What do you think of the death penalty? "Survey"?

Question

How old are you?

What is your country of residence?

Do you believe it deters crime?

What kind of offences would make it acceptable?

Do you think it's cruel and if so are you sympathetic of the convicted?

Do you think the death penalty should be legalized unanimously?

What safeguards would you implement to protect the innocent?

Do you believe it is racially or discriminantly handed down?

What methods do you think should be used to kill the convicted?

Do you think the death penalty puts police officers in greater danger and leads to more gruesomn crimes?

Answer 1

USA

You don't have to sympathize with criminals or want them to avoid a terrible punishment to ask if the death penalty prevents or even reduces crime and to think about the risks of executing innocent people.

124 people on death rows have been released with proof that they were wrongfully convicted. DNA is available in less than 10% of all homicides and isn’t a guarantee we won’t execute innocent people. Human beings are fallible and we cannot expect to get it right, every time.

The death penalty doesn't prevent others from committing murder. No reputable study shows the death penalty to be a deterrent. To be a deterrent a punishment must be sure and swift. The death penalty is neither. Homicide rates are higher in states and regions that have it than in states that don’t.

We have a good alternative. Life without parole is now on the books in 48 states. It means what it says. It is sure and swift and rarely appealed. Life without parole is less expensive than the death penalty.

The death penalty costs much more than life in prison, mostly because of the legal process which is supposed to prevent executions of innocent people.

The death penalty isn't reserved for the worst crimes, but for defendants with the worst lawyers. It doesn't apply to people with money. When is the last time a wealthy person was on death row, let alone executed?

The system is racist but not in the way people may think. A defendent is much more likely to face the death penalty if the victim was white. While whites and non whites are murder victims in approximately equal numbers, 79% of people executed were for murders of white people.

The death penalty doesn't necessarily help families of murder victims. Murder victim family members across the country argue that the drawn-out death penalty process is painful for them and that life without parole is an appropriate alternative.

Problems with speeding up the process. Over 50 of the innocent people released from death row had already served over a decade. If the process is speeded up we are sure to execute an innocent person.

Answer 2

I'm 48 years old, US citizen.

The death penalty does NOT deter crime.

There are no acceptable offences that make it acceptable.

It is cruel and not so much that I'm "sympathetic" of the convicted I just don't believe in a killing for a killing.

The death penalty should not be legal so we wouldn't have to worry about safeguards.

A lot of times race can be a factor.

No methods of killing should be used and as I stated earlier the death penalty does not deter crime therefore has no effect on the danger to police officers.

Answer 3

I am 64, and retired.
Live in Wisconsin, USA
It may deter crime in some cases. My objection to the death penalty is that innocent people get convicted of crimes all the time. Not all, of course, but some are eventually proved to be innocent. The Innocense Project, based at the U. of Wisconsin, has exonerated many people wrongly convicted over the past few years. Where guilt is admitted without coersion, it may be ok. but recently, we have seen that this may even be suspect. Police abuse has enabled many confessions of guilt to be used, only to find out later that it was a forced confession. According to a study revealed this week, The Wisconsin State Journal, reported that nationally, 97 black citizens are arrested and jailed for every 1 white citizen for the same drug crime. It's not hard to prove discrimination, or at least increased surveilance of people of color. In cases where the death penalty awaits a person who has commited a so called capital offense, this person feels he has nothing to lose by putting police officers in more danger, and may resist and escalate to more gruesome crimes, in a bid to remain free. A life sentence can be as much a deterrant, and allows a wrongly convicted person at least a glimmer of hope for exoneration. A death penalty snuffs out even that small hope. Wisconsin, does not have a death penalty.

Answer 4

1. I am 65 years old.
2. I am a resident of the United States.
3. I do believe that Capital Punishment keeps THAT person from killing again. As to it's deterrence on others--Studies indicate both ways, and I am unsure.
4. I do not think Capital Punishment is cruel, look at the suffering of most victims before their murder, and the on-going suffering of their families.
5. My society is a society of majority rule, but even so, over 60% favor the death penalties. Therefore, unanimous approval is not necessary.
6. Safeguards already exist--automatic appeal, plus more appeals than seem reasonable--many death row inmates have more appeals than they have hair. Additionally, many people work very diligently to save almost every individual on death row--either because of emotion or political conviction.
7. I think it can be, but I believe that it may appear discriminatory applied because many crime perpetrators are poor, frequently minority.
8. I think that there should be alternatives--lethal injection, gas chamber, hanging, or firing squad.
9. I think criminals put police officers in great danger, but I do not believe the death penalty puts them at greater danger, nor do I believe that as a consequence of the death penalty the crimes are more gruesome. I think some people are gruesome and their conduct reflects them.

