Arguing in Favour of the Death Penalty

by army_girl_06 (student)

CRIMINAL JUSTICE

Death in the Criminal Justice System

Saura Jenson

Kaplan College

Death in the Criminal Justice System

The death penalty is an issue that has been debated in the past for many years. In today’s society and in the future it is an issue that will continue to be debated over for many years to come. Some believe the death penalty should be abolished while others believe the death penalty should remain an open and often used option. Although there are things that could be changed in dealing with the death penalty, it should not be completely abolished. The death penalty should be administered to those who commit heinous crimes, whether it involves murder or some other violent crime. It cheapens the life of an innocent murder victim to say that society has no right to keep the murderer from ever killing again. (Stewart) Society owes it to the victims of these criminals to hold them responsible for their actions and to have them pay the ultimate price with their own life.

One can look at judicial history and tell that just because someone is sentenced to death does not mean that it will actually happen. These people that are sentenced to death often times sit on death row for many years. For instance in Florida a spree killer named William Elledge, who confessed to his crimes and has openly discussed his guilt in interviews, will soon complete his 33rd year on death row with his appeals still unresolved (Von Drehle).

People in today’s society have become so liberal that they are willing to give everyone a second chance. People want to give the man who rapes and murders the same second chance as the boy who steals from the grocery store. It may just be that society goes through changes throughout time and that's way criminals are dealt with differently, but people should see a huge difference in the effect of those two crimes has on the rest of the population. People are not going to live in fear about going to the grocery store because a little boy has stolen something; however, they are going to think twice about going shopping by themselves at night when they've heard that a serial rapist and murderer is among them. All crimes should have a set punishment, but not necessarily the old eye for an eye way of thinking. Society has lightened punishments in recent years because the criminal shows remorse. What people fail to see is that remorse can easily be faked.

There are many good and bad points that opponents to the death penalty bring up, but there are also good and bad points that pro-death penalty believers argue. Opponents of capital punishment believe the death penalty is not beneficial. An eye for an eye makes the world blind(Bohm/Hittel). We execute those who commit these atrocious crimes so that they do not have the chance to kill again. Dr. Robert Blecker argues that the death penalty is necessary for punishing the worst criminals (Hittel). Heinous crimes seem to be no big deal and no shocking occurrence, in today’s society. It is sad to see that the world has come to a point where these heinous atrocities are common place and that few take notice.

The headlines are covered with people who have committed terrible crimes and sit on television laughing about what they've done, knowing they're not going to receive the death penalty for their crime. The death penalty is not handed out easily and the prosecutors do not just decide that they will seek it. Most states have certain guidelines that must be met before the death penalty can be considered. For instance in Colorado there has to be statutory aggravators, these aggravators can consist of many things but must show the crime was especially heinous, cruel or depraved or the murder of a police officer (Gutierrez).

The government and the judicial system has now become so bogged down and overcrowded that the thought of going to jail is like a joke, people know that if it is their first offense or even second most times today they can get a suspended sentence or probation because there is no room for them in the jail system. In jail some people have all the luxuries of home, cable television, three hot meals a day and the ability to take college classes. At one point in time, jail was somewhere a person feared to go. Now jails have all ...

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It seems that at least one-fourth, if not one-half, of the crimes committed sending people to jail deserve a harsher punishment and in some cases, the death penalty. The crime a person has to commit in order to receive the death penalty has dramatically changed over the past several years. It is now much more difficult for the state to seek the death penalty. Society seems to have the need to “think about” whether or not the death penalty should be sought. Determining whether or not a mother who has drowned all of her children or a man who has been confirmed in having raped, dismembered, and killed five boys under the age of ten in a matter of weeks should receive the death penalty does not seem to be a hard decision to make. There should be no questions asked and no second thoughts about putting those kinds of people to death.

