Should the Death Penalty be Discontinued?

Nichole Brown
Criminal Justice 1010
Gary F. Cox
4/25/14
Nichole Brown
4/25/14
Research Paper
CJ 1010
Gary F. Cox

Should the Death Penalty be Discontinued?

The Death Penalty. Just those three words can stir up some very strong emotions in people.
Today, this has become quite a controversial point of discussion, with many people having very strong,
differing opinions. There is such a vast amount of information out there, that it can sometimes be
overwhelming knowing where to start, and what sources to trust. One source that I will often be quoting
is the Death Penalty Information Center. Their website has a lot of knowledgeable information, and
they are a well known, trusted source, for giving the facts.
The question of should the death penalty be discontinued is one that reminds me of the
Humanities. Questions of what we should and should not do, what is right and wrong; these are very
tough questions to try to tackle. However, my hope through this paper is to find research as to all of the
facts behind what the death penalty is, what the alternatives are, and what the best option would be for
the whole of society.
I am not going to discuss the pros and cons to every issue behind this controversial topic,
however some of them include; Morality, Constitutionality, Deterrence, Retribution, Irrevocable
Mistakes, Cost of Death vs. Life in Prison, Race, Income Level, and Attorney Quality. These are all
very important topics that should be researched, and studied, before forming your own opinion on this
issue.
From my research, one of the reasons people believe that the death penalty should continue to
be in place is that it acts as a deterrent to potential future criminals. If the criminals know that they have
the chance of being put to death, this may deter them from committing crimes in the future. However,
some believe that there is no true evidence that supports the idea that the death penalty truly does act as
a deterrence, or more of a deterrent than a sentence of life without parole. Murder crimes are also very
often crimes of passion, where the criminal is not thinking clearly, so this type of deterrence would not
seem to have much of an effect.
There is no credible evidence that the death penalty deters crime more effectively than
long terms of imprisonment. States that have death penalty laws do not have lower crime rates
or murder rates than states without such laws. And states that have abolished capital punishment
show no significant changes in either crime or murder rates. The death penalty has no deterrent
effect. Claims that each execution deters a certain number of murders have been thoroughly
discredited by social science research." (ACLU.org)
It seems to me that saying the death penalty acts as a deterrent, is actually false. Found on the
Death Penalty Information Centers website, was some intriguing information. It stated that the
2011 FBI Uniform Crime Report showed that the South had the highest murder rate. The South
accounts for over 80% of executions. The Northeast, which contains less than 1% of all executions, had
the lowest murder rate. This shows that an area that has a very small amount of executions, is also an
area that has the lowest murder rate. However, that information could be the result of various other
reasons, than the absence of the death penalty. There are many other factors that could produce this
result, such as they may have never had very many murders taking place in the Northeast anyway,
therefore they do not have as many executions.