Answer 5

1. 42

2. US

3, No. States that have capital punishment and use it the most often show no lower murder rates than states without it and sometimes even show murder rates that are much higher.

4. I don't consider the actual execution to be cruel. I consider the unavoidable process that must be followed in order to enact it to wind up being cruel. I am not entirely sympathetic to the convicted. My objection to capital punishment is based more in wariness of greater state power than it is on a "cruel and unusual punishment" restriction.

5. I don't understand what you mean by "unanimously". Do you mean in all states? No, I do not. I support the states retaining the right to determine sentences for their own penal offenses.

6. I don't support the state having the power to execute. That is my safeguard against the possibility of wrongful conviction.

7. I believe that capital punishment is more likely to be sentenced against a non-white offender, particularly if the victim was white. I believe that is more likely to happen because a jury is the party that sentences execution, but I believe it would still happen if judges were responsible for doing so.

8. None. I do not support the state having the power to execute offenders.

9. No, I do not believe that capital punishment puts police in greater danger or leads to more gruesome crimes. Few persons commit first degree murder with the expectation that they will be convicted of that crime. Going to prison for life with no chance of parole isn't exactly an attractive sentence either.

Answer 6

1) 31

2) the United States

3) No

4) Any crime in which someone's life was intentially taken or lost while suffering from intentional harm.

5) I don't think it's cruel.

6) No, I'm not even sure what you mean by "legalized unanimously."

7) Court trial with sufficient appeals

8) I don't know. I believe the standards of what deserves the Death Penalty should be universal, but I imagine their are still some sitting judges with different standards for different races.

9) Any that minimize suffering, either through pain management (lethal injection) or by killing quickly (hanging and others).

10) No. Criminals cause more gruesome crimes. I think it is wrong to blame the death penalty for the irrational logic of criminals.

Answer 7

21, UK

The death penalty absolutely does not deter crime. In my country in the 18th century you could be executed for just about anything - stealing a loaf of bread was a capital crime. Yet there was higher crime then than there is now. No country in Western Europe has the death penalty - and the US has a much much higher violent crime rate. If people are desperate enough they WILL commit crime, regardless of the cost. Just look at all those sub-prime mortgages, people still took them out, even if they KNEW that the cost was going to be absurd.

There are NO offenses which make capital punishment acceptable. I'm all for life in prisonment, don't get me wrong - and THAT has the added bonus of being a nice 60 year long "execution", as they die at the end of it anyway.

I think the electric chair is cruel, but there are plenty of methods of execution that aren't. I'm more concerned about the fact that it's barbaric rather than cruel.

I do not think the death penalty should be legal at all, in any country, under any circumstances.

I don't think having the death penalty necessarily leads to more gruesome crimes - I can't see any link there. But it certainly leads to more gruesome societies.

Answer 8

52
USA
Absolutely - Read the Heritage Foundation report on it.
Murder, rape involving a child.
I think it is not cruel enough. Putting someone to sleep, cruel?
I am not sure what you mean by legalized unanimously. In every state? YES.
It would take DNA evidence or positive ID by the victim or credible witness.
No. It definately used to be, but with my strict requirements for death sentence, it could not be.
Electric chair or public hanging.
That question is like saying that more people die because they read books. There is no comparrison there whatsoever.

mordent...you want to compare the 18th century to today, or Europe to the US, and neither of these are like comparing apples to oranges. It is more like comparing apples to automobiles. There are too many variables. Click on the link below. The study has been done...comparing APPLES TO APPLES and the death penalty DOES deter crime. Even if this report were wrong, the death penalty is guaranteed to prevent at least one person from re-offending.

Answer 9

Christians have authorized of capital punishment for an prolonged time. Why is it abruptly barbaric? The loss of life penalty wasn't designed to be abused (because it became with Christ). this is in place to rid society of the degenerate scum that have not have been given any objective of reform. maximum great-crime convicts are in hardship with the regulation returned if/while they are released. The loss of life penalty avoids wasted tax money by no longer prolonging the drawing close.

Answer 10

25.

United States.

Not neccessarily.

Murder; child molestors w/ at least 1 prior offense.

I do not believe its cruel, I do not have sympathy for the convicted.

Yes.

Basically the same we have now. With modern advances in science the instances of a convicted person being innocent become rarer and rarer.

No.

Here is what I believe in the order of most humane to least humane: lethal injection, hanging, electric chair, firing squad.

No.