reasons why there should be an end to the death penalty?

Answer 1

Mostly, because it is not effective.

Answer 2

The financial cost of having a capital trial followed by all the appeals necessary prior to actually execute someone is enormous. A capital murder trial costs, on average, two and a half times more than a regular trial. This does not count the cost of the appeals process which is mandatory in most places with the death penalty.

I would say that the death penalty should only be an option in the most extreme cases.

Answer 3

You have received some really terrific answers. One answerer, however, thinks that the death penalty is an answer to prison overcrowding. Our prisons are overcrowded for reasons that have little to do with the death penalty. For one thing, low level, non violent drug offenders are routinely sentenced to long terms.

Another reason is that beginning in the 1970's, facilities treating people with mental illness have been closed, across the county, and the outpatient, community based resources to help these people were not funded. Instead of getting the treatment they need to lead happy and normal lives, many people suffering from mental illness are ignored by public health agencies until an incident occurs. In prison, the kind of help offered is limited and many mentally ill people become much worse. The percentage of mentally ill people in prison is estimated (conservatively) as three times the percentage in the general population.

Ending the death penalty will free up some money to help sick people get needed treatment, for other crime prevention methods of proven benefits and for victims services.

Answer 4

I can give you 11:

1. Permitting premeditated murder is totally unacceptable, even if done by the state. Capital punishment lowers the value of human life as seen by the general population and brutalizes society. It reinforces the idea that killing someone is an acceptable way of solving problems.

2. It is based on a need for revenge not justice. Retribution and revenge have no place in the modern justice system.

3. Lack of Deterrence: The death penalty has not been shown to be effective in the reduction of the homicide rate. Homicide rates are often higher in states that have capital punishment than in states that do not. (sources 1 - 6) Most killers don't think about the consequences anyway. They do not think they will be caught.

4. Cost: The cost of all the appeals by a convicted murder, plus all the costs associated with an execution is far greater than the cost of locking that person up for the rest of their life

5. Human life has intrinsic value, even if a person has murdered another individual. If you kill someone, you've taken away something sacred. That is never right, even if its done by the state.

6. The death penalty is unfair The mentally ill, poor, males, and ethnic minorities are over-represented among those executed. One pilot study of over 2 dozen convicted criminals on death row found that all had been so seriously abused during childhood that they in all liklihood all suffered from brain damage. Women convicted of murder are almost never executed; execution is a penalty that is almost entirely reserved for men. A 1986 study in Georgia showed that people who killed "whites were four times more likely to be sentenced to death than convicted killers of non-whites." (sources 7-9)

7. Chance of Error: Many convicted murderers are later found innocent, and have been pardoned. It is impossible to pardon a corpse. In 1987, a study was published by the Stanford Law Review. They found some evidence that suggested that at least 350 people between 1900 and 1985 in America might have been innocent of the crime for which they were convicted, and could have been sentenced to death. 139 "were sentenced to death and as many as 23 were executed." In the UK, groups such as the Guildford 4 were released after 16 years for crimes they were tortured into confessing to. In Illinois, a class of journalism students (not law students - JOURNALISM students) found that 13 out of 25 men on death row were factually innocent of the crimes for which they'd been sentenced - that's half! (source 10).

8. Capital punishment is cruel. If it is considered torture to hang someone by their arms so they suffer pain, what is it if you hang them by the neck to kill them? If it's torture to apply an electrical current to a person to make them confess to something, what is it if you apply a greater current in order to kill them?

9. The family of the prisoner is also punished by having their loved one killed by the state. Yet the family is usually innocent of any crime.

10. The existence of the death penalty means that some jury members are reluctant to convict in murder trials because of the possibility of executing an innocent person. Thus, many killers go free and are never punished.

11. The death penalty is useless: Killing a murderer does not bring his victim back to life. It achieves nothing but the death of still another person.

Answer 5

The reason to abolish death penality is the respect before life. Everyone has a right to live. No matter what s/he did. No matter. In the 10 commandments one says "Thou shalt not Kill". I am totally against death penality. They might say "the procedure" is going fast and painless (but who knows really) but they can't take away the mental stress of someone who is sentenced to death and waits for his final day. Death penality is such a violation against humanity.

Answer 6

I can't think of a reason to end it. We need to ease the over crowded prisons and I don't mean an early release of the lesser inmates. I mean those on death row.

Answer 7

Because some people are innocent and get killed wrongfully,

For a does of leathal injection to be created, 2 million dollars are wasted, and life in prison only wastes 500,000 dollars

If their crime was that great, wouldn't you get more pleasure out of watching them suffer than taking away their life nad leaving them in peace.

Just because someone did soemthing, it does not give you the right to do the same to them.

They might be mentally ill, na dthem they would be wrongfully killed because they don't know better.

Answer 8

- It does not prevent crime (When a state changes to a death penalty state, the crime rate doesn't go down).

- It is morally questionable (punishing a criminal with their same crime?).

- It is applied unfairly (more minorities are put to death than whites, even for the same crime/ same circumstances).

- It costs more than life in prison (due to appeals, attorney's costs, etc.).

Answer 9

They get off easy. They get put to sleep and then injected with posion. hmm how do they suffer? Aftre there dead they dont have to live with anything. They are free. no punishment! You think if deading meant anything to them they would have hurt someone know the chance of death? no! so you might be letting them commit suicide legally huh? The goverment kills them and they dont have to be coward. you also got to remember if you do something wrong noone should do it to you. two wrongs dont make a right.

Answer 10

No one has the right to decide who shall live or who shall die.
Other reason :
there has been too many innocent people in death row that after many years were found innocent.
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