Found on the International Commission Against Death Penaltys (ICDP) website was an
interesting statement, The effectiveness of the death penalty in order to prevent crime is being seriously
questioned by a continuously increasing number of law enforcement professionals. If law enforcement
is even questioning if this deterrence is true, then we should be also.
None of the information I have presented is concrete evidence for the idea that the death
penalty is, or is not, deterring criminals. However, I think it is important information to keep in mind
when forming an opinion on the issues relating to the death penalty.
Another reason that those who are for the death penalty bring up, is that it acts as retribution.
Enacting the death penalty requires the criminal to pay for the harm that he/she has done. J.
Budziszewski states that:
"Society is justly ordered when each person receives what is due to him. Crime disturbs
this just order, for the criminal takes from people their lives, peace, liberties, and worldly goods
in order to give himself undeserved benefits. Deserved punishment protects society morally by
restoring this just order, making the wrongdoer pay a price equivalent to the harm he has done.
(ProCon.org)
Those on the other side of the issue believe that this retribution is really just revenge, and the
government trying to get even, or get back at them for what they did. This could often lead to the judge
being pressured into sentencing the death penalty. If they feel that the victim has strong emotions about
this person being put to death, he/she may feel bad for the victim, and inflict a harsher punishment than
necessary.
Another point of controversy is the problem of money. What really costs more? Life without
parole, or the death penalty? At the surface level, it seems that the death penalty would be a cheaper
method, but you also have to consider the additional judicial processes involved in sentencing an
execution. There are a lot more formal matters that are required to take place before a person can be
sentenced to death.
Dudley Sharp, and advocator for the death penalty states that, There is no question that the up
front costs of the death penalty are significantly higher than for equivalent LWOP cases. There also
appears to be no question that, over time, equivalent LWOP cases are much more expensive... than
death penalty cases. (ProCon.org)
Sharp believes that often death penalty cases are actually cheaper in the long run. However,
Richard Dieter would not agree;
"In the course of my work, I believe I have reviewed every state and federal study of
the costs of the death penalty in the past 25 years. One element is common to all of these
studies: They all concluded that the cost of the death penalty amounts to a net expense to the
state and the taxpayers. Or to put it differently, the death penalty is clearly more expensive than
a system handling similar cases with a lesser punishment. [It] combines the costliest parts of both
punishments: lengthy and complicated death penalty trials, followed by incarceration for life...
Everything that is needed for an ordinary trial is needed for a death penalty case, only more so.
Dieter made me think of another interesting aspect, that I believe has helped to ground my
personal opinion even more. If the death penalty is still active, and a person is put through all of the
additional trials, to be sentenced for the death penalty, and they are not sentenced to death, the system,
and taxpayers, will still have to pay for them to be incarcerated. This means that in the end you are
paying for both the death penalty trial, and then, if it was not successful, you are still having to pay for
their incarceration afterward. It makes a lot more sense to me to do away with these trials, and simply
sentence the criminal to life without parole.
The next topic, and its a big one, is Morality. The question of whether it is moral for us to enact
the death penalty, is an important factor to consider. Whether it is moral or not for judges to be able to
sentence a person to death, needs to be addressed. Bryan Stevenson, Professor of Law in New York,
believes that it is quite immoral. He states:
Ultimately, the moral question surrounding capital punishment in America has less to do
with whether those convicted of violent crime deserve to die than with whether state and federal
governments deserve to kill those whom it has imprisoned. (ProCon.org)
This quote stood out to me. The words deserve to kill, are so strong. No one has the right to
kill, and I believe that he uses that type of language to influence the emotions of the reader to think that it
truly is immoral for governments to kill, because they do not have the right to.
Antonin Scalia, Justice of the US Supreme Court, thought differently. In a May 2002 First
Things article titled "Gods Justice and Ours," he wrote,
"While my views on the morality of the death penalty have nothing to do with how I vote
as a judge, they have a lot to do with whether I can or should be a judge at all. To put the point
in the blunt terms employed by Justice Harold Blackmun towards the end of his career on the
bench, when I sit on a Court that reviews and affirms capital convictions, I am part of 'the
machinery of death.' My vote, when joined with at least four others, is, in most cases, the last
step that permits an execution to proceed. I could not take part in that process if I believed
what was being done to be immoral... In my view the choice for the judge who believes the
death penalty to be immoral is resignation, rather than simply ignoring duly enacted,