The idea of the death penalty is not a bad one, but some of the procedures taken to actually make it happen should be changed. There have been so many times when a judge sentenced the death penalty and, still, twenty years later the convicted murderer was sitting on death row. There should be death penalty reform to insure that when the death penalty is the verdict in a case that the appeals will be swift and the sentence can be carried out within a reasonable amount of time. The way the system is set up right now it wastes a lot of time and money. Tax payers pay out millions of dollars for the prisoners legal fees and these prisoners are allowed to let their cases drag out for years. Pro death penalty supporters call for reform so that it can be carried out “fairly, justly and in a timely manner.” (Bailey) Opponents of the death penalty call for reform so that the death penalty can be done away with altogether and think that the criminals should all just be put into jail for life without parole. People fail to realize that the prisons are full and it costs millions of dollars to build more not to mention the cost of staffing and upkeep. With jail sentences, it does not seem to deter people from committing violent crimes, most of the time anyway, so at least with the death penalty there is some hope to try and prevent heinous crimes from occurring again. There have been studies done in recent years that show there is a possibility that the death penalty deters others from committing violent crimes. According to the recent studies for each inmate put to death there are anywhere from three to eighteen lives saved. (Liptak) Honestly though if the death penalty was a true deterrent to heinous crimes, we would not have so many problems, if the justice system used the death penalty in a more fair and swift manner it might be that the people in society that would commit crimes would think twice before doing so. Even if the death penalty is not a deterrent to any crime, it is a reasonable punishment and sentence that more people should receive for the crimes they commit.

People have such a lack of respect for the government and the laws that are set that it seems the only way to deal with such people is to give out a harsh sentence such as the death penalty. Putting to death one serial rapist or murderer is not going to stop rapes and murders from happening, but at least there will be one less person out in the world committing heinous crimes than there was before. The death penalty was originally created to be a deterrent to crime and it could get back to being that if people could see the government using the death penalty more frequently and swiftly. Jail houses have all the luxuries of living at home and if the death penalty is abolished people will commit serious crimes because they want to, rape because they want to rape, and steal because they want to steal knowing that nothing too terrible could possibly happen to them, after all what is life in prison when you get cable television, health care paid, three hot meals a day, a roof over your head and a bed to sleep in? Jail might not be their first pick of places to be, but it's certainly not their last when they know they're going to have food, clothing, and shelter. The death penalty is not used enough to be called our most effective method of deterring crime. In fact, at this point it is probably not the most effective way of deterring crime. If the government actually made people stay in jail for the amount of time they were assigned in their sentence, a lot less crime would be happening. People are getting sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole and in less than ten years in some instances can be back on the streets again.

How is that safe for the society and how is that holding to the sentence given to them by the judge? What does this say to the families of the victims of their crimes? This is the reason that the death penalty should remain in effect and should be used justly, fairly, and swiftly. It seems that both sides are being taken lightly but sometimes, if society is lucky, the death penalty is actually carried out and the thought of that person harming another innocent individual can be out of the minds of society for good. Putting someone behind bars for committing a heinous crime for ten years and then releasing them back to society should not comfort anyone.

Over the years, society has wavered on how the death penalty is viewed and sought. This wavering is due to many reasons, such as what crime was committed, did it shock the nation, was it very gruesome, did it involve a child, or a police officer? While these are all very good reasons to change views on the death penalty, there should be a standard that in these type cases the death penalty will be sought and if the case does not meet those standards then it should be life without parole. The sentence handed down by the jury or the judge should be followed through completely with no early release for good behavior or parole because one-third of your sentence has been completed. Society has to reach a compromise on what is just and fair and set the laws so that the punishment fits the crime.

What some people fail to notice is that a lot of times the cities and states with higher crime rates have fuller prisons and need another kind of punishment to keep killers or rapists off of the streets. The death penalty effectively and rationally does the job. Reforms are a necessity, nothing works well without reforms. Cutting the death penalty and sentencing the convicted to life without parole (Bailey) would just create higher populations in our prisons and cause the states to spend more money and space creating bigger facilities to all of the convicts being sentenced to life. A good reform idea would be the time the average convict waits on death row to be executed, 17 years in California, (Bailey). As the backlog on death row increases the threat that prison and capital punishment used to impose decreases in the eyes of the criminals. They know that the odds of them being executed before 10 years are very slim.

The death penalty should still be upheld in all 50 states. There are various arguments on why to cancel capital punishment and how it is unconstitutional but more of the evidence points to a decline in heinous crime rates since the death penalty came about. Reforms are definitely needed but to cut out the death penalty altogether is to rash of an act because the benefits out way the consequences and the what-if’s. The victims’ families of those criminals on death row should have justice in knowing that they received the highest and harshest punishment possible. Capital punishment is a highly debated issue today and has been since it was implemented. Until there is a change in society it will remain a hot button issue to be debated. Changes are needed to make the process better as a whole but it should never be abolished.

