I have been reading alot about the death penalty recently, This issue has taken on a life of its own, we have arguments from abolitionists that it is cruel and barbaric. we have arguments from pro Death penalty saying and eye for an eye, and its a deterrent but is that really true? is either side right. I want to look at this issue from a logical side and let you make up your own mind.
Pro Death penalty advocates use the argument of ” why should society pay to house those that commit heinous crimes against society”, if we execute them we can save hundreds of thousands of dollars. this argument has long been used however the reality is it costs the tax payers so much more to execute then it does to imprison for life.
each capital case cost approximately $117,00 more than a non capital murder trial, the reason for this is because of the irreversibility of the sentence if it is carried out. the combination of Pre trial motions, expert witness costs and jury selections which in itself can be a long and drawn out process, add to the increased costs. After a person has been convicted and sentenced to death there is mandated appeals that again add a higher cost to a capital case for both the prosecution as well as the defense.
A single Death penalty case in the state of Texas costs the tax payers approximately $2.3 million dollars this is triple what it would cost to imprison the same individual in a single cell at the highest security level for a term of 40 years. Texas is not the only state where the costs of the Death penalty exceed that of incarceration if California were to abolish the Death penalty it is estimated that the state would save around $90 million annually, In Florida the cost of executing is six times higher then imprisoning and individual for life without parole.
The argument for pro Death penalty advocates using cost as a reason for keeping the death penalty loses all credibility when you look at the actual figures of what capital cases cost, with the financial gains that can be made from abolishing the death penalty more police could be hired, anti crime programs could be established, education and health care could also be given a financial boost.
Pro Death Penalty Advocates will tell us that the Death Penalty reduces Crime but is this really true? well not according to the statistics. in states that have abolished and then re instated the death penalty Violent crime rates remained the same with no significant reduction recorded, In 2005 According to the FBI the national murder rate in the United states was approximately 5.6 per 100,000 people, however in Texas the Murder Rate was 6.2 which is 11% higher then the national rate so in a state that leads the country in Executions having a murder rate 11% higher then the national average shows that as a deterrent Capital punishment doesn’t work.
The death penalty is irreversible, and with the growing numbers of people being found innocent through DNA and advances in technology is it really worth risking the life of a possibly innocent person. Remember that those on Death Row have families and loved ones. If an innocent person is executed that would in itself constitute a murder but who is then held accountable. There is no justice for that persons family. You can not go to a grieving family and say to them Oops sorry, we had the wrong man. Mistakes can and have been made there is no denying that and taking the life of an innocent can not be defended, State sanctioned or not.
On the 11th of May 2007 Curtis Edward McCarty was exonerated after spending 21 years in prison and 16 of those on Death Row in Oklahoma, McCarty was convicted not once but twice the first in 1986 and then again in 1989 both times being sentenced to Death, for the 1982 murder of Pamela Willis he was exonerated after DNA showed that sperm recovered from the victim did not match McCarty.
Charles Irvine Fain is another man that was released from Idaho’s death row, in 1983 Fain was convicted of the rape, kidnapping and Murder of Daralyn Johnson, however on the 23 August 2001 he was exonerated after DNA showed that the hairs found on the victim did not match Fain.
in both of these cases the real pepertrator is still out there and has yet to be found or identified.
Convicting these men served as not as a deterence but as an example that capital punishment is no deterent for the real killers and it also shows a flaw in the system if these men are innocent how many have already been executed that were also innocent, so many may have been and have payed for the crimes of someone else with thier lives and in society there is no justification for that.
in todays society we hear an eye for an eye as it is quoted by pro Death penalty advocates however I choose to follow the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi An eye for an Eye will send the whole world blind, how about you?