constitutional laws and sabotaging death penalty cases. He has, after all, taken an oath to apply
the laws and has been given no power to supplant them with rules of his own. Of course if he
feels strongly enough he can go beyond mere resignation and lead a political campaign to
abolish the death penalty-and if that fails, lead a revolution. But rewrite the laws he cannot do."
(ProCon.org)
This was a long quote, but quite full of knowledgeable information. I appreciated the fact that he
recognized that a judge should resign, if they felt that this was immoral. A judge can not do their job, if
they thought what they were doing was immoral.
The next issue I will address is Attorney Quality. Many people who are against the death
penalty state that death penalty defendants are not being given adequate attorneys. Found on
deathpenalty.org, was this,
Almost all defendants who face capital charges cannot afford an attorney and rely on
the state to appoint one for them. However, often times appointed attorneys are overworked,
underpaid, lack critical resources, and are either incompetent or inexperienced. As a result
when death sentences are set aside by the federal courts, it is often because among other
reasons the trial attorney was so incompetent that the accused's constitutional right to effective
counsel was violated. (Death Penalty Focus)
If this is true, it is an important factor to consider when determining your opinion on the death
penalty. However, the US Department of Justice wrote something quite contrary. In its Sep. 12, 2000
Survey of the Federal Death Penalty System published on www.usdoj.gov was this,
Since 1988, federal law has expressly required that, upon the request of an indigent
capital defendant, a federal judge shall appoint two attorneys to represent the defendant and
make available sufficient funds for reasonable investigative and expert services. The attorneys
appointed to represent an indigent defendant must have the 'background, knowledge, or
experience [that] would otherwise enable him or her to properly represent the defendant, with
due consideration to the seriousness of the possible penalty and to the unique and complex
nature of the litigation Furthermore, a separate provision in effect since 1994 requires that at
least one defense attorney be 'learned in the law of capital cases' (a prior version of that statute,
in effect from 1948 to 1994, provided for all capital defendants to be represented by 'learned
counsel').
The final topic I will mention is one that has had greatly influenced me. This is the problem of
Irrevocable Mistakes. I think that an honest person, trying to do the right thing, and in the end, killing
someone for a crime that they did not commit, is something that no one should have to deal with. The
Death Penalty Information Center stated that Since 1973, over 140 people have been released
from death row with evidence of their innocence. These people were so close to being killed for
something they never did. This is a crime in itself. The government could be murdering innocent people.
Steven D Stewart thinks otherwise. He states that, The inevitability of a mistake should not
serve as grounds to eliminate the death penalty any more than the risk of having a fatal wreck should
make automobiles illegal..." (ProCon.org)
These are only a few of the points that people are debating over today on the issue of the death
penalty. You could continue going on and on discussing all of the pros and cons to the issue, however I
feel that the issues I covered are some of the main controversial topics today. Before writing this paper,
I had a feeling that I was going to be against the death penalty. The biggest reasoning behind this opinion
is that we as humans mess up, we are flawed creatures, with an imperfect system. Therefore, I do not
think it is our right to determine when a persons life should end.
After doing research, and learning a lot more about this issue, I have the same opinion. It seems
to me that the risks, outweigh the benefits. I honestly did not see many valuable benefits at all. I also, am
not saying that we should never execute people. I do see merit in some of these points that people are
making. This is a very tough topic, but I do not think, even at the end of all this, that I can honestly
answer the question of whether the death penalty should be discontinued. I definitely feel for the people
who are in the position to make this tough decision.
This is a hard, but also very important topic to discuss. If one day a loved one of yours is in a
situation where the death penalty is a factor, whether victim or defendant, it will suddenly become very
significant to you, and it should be now. It is important to be educated and realized that everyone forms
opinions with biases, and it is vital to recognize those biases in ourselves, when we begin to form our
own opinions.


















Works Cited

"Facts about the Death Penalty" Death Penalty Information Center. Web. 25 Apr. 2014.

"Inadequate Legal Representation." Death Penalty Focus. Web. 25 Apr. 2014.

"Is Poor Representation by Public Defense Attorneys a Widespread Problem in Capital Cases?"
ProConorg Headlines. Web. 25 Apr. 2014.

J. Budziszewski, PhD "Capital Punishment: The Case for Justice,"OrthodoxyToday.org
Aug./Sep. 2004 Web. 25 Apr. 2014.

"The Death Penalty: Questions and Answers," ACLU.org Apr. 9, 2007 Web. 25 Apr. 2014.

"Top 10 Pros and Cons - Death Penalty - ProCon.org." ProConorg Headlines. Web. 25 Apr. 2014.

"Why the Death Penalty Should Be Abolished." International Commission against the Death
Penalty RSS. Web. 25 Apr. 2014.