The Death Penalty Is Inhumane

The death penalty is something many people face each day . There is approximately 1,188 people that were executed in the U.S from 1977 through 2009 . There are many ways on how to execute someone, but primarily we use the lethal injection. The way people are trailed and put on the death penalty, is because of the involvement with first degree of murder, or other crimes. Proponents say that the death penalty is an important tool for preserving law and order. They also argue a term “an eye for an eye” which means that it helps the families grieving, and ensure that they don’t release back to the public for future tragedy. The people against the death penalty say that it is wrong to take a human life, and has no effect on crime. Many of the death row inmates prefer death over life in prison. They say that many death row inmates have been volunteering for their executions. Over 75 inmates have volunteered for their death sentence. This is called a state-assisted suicide. Many inmates said that they would rather gamble on being executed than having life parole. Many inmates say that they spend over a decade awaiting execution. Some prisoners have been in death row for 20 years. They usually are isolated from other prisoners and spend as much as 23 hours alone in their cells. The two punishments they receive other than the death penalty is the living conditions they live in prison. They are usually in a state where they would be executed and,

The debate on whether or not the death penalty should be abolished has been ongoing for quite a long period of time. While there are those who believe that the death penalty does not serve its intended purpose, proponents of the same are convinced that the relevance of the same cannot be overstated and hence it should not be abolished. In this text, I examine the arguments for and against the death penalty.

Those who believe that deterrence justifies the execution of certain offenders bear the burden of proving that the death penalty is a deterrent. The overwhelming conclusion from years of deterrence studies is that the death penalty is, at best, no more of a deterrent than a sentence of life in prison. The Ehrlich studies – which took

The use of the death penalty has brought peace of mind to our citizens. Though through the mid nineteen sixties until the early nineteen eighties only about six death penalties actually took effect. When the number of executions dropped, the murder rate rose from 5.6 per 100,000 people to 10.2 which is almost double the murder rate. A society cannot live in fear but needs to live in reassurance and protection. As of nineteen ninety-nine, the murder rate dropped dramatically to 5.7 because the execution rate increased to 47 executions. Pearce, Matt. "Counterpoint: Defending The Death Penalty." Points Of View: Death Penalty (2014): 6. Points of View Reference Center. Web. 23 Sept. 2014. This demonstrates the deterrent effect capital punishment has on society. The result is deterrence shows if one kills then one will be punished for their actions and crime.

All of the research that I have done suggests that the death penalty is not a major source of deterrence for criminals to commit severe crimes such as homicide. In a 2009 survey of America’s top criminologists, published in the Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology and written by Professor Michael Radelet, eighty-eight percent of the expert criminologists stated that they do not believe the death penalty acts as a deterrent for criminals to commit homicide. Respondents to this survey were asked to base their answers on research, rather

Those that are for the death penalty claim that it will serve as a deterrent and is the only way for retribution against murderers. Both issues are highly debatable and have even been a subject of criticism. Punishment as a deterrence has been used for ages. This concept does work, however it should not be applied to all criminals, in my opinion. Some pro capital punishment individuals claim that it is an efficient deterrence against criminals. In an article “Death penalty is a deterrence”, the authors claim that by practicing the death penalty, violent crimes will decrease.”violent crime has declined eleven percent, with murder showing the largest decline at even more than twenty two percent. We believe that this has occurred in part because of the strong signal that the death penalty sent to violent criminals and murders.” These statistics taken from this article may be inaccurate and should be closely examined.

The use of capital punishment in the U.S. is a growing concern for most American citizens. According to statistics, seventy percent of Americans are in support of the death penalty, while only thirty percent are against it. These statistics show that few people are against capital punishment (“Fact” 1). With the use of the death penalty growing the controversy is becoming more heated. With only twelve states left not enforcing it the resistance is becoming futile (“Fact” 4). Many debates have been made and even clauses have been invoked, such as, the “Cruel and Unusual Clause” that was invoked by the Supreme Court in 1962 (Meltsner 179). The use of death as a punishment has been viewed as “cruel

Prisons in the United States have come to be the largest mental heath providers owing to the increase in the number of incarcerated individuals with severe mental illness. Yet, prisons are not meant neither are they designed for this purpose. The prison conditions cannot accommodate the mentally ill because of congestion, violence, inadequate health services and absence of any meaningful activity. These conditions are not proper for individuals whose perception of reality is distorted. As such, the impact of overcrowding, lack of privacy and the hard conditions that are characteristic of prisons is worse for prisoners with mental illness. The result is that prisoners with mental illnesses are often subjected to abuse and neglect. Beyond this, they may also pose a threat to other inmates in situations where mental illness leads them to violence. Since prisons are not designed for the purpose of taking care of the mentally ill, there is bound to be poor mental health services which further impairs their functional abilities. This is due to inappropriate administering of psychotropic medication.

