Running Head: IS THE DEATH PENALTY EFFECTIVE?

Is the Death Penalty effective?

Aina Oluwafisayomi
COMM 2715: Academic Writing for Success Strategy
Clayton Rhodes
November 15, 2020
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Is the Death Penalty effective?

The death penalty is also known as capital punishment. It is a type of punishment
sanctioned by the government in which a person found guilty of a crime is put to death. There
are many ways the death penalty can be done. A person found who is guilty of a crime and is
given the death penalty can be punished through lethal injection, electrocution, fire squad or a
gas chamber. The topic of the death penalty being effective or not is a very common topic. Some
say that it is effective while some are against it and have made effort to put a stop to it in their
society. I feel the death penalty is a cruel act and should not be practiced. The death penalty has
been in practice for a very long time, as far as the eighteenth B.C. According to the Death
Penalty Information Center (2019) “the first know death penalty laws date as far back as the
Eighteenth-Century B.C. in the Code of King Hammurabi of Babylon, which codified the death
penalty for 25 different crimes.”
Every country has its laws on capital punishment. Among Western countries, America is
the only country to continue the practice of death penalty. Great Britain no longer practices the
death penalty. The European Union has outlawed the death penalty and any country joining the
European Union must stop the use of the death penalty. In the United States, New Jersey has no
inmates on death row due to it being abolished in 2008. Texas has put to death more people than
any other. In 2020, the State of Texas has executed three people; eight executions have been
withdrawn due to the current health crisis while five have been set for 2021. In total, Texas has
had a total of five hundred and sixty-six executions. The second highest number of executions
goes to Virginia which has had a total of one hundred and thirteen executions. There has been a
total of fourteen prisoners executed in the United States in 2020. Five states and Federal
Government have carried out executions. In some countries you can only get the death penalty
for doing specific crimes like murder, treason or smuggling large amounts of drugs.
In Canada, the death penalty was totally abolished on the 10th of December 1998. On this
day, all remaining references to the death penalty were taken out of the National Defence Act.
The last execution in Canada was made under the Criminal Code in 1962 when Ronald Turpin
and Arthur Lucas were both hung at Toronto’s Don Jail. The last time a legal execution was
carried out by the Canadian military was the execution of Harold Pringle in 1945 when he was
shot at dawn in Italy. Since 1867, all civilian executions in Canada were done by hanging. While
military executions were traditionally by shooting. Calls for the abolition of death penalty date
back to before Canada’s establishment in 1867.
A long line of Canadian Prime Ministers openly opposed the to the death penalty. It
started with John Dieffenbakker and ended with Stephen Harper. In 2001, in Burns, the Supreme
Court found that it would be a breach of the constitution for Canada to extradite a prisoner wo
was sentenced to death. The Second Optional Protocol Rights was signed and ratified in 2005 by
the Canadian government. This constitutionally stops the restoration to the death penalty in
Canada with no removal process. Because Canada is a fully abolitionist country, the only
Canadians at risk of execution for crime are those in foreign countries. Countries such as Iran,
Saudi Arabia, and even the United States may have Canadians at risk of execution.
Not everyone agrees with the idea of abolishing the death penalty. Some reasons for this
are that they feel the country needs to be tough on crime. They feel by giving such harsh and
inhumane punishments, other criminals or people thinking of attempting crime will have a
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change of heart due to fear of death. Some people feel that every criminal chose to commit the
crime they are being tried for. Because of this assumption they support the death penalty and
believe the criminal should have had that in mind before carrying out their actions. In some
cases, people support the death penalty because it cheaper than keeping a prisoner in jail. In the
United States, imprisonment costs an average of more than $31,000 per prisoner per year,
nationwide. It costs as much as $60,000 in some states. Meanwhile in Canada in the federal
scheme, the cost of holding adults in detention is usually greater. On average, spending on
custodial care rose to around $330 a day per federal inmate in 2017/2018, or $120,571 annually,
compared to $233 per day for provincial/territorial prisoners, or $84,915 annually for
provincial/territorial offenders.
From my point of view, I feel the death penalty should remain banned. Yes, these
people have been found guilty of heinous crimes, but to me they are still human. If the goal of
prison is to reform a criminal, then there is no reason for the death penalty to be put in place
because it does not actually do any reforming. There are also cases where the person convicted
of a crime is innocent. In the case of someone being put to death for murder, it is hypocritical to
kill the person. If there is one advantage to banning the death penalty it is that there could be a
significant decrease in murder rates. The proof of this shows when in 2003, 27 years since the
abolishment of death penalty, the murder rate in Canada dropped by 44% from 1975, when the
death penalty was still imposed. I am glad to live in a country where capital punishment is
abolished.
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References

Death Penalty Information Center. (2019, June 20). Early History of the Death Penalty.

https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/history-of-the-death-penalty/early-history-

of-the-death-penalty#:%7E:text=Early%20Death%20Penalty%20Laws,penalty%20for

%2025%20different%20crimes.

Bienen, L. B., & Denno, D. W. (2010). Murder and Its Consequences: Essays on Capital

Punishment in America. Northwestern University Press.

U.S. capital punishment - total executions by state 1976-2019. (2019, November 18). Statista.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/199090/total-number-of-executions-in-the-us-by-state/

Death Penalty Information Center. (2020, September 24). 2020.

https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/2020

Death Penalty in Canada. (2018, July 25). Amnesty International Canada.

https://www.amnesty.ca/our-work/issues/death-penalty-support-abolition/death-penalty-

canada

Mills, E. (2019, April 29). How much does it cost to send someone to prison? Marketplace.

https://www.marketplace.org/2017/05/19/how-much-does-it-cost-send-someone-prison/