In today's society, does it really seem humane to sentence someone to death? The death penalty is a cruel and barbaric punishment that should be ended. The death penalty is a flawed system for many reasons. For example, it takes more money to sentence them to death then it would to house them in prison for their entire life. Also the fact that the death penalty has no deterrence on crime and last that it is barbaric to punish someone who is being put to death for murder by murdering that individual. The death penalty needs to come to an end it is time that we as a society no longer live by this cruel barbaric system that has so many issues. Sadly, many people do not know that it actually takes more tax paying dollars to put someone to death rather than leave them to rot in prison for the rest of their life. According to the Death Penalty information center “The average cost of defending a trial in a federal death case is $620,932.” This being nearly 8 times the cost of a case where the death penalty is not involved. The united states of america is already in debt that continues to climb because of our increasing deficit every year. In fact, in california alone since 1978-2012 the cost of the death penalty have totaled over 4 billion dollars. This is added up from the pretrial and trial costs along with appeals and incarceration costs. The fact that the cost
Of the death penalty is so much more than it cost to house a criminal for the rest of his or her life alone should
Finally many people say that they do not want thier taxes to go to feed criminals in prison however Statistics from the Death Penalty Information Centre show that Maryland has spent “$186 million dollars on five executions” and California’s cost is roughly “$90,000 per year per inmate. With
Many counties complain about the high costs and the financial difficulty it causes. The document, What Politicians Don’t Say About the High Costs of the Death Penalty, written by Richard C. Dieter, executive director of The Death Penalty Information Center states, “Georgia is laying off 900 correctional personnel and New Jersey has had to dismiss 500 police officers. Yet these same states, and many others like them, are pouring millions of dollars into the death penalty with no resultant reduction in crime.” These cost of these trial are not only immense amounts of money to the local governments, but also people’s jobs and lives. It is an unnecessary process that millions of dollars are being poured into each
Some may be shocked to be informed that capital punishment actually costs more than life in prison; that is without parole. Many would figure that the costs would be less for the death penalty because of the food, place of living for the prisoners, etc., but quite frankly, it costs more for a prisoner to be punished to death rather than to having life in prison (Hyden). Some state’s taxes differ but for the state of California, capital punishment costs taxpayers more than $114 million a year (Bushman). Additionally, the taxpayers of California spend $250 million per execution (Bushman). According to the nonpartisan state legislative analyst’s office, the average cost of imprisoning an inmate was around $47,000 per year in 2008-09. In comparison, the death penalty can lead to an additional $50,000 to 90,000 per year, according to the studies found (Ulloa). In more studies, they have estimated the taxpayers to spend $70 million per year on incarceration, plus $775 million on additional federal legal challenges to convictions, and $925 million on automatic appeals with the initial challenges to death penalty cases
Not only does the death penalty not deter crime but it is also very expensive. The death penalty costs so much because of the appeal process. The appeal process is a very long and expensive process that can go on forever and costs the government millions. Many assume that abolishing the death penalty is wrong because it becomes unfair to the taxpayers because they think the cost is less than that of life in prison without parole. However life in prison is less expensive than the death penalty (Bedau). The death penalty is actually three times more than keeping a prisoner in prison for life without parole (Messerli). Death penalty trials are costly as well. “[S]tudies estimate that death penalty trials cost $1
The death penalty till this day remains to be a very controversial topic. Some people may argue that it should be considered a form of cruel and unusual punishment; others may rebuttal in saying that the death penalty is capital punishment. When visiting the idea of placing someone to death one must bear in mind the possibility of condemning an innocent person through such torture, the brutalizing effect on society it may leave, and the serious psychological trauma that a defendants family and friends may face. Is this really what the justice system is willing to place on the line in order to gain a form of so called justice. I mean reasonably speaking what will anyone gain from such an action. It definitely will not bring the harm to be undone. As stated in the encyclopedia under the theory of judicial torture “ the use of torture was confined to capital crimes, for which the death penalty or mutilation could apply” (PIHLAJAM, 2004). Looking at how the death penalty is conducted people should not be treated like animals, given a due time to be put down. No human being deserves such treatment whether or not his or her offense was so horrific and traumatic. Is that not the lesson being taught to society when the criminal is captured? Yet, the law as a jury of peers, men just like the accused, may cast the same sin upon him. Why should this action be considered in any way to be fair or believed to be capital punishment?