Reforms should include ensuring that the death penalty is carried out fairly, justly, and in a timelier manner, says John Van de Kamp. The evidence shows that California has the biggest backlog of death penalty cases with an average of more than 17 years waiting on death row.The death penalty has many restrictions as to who qualifies to be executed. The article states that the death penalty is reserved for particularly heinous crimes such as multiple homicides or the killing of children unless they meet a predetermined grade of willfulness or premeditation.

Findings indicate that in 2007 42 people in 10 different states were executed 26 of them being in Texas. The majority of them were white and all were men. At the end of 2007 35 of the 50 states had 3,220 inmate sentenced to death which went down from the number in 2006.The article states that the Electric Chair was first used in New York in 1980 and still used in 13 states, the Gas Chamber was used in Nevada in 1921 used only in a few states, and Lethal Injection was introduced in 1977 and is used in 23 states.

Numbers of people for the death penalty have fallen from previous years. The polls indicate that only 64% of people were in favor of the death penalty in 2008 compared to the 69% in 2007. In contrast the percentage of people who prefer the death penalty to life without parole has gone up 5% from 42% in 2004.

Scott Storey says that it takes the right kind of case where guilt is clear. Even when it’s a capital murder case a jury still has to convict the defendant with the death penalty. It is very difficult to get the death penalty even in mass murder cases.

Both Dr. Robert Blecker and Dr. Robert Bohm agree that the current process on death row is slow, unfair, and wasteful. Blecker argues that it is morally necessary for punishing the worst criminals while Bohm thinks that it is unnecessary.Liptak states that according to recent studies for each inmate put to death 3 to 18 murders are prevented. Even H. Naci Mocan who is opposed to the death penalty can’t deny that the evidence shows there is a deterrent effect on the rate of homicides.

Two- thirds of the population of America believes in capital punishment according to Stewart. Still the death penalty is rarely carried out and the value of the death penalty as it stands now is limited due to the slow appeals process.The death penalty in the United States has continued to exist countering the trends set in the rest of the developed world says Von Drehle. America has more revulsion to violent crime and higher belief in personal accountability. Fewer than 3 of 100 death penalties imposed in the United States are carried out in any given year notes Von Drehle.

References

Bailey, Eric. “Legal experts agree death penalty needs reforms but disagree on how.” 11 January 2008. LA Times. 11 December 2008 http://www.articles.latimes.com/2008/jan/11/local/me-death11

“Capital Punishment and the Deterrence Debate.” 2007. Columbia University. 11 December 2008. http://www.iserp.columbia.edu/news/article/capital_punishment.html

“Capital Punishment Statistics.” 2008. Bureau of Justice Statistics. 11 December 2008. http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/cp.htm

“Capital Punishment: Debate Over Capital Punishment—A Pro Stance.” Study World. 11 December 2008. http://www.studyworld.com/moral_issues/capital_punishment/debate_over_capital_punishment.html

“Gallup Poll.” 5 October 2008. Polling Report. 11 December 2008. http://pollingreport.com/crime.htm

Gutierrez, Hector. “’Aggravator’ Key for Death Penalty What’s Required? A Case that ‘Shocks’ the Community.” 9 December 2006. Rocky Mountain News. 11 December 2008. http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/dec/09/aggravator-key-for-death-penalty-whats-required/?partner=yahoo_headlines.

Hittel, Mary Elizabeth. “Capital Punishment Debate.” 6 April 2007. Student Operated Press. 11 December 2008. http://thesop.org/index.php?article=4954

Liptak, Adam. “Does Death Penalty Save Lives? A New Debate.” 18 November 2007. NY Times. 11 December 2008. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/18/us/18deter.html

Stewart, Steven D. “A Message From the Prosecuting Attorney.” 2008. The Clark County Prosecuting Attorney. 11 December 2008. http://www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/death.htm

Von Drehle, David. “Death Penalty Walking.” 03 January 2008. Time. 11 December 2008. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1699855,00.html