The Importance Of The Death Penalty

If a person breaks the law and commits murder, then they should be given the same treatment and be put to death, by the means of the death penalty, capital punishment. If the population knew that the death penalty was the punishment for murder they would think twice before committing such an act. It is expensive to house a death row inmate and the cost to the American tax payer is millions of dollars a year. It is very expensive because a death row inmate requires one officer to each death row inmate for a twenty-four hour, around the clock period of supervision. Last if we allow murderers to escape the death penalty they can be paroled after a period of time, or escape, and may retaliate, harming, witnesses or family of the deceased.

Death penalty is a constant source of controversy and divided opinion depending on who you ask. The punishment of death is given to criminals who commit severe crimes. The severity of crimes that attract the death penalty is debatable due to the severity of the crime. The justice system is based upon punishment for crimes committed by emphasizing the punishment fitting the crime committed. Countries such as China and Singapore, and United States, issue the death penalty to punish murderers or rapist, therefore fueling the already going debate on how to befit the punishment is in such cases. All the death penalty aims to achieve is the punishment to those who break the rules. The death penalty has well documented weaknesses as well as strengths. Not least of is brutality and finality, some of these frailties lead to the calls for its abolishment. The death penalty is inhumane. Wrongly applied as well as completely unjustifiable sometimes killing innocent people irrespective of the crime. Life sentence of imprisonment without parole or pardon achieves all that the death penalty seeks to achieve without costing the society its moral standing and families losing those they love.

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

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.

In the article "The Case Against the Death Penalty," which shows up in Crime and Criminals: Opposing Viewpoints, Eric Freedman contends that capital punishment does not discourage fierce crime as well as conflicts with decreasing the crime rate. This essay will analyse Freedman 's article from the perspectives of a working man, a needy individual, and a government official.

This paper will discuss the Death Penalty. It analyzes the effectiveness of the death penalty. It covers the history of the death penalty as our nation shifts through various eras in its history, as well as the historical background of the death penalty in New York. It considers all factors such as crime rates, deterrence, the rights of the people, and consequences of the death penalty. Analogies were made of areas all over the country as to what degree the death penalty effects crime all around. It concludes this paper by reflecting on the information provided of the death penalty and provide an alternative to it.

The death penalty is just one of many faults in the justice system. It is legal in 31 states such as Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, and Wyoming. It is illegal in 19 other states such as Alaska, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Rhode Island, Vermont, West Virginia, Wisconsin and D.C. The biggest percentage of the inmates facing death row are in the south, the greatest number found in Texas, Georgia, Alabama, and Florida. There are both goods and bads about this form of punishment, some cons about the death penalty is that it gives out the wrong idea, why kill someone to show everyone else that taking a life is the wrong thing to do. It is not going to bring the victim back to life and the criminal’s family is going to be

There were many studies that were done in May 2012 that show in some states there was a significant cost up to $232 million per year for someone to remain on death row. Someone not on death row, only a life sentence, costs an average of $11.5 million per year. The largest cost is associated before the trial begins and during the trial. Even if all appeals were banned and extinguished, the death penalty would still cost a whole lot more than any of the other alternative sentences. If a prosecutor seeks the death sentence, they have to go through two phases of conviction – conviction phase first, then a sentencing phase. And then each trial usually has some special motions and then has to allow for extra time for the jury selection process. More costs are involved with the investigative side when the prosecution is seeking the death penalty. When there is any other verdict other than death, then there are usually a lot more costs involved for a retrial, and in turn, the sentence usually ends up as life in prison.

penalty? In different states there are different ways they use the death penalty. In some states

“We have killers walking among us. We have killers living in our neighborhoods,” explained Howard Morton, executive director of families of homicide victims and missing persons. With the disappearance of the death penalty, violent crimes are more likely to occur. Frightened for their lives, murders would wonder what repercussions they will face. Legalizing executions would make America safer, criminals would think before committing crimes, and they do not learn from their mistakes in prison, making the re-commit crime rate higher.

The death penalty has been in the justice system of America tracing all the way back to the days of its founding fathers. Though it is a highly controversial legal and moral matter, it still stands today as the most ultimate punishment in the United States. Many countries have been or are currently abolishing their death penalty under the notion that it is unjust and morally wrong. The United States, on the other hand, has 38 out of its 50 states with laws that state the death penalty as its ultimate punishment. Since 1990, more than 350 people have been put to death with another 3,300 waiting in death row. Another statistic that is an eye opener is since 1976, 552 executions have occurred in the United States, with 394 by lethal injection, 141 by electrocution, 11 by gas chamber, three by hanging, and two by firing squads. Half of the executions that have taken place after 1976 have happened within the last five years, 52 happening so far this year (Death Penalty). The Supreme Court ruled that capital punishment violates the 8th Amendment, which protects the right from “cruel and unusual punishment, on June 29th, 1972. The respective states halted executions in 1967, awaiting the ruling of the case. However in July, of 1976, the Supreme Court, as a just punishment for certain crimes, upheld the death penalty (Fagan, n.d.). For the nine years that the death penalty was suspended, the United States did not have a substantial amount of crime increase, which is somewhat

The constitutionality of the death penalty has been a heated topic of discussion for decades. The history of the death penalty in the United States is extensive; from a suspension to a reinstating and individual statutes throughout the 50 states. One of the most controversial of the Supreme Court cases involving the death penalty is Roper v. Simmons. In 2005, the Supreme Court ruled that the execution of people who were under 18 at the time of their crimes violates the federal constitutional guarantee against cruel and unusual punishments. In making its decision, the Court considered both the emerging national consensus and psychological organizations citing new evidence of delayed brain maturation that impacts culpability (define this

A 2003, Kansas audit found that the estimated cost of a death penalty case was 70% more than the cost of a comparable non-death penalty case. Death penalty case costs were counted through to execution (median cost $1.26 million). Non-death penalty case costs were counted through to the end of incarceration (median cost $740,000) (Death Penalty Cost. (n.d.).

The majority of people believe that the death penalty is applied fairly today in the US. According to Washington D.C; six out of 10 people favor the death penalty. People might think (at first,) that the death penalty is cruel, until they actually know what and why it is used for. The death penalty is mostly used on convicted murders, while some have been used for on extreme cases relating to aggravated rape. “When asked about the frequency with which the death penalty is imposed, 40% of Americans say it is not imposed enough, with the remainder equally divided between saying it is imposed "too often" (27%) or "about the right amount" (27%).”(Dugan) With this only 27% of people think that the death penalty is applied “too often”, while 40%

Firstly, the death penalty is a very expensive process with a lot of time and resources being pulled. In the state of Texas, it cost $2.3 Million per execution, which is the same cost to put that person in a maximum-security prison under solitary confinement for 40 years (Cary). This is completely absurd that the death penalty is even thought to be a better option, especially since the person is most likely not to be in solitary confinement for 40 years. Assuming the person on death row is around the age of nineteen by the time they would reach that price of $2.3 million they would be lucky to be still alive. To put the money being used into a much larger perspective in the state of California taxpayers can pay anywhere from $63 million to $114 million a year on the death penalty which is more than it would cost to put them in prison