What's your point of view about the death penalty?

Answer 1

This issue should be decided on the basis of solid facts. Here are some verifiable and sourced facts-

Re: cost
The death penalty costs far more than life in prison. The huge extra costs start to mount up even before the trial.

Re: Alternatives
48 states have life without parole on the books. It means what it says, is swift and sure and is rarely appealed. Being locked in a tiny cell for 23 hours a day, forever, is certainly no picnic.

Re: Possibility of executing an innocent person
Over 120 people on death rows have been released with evidence of their innocence. If we speed up the process we are bound to execute an innocent person.

Re: DNA
DNA is available in no more than 10% of murder cases. It is not a miracle cure for sentencing innocent people to death. It’s human nature to make mistakes.

Re: Deterrence
The death penalty isn’t a deterrent. Murder rates are actually higher in states with the death penalty than in states without it. Moreover, people who kill or commit other serious crimes do not think they will be caught (if they think at all.)

Re: Who gets the death penalty
The death penalty isn’t reserved for the “worst of the worst,” but rather for defendants with the worst lawyers. When is the last time a wealthy person was sentenced to death, let alone executed??

Re: Victims families
The death penalty is very hard on victims’ families. They must relive their ordeal in the courts and the media. Life without parole is sure, swift and rarely appealed. Some victims families who support the death penalty in principal prefer life without parole because of how the death penalty affects families like theirs.

Opposing the death penalty doesn’t mean you condone brutal crimes or excuse people who commit them.. According to a Gallup Poll, in 2006, 47% of all Americans prefer capital punishment while 48% prefer life without parole. Americans are learning the facts and making up their minds using common sense, not revenge.

Answer 2

I'm all for it but the system is broken. Any and all punishments should be administered as soon as possible. Sitting in a cell for twenty years waiting for your execution and hoping you'll get a reprieve isn't much of a death penalty. One trial, two reviews and execution within a year of sentencing would be much more effective.

Rather amusing how a person can feel that the death penalty is barbaric and say to confine somebody for life is worse. By that statement there should be no life imprisonment, execute them all.

Answer 3

Three things-That severely retarded people are sentenced to death.One man in Arkansas was so incapable of understanding what was happening,he told the guards to save his last meal,because he would be back to finish it later. The other is that minorities and the poor are much more likely to be sentenced to death than wealthy whites.Lastly,it depends on who dies.In many states,killing a police officer is a death penalty case,no matter the circumstances.Why execute people based on the job description of their victim?I mean,I respect and admire cops,but I don't think their lives are any more valuable than that of my 5 year old niece or my neighbor who works in a power plant.

Answer 4

Death penalty advocates will point to a slew of evidence supporting their case, and death penalty opponents will do the same.

However, looking at our judicial system and the history of the death penalty in several key states (Illinois and Texas), there are cases of innocent people on death row, put away by corrupt lawyers and judges who wanted to make their careers - so much so that Illinois got rid of the death penalty.

In Texas, they had an instance of strong abuse of power by the police force in Austin, where a confession was coerced from two gentlemen framed for murder. They even got one of the guy's girlfriends to testify against him they created so much doubt in people's minds with the case they concocted. Facing Death Row, they pleaded out to life in prison, where one was brutally beaten and raped to the point that he was mentally treatrded and longer to care for himself. They were later released after the discovery was amde that the case was handled so poorly and the real killer was found.

Our judicial system is supposed to be based on getting it right and making sure we punish the criminal, not the innocent - that is why we are innocent until proven guilty. Using the death penalty does not allow for a correction in the law once the penalty is administered, and it is also used as a heavy handed tool to get potentially innocent people to plead out. This, to me, suggests that it all too often runs contrary to the very goals of the criminal justice system we are supposed to believe in. After all, you put an innocent person away, you are punishing someone for something they didn't do, creating another crime, and letting the guilty party go free.

Based on the above, I am against the death penalty.

Incidentally, people who look all too often for the stance of presidential candidates on the death penalty as a litmus test should really reassess their reasoning - the death penalty is only implemented federally in the instance of treason, so it would seem to be a moot point.

Answer 5

If someone murders someone they have given up their right to life.


I think a better solution would be if we start teaching our kids morals and you are not all victims of something.

When parents start being parents instead of the good buddies.

Like if the kids are building bombs in their bedrooms the parents should know and stop it.

You go to the mall and see the screaming kids calling their parents every 4 letter word in the book. If I did that it would be but once and if I live to tell the tale it would be a mircale.

Answer 6

It isn't put to use enough. The convicted should be able to appeal, but not for 20 years.
There has to be consequences paid. If those consequences were carried out instead of tying up the legal system with an infinite number of appeals, then maybe people wouldn't be so inclined to commit, or be in a situation that could tie them to capitol crimes.

Answer 7

On overcrowding- the reason our prisons are overcrowded isn't because of the fact of murderers. Our prisons are finished for 2 significant motives: We sentence non violent offenders to long words, particularly for minor drug appropriate offenses. 2nd, in the 1080's psychological hospitals began last and have been meant to get replaced with community based centers. Few of those have been set up - so as that many human beings affected by psychological ailment have been undiagnosed and untreated till they have been arrested. another element: existence without parole is on the books in 40 9 states (all different than Alaska). It skill precisely what it says, and it costs far under the loss of life penalty (even once you contain the cost of lifetime incarceration. As you recognize, the biggest problem with the loss of life penalty is that in case you convict someonw and later discover out that he's harmless, you are able to launch him from penal complex, yet no longer from the grave. The equipment could make tragic and irreversible blunders. In 2004, Cameron Todd Willingham became carried out in Texas for commencing the hearth that killed his toddlers. present day forensics has shown that the hearth became unintended. There wasn’t even a criminal offense. Over one hundred thirty different wrongly convicted human beings sentenced to loss of life have been exonerated. DNA, isn't available in homicides and could’t assure we gained’t execute harmless human beings. as much as now as deterrence, no credible learn has shown that the loss of life penalty prevents homicides. in fact, homicide expenditures are consistently larger in states with the loss of life penalty than in those without them. the main contemporary FBI archives confirms this. You picked the harder fringe of this subject- assuming which you extremely desire to talk relating to the loss of life penalty equipment in action. It comes right down to whether we could continuously keep a equipment for the sake of retribution or revenge even if it isn’t efficient in reducing violent crime, costs lots greater beneficial than possibilities and, worst of all, can carry approximately the nightmare of looking that we carried out somebody for a criminal offense he didn’t commit.

Answer 8

I don't think that it works- people still commit crimes and don't seem to be bothered by spending large amounts of time on "death row" waiting for their big day after tons of appeals. We need to come up with something better- I like the idea of those work/sweat camps like in Texas. Make the inmates "earn their keep".Australia used to be a penal colony- maybe we should have something like that?! We can just get one of those "Survivor" islands or something- no immunity idol, though!

Answer 9

I think if you murder someone you should get the death penalty. No matter what. They shouldn't' even have a sentencing...it should automatically be the death penalty.

Answer 10

i have recently started researching information on death row and death row inmates and i find it disturbing that there has been many that have been exonerated due to dna technology. if someone is guilty i have no sympathy for their punishment but i do have sympathy for the victims, the victims families and the family of the death row inmate. so i am torn between the two sides.