death penalty, should be abolished in all states because it can put innocent lives at risk, it costs millions of dollars each year, and killing someone, even if they have done wrong, is never the solution. The death penalty puts thousands of lives at risk each year. Without a confession from the person who committed the crime or an eyewitness from the scene of the crime, no one will actually know the truth of what happened. Since 1973, of all the inmates who have been put up for the death sentence, 111 of them have been let go from their sentence because they were found innocent (Witherbee, 2015, p. 5). Killing someone is never the answer, especially if there is no complete evidence. Witherbee (2015) states, “In recent years, we’ve seen more than a few instances of police who planted evidence, laboratory technicians who took

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