Capital Punishment Essay, Research Paper

Capital Punishment

Introduction

?Eye for an Eye? and ?Tooth for a Tooth? remains to be two of the 282 laws of justice that Hammurabi established. I am headed towards the topic of Capital Punishment. I am here to support Capital Punishment, and I believe that it has many positive effects to our society. One of the more common procedures in our country is the Death Penalty.

the death penalty is extraordinarily rare. Since 1967, there has been one execution for every 1600 murders, or 0.06%. There have been approximately 560,000 murders and 358 executions from 1967-1996 FBI’s Uniform Crime Report (UCR) & Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS). As a supporter of Capital Punishment, putting a murderer to death row deters crime, efficiently utilizes the public?s money, and is an equal retaliation.

Body

I personally believe that execution is an effective deterrent of crime. To support this argument, I think that if a person knows how fast you can be put to death by committing a crime, it will make them fully aware of their consequences in doing such crime. Although this doesn?t stand for all people, I can say that it is an educational statement that many believe to be true. For all the people that are rational in the thought, the punishment of death seems to be a likely deterrent. Safety is another reason why I am fore Capital Punishment. It guarantees the society that the convicted murderer will never be out to commit another crime, which takes away a persons fear for their life from that one person. Statistics by Dr. Isaac Ehrlich at the University of Chicago claimed that capital punishment is indeed a deterrent. His research has shown that if the death penalty is used in a consistent way, it may deter as many as 8 murderers for every execution carried out. Also, Life Imprisonment most of the time only gives the prisoner one last chance to get out of the punishment, because prisoners are continually growing in number which leads to overcrowded jail facilities. This allows the criminals to have an early parole than their sentence should have been which is totally wrong.

When a person?s minds intent is to kill someone, they should suffer and be executed. The opponents that are against Capital Punishment claims that a person executed could be innocent. While this could be true, and does happen, as a Christian, I believe that God will be the last person to make the final decision and judgment upon who is guilty or not. He will reconsider the fact of going to hell or heaven. If you did not commit the crime, he will be the one to make the final decision. And that?s the way a true Christian should view that issue. If you are not a believer, there are still many safeguards guaranteeing protection of the rights of those facing the death penalty.

Some Safe Guards:

1) Capital punishment may be imposed only when guilt is determined by clear and convincing evidence leaving no room for an alternative explanation of the facts.

2) Anyone sentenced to death shall receive the right to appeal to a court of higher jurisdiction

3) Anyone sentenced to death shall have the right to seek pardon

4) Persons below eighteen years of a age, pregnant women , new mothers or persons who have become insane shall not be sentenced to death

Capital Punishment, such as the death penalty, does in fact save money. Most people believe that it costs more to execute murderers than to imprison them for life, because of the cost of court appeals, and the time that it takes to carry out the death sentence procedure. But studies show that over time, Life Imprisonment costs more money overall than Life imprisonment does. JFA estimates that Life with out parole

Costs 1.2-3.6 million more dollars than equivalent death penalty cases. There is defiantly no question that the up front costs of the death penalty are much more higher than for equivalent LWOP cases. There also appears to be no question that, over time, equivalent LWOP cases are much more expensive – from $1.2 to $3.6 million – than death penalty cases.

Capital Punishment is also an equivalent form of punishment. When a person murders a person, they should be ready to have their life taken. The victim suffers more than the murderer on death row, because the victim deserved none of the suffering inflicted. The death of a murdered victim has a greater impact on their family, friends, and loved ones. For their loved one got murdered for unknown reasons. When a killer is executed, he is suffering the consequences upon what he did. It is only fair to punish someone equally upon what they did.

Bibliography

Us Vital Statistics Abstract, 1994, and C.P. 1995 BJS 1996

Death Penalty-American Civil Liberties Union