Should the death penalty in the United States cost so much? The death penalty is an expensive process to go through. The united states can be doing much more with this money, like giving it back to our schools, police
The Fact sheet found on the Death Penalty Information Center showed that solely in Kansas, there was an average of $400,000 per case for defense costs by inmates placed on death row compared to the average of $100,000 paid per case to defense attorneys when there was no death penalty (DPIC). Alarcon and Mitchell conducted a study in 2011 that showed that just in California getting through the process of having an inmate on death row was over $4,000,000,000 (DPIC). This was due to the various amounts of fees that had to be paid for court trials, appeals, housing death row inmates in preparation for their incarcerations etc. (DPIC) lastly just in the state of Texas, the cost of carrying out a death penalty case, which is $2.3 million is three times as much as housing an inmate in solitary confinement at a maximum-security prison for 4 decades (DPIC). This huge difference in numbers add to how unrighteous it would be to keep the death penalty legal in the U.S.
The death penalty has been around for centuries. It dates back to when Hammurabi had his laws codified; it was “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”. Capital punishment in America started when spies were caught, put on trial and hung. In the past and still today people argue that, the death penalty is cruel, unusual punishment and should be illegal. Yet many people argue that it is in fact justifiable and it is not cruel and unusual. Capital punishment is not cruel and unusual; the death penalty is fair and there is evidence that the death penalty deters crime. A big part of abolitionist’s argument is that the death penalty is not humane. They pull in Amendment 8, “…nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.” What the victim went though was indeed “cruel and unusual punishments’.” The murderers’ death is not cruel. The people will demand justice for what he or she has done (Bidinotto 19). Hanging and the electric chair are topics more reasonable to argue, but now because of lethal injection capital punishment has become more humane. The death penalty is not barbaric, the pain and agony that the victim went through is barbaric. Abolitionists were very upset in 1996 when rapist and murderer John Albert Taylor was executed by firing squad; they said his death was barbaric (Feder 32). Charla King, the poor 11-year-old girl he raped and strangled with a telephone cord, her death was barbaric! It makes no sense to think that John
Also, the cost of the death penalty is really high, the cost of keeping someone in jail for life which will cost 600,000 per prisoner and just for one person to be put to death is would cost 2.3 million per prisoner. That is not a logical reason to kill someone then to keep them alive because the cost is three time less to keep a person alive in jail for life then to kill
Capital punishment is defined as the legally authorized killing of someone as punishment for a crime. There are many arguments that are for and against the death penalty. Majority of these arguments contain broad categories ranging from morality to attorney quality. Although most would support that capital punishment is the closest penalty for murder it is still used unequally across the prison populations. Capital punishment is a practice that the judicial system should abolish for the future generations.
Although keeping someone in a prison may cost a lot, sentencing someone to death is not cheap as well. It has actually been proven that the death penalty is more expensive than a prison sentence. This is because the trails for death penalties are long, and very complicated. In order to go through with the death penalty you need to have more experts, double the amount of attorneys and there will be a trial for guilt and a separate one for punishment. The criminal on death row is also held in a high security prison (Top Ten Pros and Cons). Though the death penalty may sound simple, it is much more complicated currently then it was multiple years
The article “Death of the Death Penalty” states that “200 million dollars per year” is what it takes states to execute criminals each year. This money could be used as funding for recreational activities or building housing or schools for their citizens. Based on this evidence, capital punishment costs millions of dollars that could be used to make their state a better place to live in.
According to Death Penalty Information Center, (DPIC) As of July 1,2016, there were 2,905 death row inmates being held in prisons. Roughly each one of those inmates are still currently be held for their execution date, on average each criminal that is waiting death row is being held for 14 years. Each prisoner cost 43,352 dollars (roughly) each year. For one inmate to be put on death row for 14 years it would cost 606,928 dollars. Some say that Capital Punishment would put our country into more debt than it already is in. I agree with this theory, but if we would stop holding death row inmates for multiple years, it wouldn't be as much of a punishment to our taxpayers who fund the operations. Also fellow criminals would be detoured from the
Attention Getter: With the United states in debt up to nineteen trillion and states facing budget cuts, a million dollars is a lot of money to spend to give one person the death penalty. While some people may agree with the death penalty, others may not. Some people feel that locking a criminal in prison for their life will keep the world safe, while other, believe that giving them the death penalty will deter other people from committing the crime.
The death penalty is very costly to not only the government, but also society. The death penalty has no benefits at all and should be