“Death Penalty: Justice or Revenge?”
The potential punishment for committing a capital offense within 38 states of the U.S. is the death penalty. In the remaining thirteen states, it is merely life imprisonment. One wonders how the majority of the world manages to survive without this form of retributive justice. The truth is that there is no ‘justice’ in taking a life for a life. As David Bruck said in ‘The Death Penalty’, “What really fuels the death penalty is the justifiable frustration and rage of people who see that the government is not coping with violent crime. So what if the death penalty doesn’t work? At least it gives us the satisfaction of knowing that we got one or two of the sons of bitches.” (485). Consequently, is the death penalty justice, or is it just plain blood thirst?
Considering the arbitrariness of the American criminal justice system, meaning that laws are subject to individual judgment or preference by a court or judge rather than a specific law or statue, there is great room for error in both the conviction and execution of the accused. Stephen B. Bright, an attorney and the director of the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta, informs the reader in ‘Why the U.S. Will Abandon Capital Punishment’ that, “Law enforcement officers, usually overworked and often under tremendous public pressure to solve terrible crimes, make mistakes, fail to pursue all lines of investigation, and, on occasion, overreach or take shortcuts in pursuing arrests. Prosecutors exercise vast and unchecked discretion in deciding which cases are to be prosecuted as capital cases. The race of the victim and the defendant, political considerations, and other extraneous factors influence whether prosecutors seek the death penalty and whether juries or judges impose it.” (157). As Bright has explained, the law can not only be translated in different ways, it can be molded to the personal beliefs of the person meting out ‘justice’, in many cases resulting in wrongful convictions.
Some would argue that there are more than enough barriers placed in the judicial system to protect the innocent and that the American justice system revolves around the motto ‘innocent until proven guilty.’ However, not only do the innocent often suffer needlessly for crimes they did not commit, but the statistics prove that, in reality, this is not true. Stephen Bright states that until the intervention of DNA tests, many people who were wrongfully convicted were executed. This changed considerably by 2002. By this time, more than 100 people who would have been executed were saved by DNA tests. This is limited only to those cases where DNA tests could be used. In many others, there was no DNA to test. Also, Bright emphasizes that, “Over 100 people condemned to death in the last 30 years have been exonerated and released after new evidence established their innocence or cast such doubt on their guilt that they could not be convicted.” (158)
. One case cited in his essay is that of Eddie Joe Lloyd, who was wrongly convicted for the rape and murder of a 16-year-old girl and spent seventeen years in jail for a crime he did not commit, until DNA testing proved that he was innocent. Since he was convicted in Michigan, a state that does not practice capital punishment, his life was spared long enough for him to be
freed. If he had been in a state where the death penalty was legal, he would have been executed. (159-60). Bright goes on to say, “In the South, the death penalty is most often imposed and carried out, over half the victims of crime are people of color, well over 60 percent of the prison population is made up of people of color, and half of those sentenced to death are members of racial minorities. Yet people of color are seldom judges, jurors, prosecutors, and lawyers in the courts.
For example, there is not one African American or Hispanic judge on the nine-member Texas Court of Criminal Appeals…even though 43 percent of the population of Texas is nonwhite, over 65 percent of homicide victims are people of color, and nearly 70 percent of the prison population is black, Hispanic or nonwhite.” (165). If the system worked, innocent people would not have to spend large chunks of their life in jail for crimes they never committed simply because of faulty procedures and factors such as arbitrariness, lack of reliable witnesses, and racial biases.
Some people claim that the death penalty somehow upholds the ‘eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth’ theory and that the victim’s life can only be honored by taking yet another human life. As Bruck put it, “This lottery of death both comes from and encourages an attitude toward human life that is not reverent, but reckless… He suggests that we trivialize murder unless we kill murderers. By that logic, we also trivialize rape unless we sodomize rapists.” (485). To say justice can only be served if a person is killed for capital offenses is pure nonsense. As Bruck suggested, if these convicts are already punished by life imprisonment, there is no need to end their lives. Society is safe from them as long as they are in prison. If the government continues to pursue retributive ‘justice,’ or revenge, in this manner, it will be committing the same crime for which it is ending these lives.
The only way to end this barbaric practice of legal killing is to learn that justice does not require blood. It only requires fair punishment for proven guilt. Instead of taking lives, we have to teach others the value of life. The death penalty does not accomplish this and allows for the irrevocable act of execution. Allowing the death of children, the falsely convicted and the mentally ill by execution does not do this. The thirst for revenge satisfies no one. If we are to show true value for life and true respect for the victim, those charged and proven guilty for capital offenses should be given life imprisonment and made to suffer a pointless life. That is the only true justice known to mankind at this point in time. All other methods of chastisement are futile, barbaric and completely unjust. As Bright concludes, “The American people will ultimately reach the same conclusion, deciding that, like slavery and segregation, the death penalty is a relic of another era… And the United States will join the rest of the civilized world in abandoning capital punishment.” (485).