don’t usually occur due to the fact that the extent of the evidence is very clear. The person either committed the crime or did not. Usually with these cases there is not a great deal of uncertainty. On the other hand with capital cases, exoneration count is carefully examined and the trials are conducted in much larger terms. Some of the obvious reasons are due to that fact that the trial involves someone’s life, but also due to the fact that evidence has to be pristine in order to do this. Because of this, many death row inmates are incarcerated for years on end in order for the justice system to confirm that it is indeed the true perpetrator. Throughout the inmate’s prison sentence during the variety of appeals, many inmates develop mental conditions, some even go insane. The most eminent example of this is the case of Leroy Nash. Nash was convicted for multiple counts of murder and armed robbery and was sentenced to death. After 80 years of awaiting his execution, Nash died in prison due to natural causes (Rapaport, N.D.). Nash was said to have many mental health issues that were enhanced while he was incarcerated. He was placed in solitary confinement for the majority of his sentence for twenty three hours a day with one hour of sunlight. This is an issue that arises with death row: due to the appeals and triple checking of all of the evidence, many inmates are incarcerated for an extended period of time.

The lack of answers to the question stems from the thought; what if americans don 't care if the convicted criminal suffers? Addressing this speculation was Oklahoma Republican state representative, Mike Christian, in reference to the recent media exposure of inhumane executions by lethal injection. He said, "I really don 't care if it 's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine, or being fed to the lions." (Parker, 2014, Web). Christian just simply wanted the convicted criminal who brought harm to other individuals and their families dead. Do people really care how inhumane the process is? Is that why the government has never addressed the issue, even with recent public exposure to its flaws? However, even with the vengeful thoughts, inhumane and inmate rights still apply, even for someone on death row. According to CivilRights.com, a website composed a constitution of inmate rights, says, “Inmates have the right to be free, under the Eighth Amendment, from inhumane conditions because those conditions constitute "cruel and unusual" punishment.” Even the most monstrous of people, do indeed carry their constitutional rights, even up until death (Andrews, 2015, Web). The Constitutional Rights of Inmates goes on to say, “Any punishment that can be considered inhumane treatment or that violates the basic concept of a person 's dignity may be found to be cruel and unusual.” It has been proven inmates carry these rights; due to the

The test for deterrence is not whether executions produce lower murder rates, but that executions produce fewer murders than if the death penalty did not exist. For example, the fact that the state of Delaware executes more people per capita (1/87,500) than any other state and has a murder rate 16 times lower than Washington, D.C. (5/100,000 vs 78.5/100,000) is not proof, per se, that the death penalty deters murder in Delaware or that the lack of the death penalty escalates murders and violent crime in Washington, D.C., which has the highest violent crime and murder rates in the U.S. Be careful how you explain and understand deterrence.

Last but not least, from a sociologic perspective, capital punishment does not work as intended, to deter crime rate, rather, it might brutalize individuals, at the same time does nothing good to the victim’s family other than brutal vengeance. The origin of death penalty is served as a vehicle to put a warning for those potential future criminals that such kind of behavior will lead to death. However, so far, no clear evidence can be seen that capital punishment, as a mechanism of deterrent, actually cut down the local crime rate. Ironically, a reversal trend was found by Death Penalty Information Center (2010) in the USA that the death penalty leads to an increase in local murder rate. To die might be too easy for the mindless murderers. Also, for the relatives or friends of criminals put into death through capital punishment, they are more likely to be

Maladain a writer for AFP which is the international news agency headquartered in Paris found that an inmate spends an average of thirteen years on death row. With some inmates even spending up to 30 year or more under the conditions. With that being said, what are the conditions of death row? Why do some people have a belief that death row could be considered torture? The same study by AFP talks about how prisoners live under the constant idea that they are going to die. This can be a trauma no one should have to endure because it can change you as a person, not only that but these same prisoners are often denied some of the rights that most basic prisoners have in Jail. These rights include social interaction and also other programs jails may put in place to normalize jail time. They make it really clear to death row inmates that they are useless and that they are surely going to die. Is this torture? Well, it violates the cruel, and inhuman treatment that is directly given as a human right in article five of the UDHR. It’s bad enough that inmates have to endure the lack of interaction and normalization that is given to other inmates but they have to endure it for an average of thirteen years as previously stated. With all that being said, the death penalty is a worldwide accepted act and so far we have only focused on the United States, so let’s get the bigger

Four major issues in capital punishment are debated, most aspects of which were touched upon by Seton Hall’s panel discussion on the death penalty. The first issue stands as deterrence. A major purpose of criminal punishment is to conclude future criminal conduct. The deterrence theory suggests that a rational person will avoid criminal behavior if the severity of the punishment outweighs the benefits of the illegal conduct. It is believed that fear of death “deters” people from committing a crime. Most criminals would think twice before committing murder if they knew their own lives were at stake. When attached to certain crimes, the penalty of death exerts a positive moral influence, placing a stigma on certain crimes like manslaughter, which results in attitudes of horror to such acts.

According to Corey Fedde from Csmonitor.com, Victor Glasberg, a death row inmate's attorney from Virginia stated, ¨These kinds of things are meaningful when so very little things are granted to the inmates." He later stated that ¨While they're still on Earth they should still be treated as humans." While many people believe that the death penalty should be banned, they are also in favor of better living conditions and more privileges for them. I, on the other hand, am not. The death penalty should be limited, but not illegal, and the living conditions should not be altered.