Works Cited
Bright, Stephen B. “Why the United States Will Join the Rest of the World in Abandoning Capital Punishment.” Debating the Death Penalty. Eds. Hugo Adam Bedau and Paul G. Gassell. Oxford University Press, 2004. 152-82.
Bruck, David. “The Death Penalty.” The Macmillan Writer. Eds. Judith Nadell, Linda McMeniman, and John Langan. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2000. 482-85.
Tags: DEATH PENALTY, JUSTICE, LIFE, REVENGE
May 20, 2008 at 1:47 am
May that day come sooner rather than later.
June 28, 2008 at 11:34 pm
The Death Penalty: Neither Hatred nor Revenge
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters, contact info below
Death penalty opponents say that the death penalty has a foundation in hatred and revenge. Such is a false claim.
A death sentence requires pre existing statutes, trial and appeals, considerations of guilt and due process, to name but a few. Revenge requires none of these and, in fact, does not even require guilt or a crime.
The criminal justice system goes out of its way to take hatred and revenge out of the process. That is why we have a system of pre existing laws and legal procedures that offer extreme protections to defendants and those convicted and which limit punishments and prosecutions to specific crimes.
It is also why those directly affected by the murder are not allowed to be fact finders in the case.
The reality is that the pre trial, trial. appellate and executive clemency/commutation processes offer much much greater time, money and human resources to capital cases than they do to any other cases, meaning that the facts tell us that defendants and convicted murderers, subject to the death penalty, receive much greater care and concern than those not facing the death penalty – the opposite of a sytem marked with vengeance.
Calling executions a product of hatred and revenge is simply a way in which some death penalty opponents attempt to establish a sense of moral superiority. It can also be a transparent insult which results in additional hurt to those victim survivors who have already suffered so much and who believe that execution is the appropriate punishment for those who murdered their loved one(s).
Far from moral superiority, those who call capital punishment an expression of hatred and revenge are often exhibiting their contempt for those who believe differently than they do.
The pro death penalty position is based upon those who find that punishment just and appropriate under specific circumstances.
Those opposed to execution cannot prove a foundation of hatred and revenge for the death penalty any more than they can for any other punishment sought within a system such as that observed within the US – unless such opponents find all punishments a product of hatred and revenge – an unreasonable, unfounded position
Far from hatred and revenge, the death penalty represents our greatest condemnation for a crime of unequaled horror and consequence. Lesser punishments may suffice under some circumstances. A death sentence for certain heinous crimes is given in those special circumstances when a jury finds such is more just than a lesser sentence.
Less justice is not what we need.
A thorough review of the criminal justice system will often beg this question: Why have we chosen to be so generous to murderers and so contemptuous of the human rights and suffering of the victims and future victims?
The punishment of death is, in no way, a balancing between harm and punishment, because the innocent murder victim did not deserve or earn their fate, whereas the murderer has earned their own, deserved punishment by the free will action of violating societies laws and an individuals life and, thereby, voluntarily subjecting themselves to that jurisdictions judgment.
copyright 2001-2008 Dudley Sharp
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters
e-mail sharpjfa@aol.com, 713-622-5491,
Houston, Texas
Mr. Sharp has appeared on ABC, BBC, CBS, CNN, C-SPAN, FOX, NBC, NPR, PBS , VOA and many other TV and radio networks, on such programs as Nightline, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, The O’Reilly Factor, etc., has been quoted in newspapers throughout the world and is a published author.
A former opponent of capital punishment, he has written and granted interviews about, testified on and debated the subject of the death penalty, extensively and internationally.
Pro death penalty sites
homicidesurvivors(dot)com/categories/Dudley%20Sharp%20-%20Justice%20Matters.aspx
www(dot)dpinfo.com
www(dot)cjlf.org/deathpenalty/DPinformation.htm
www(dot)clarkprosecutor.org/html/links/dplinks.htm
www(dot)coastda.com/archives.html
www(dot)lexingtonprosecutor.com/death_penalty_debate.htm
www(dot)prodeathpenalty.com
www(dot)yesdeathpenalty.com/deathpenalty_co
yesdeathpenalty.googlepages.com/home2 (Sweden)
www(dot)wesleylowe.com/cp.html
Permission for distribution of this document, in whole or in part, is approved with proper attribution.
June 28, 2008 at 11:35 pm
The Death Penalty in the US: A Review
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters, contact info below
NOTE: Detailed review of any of the below topics, or others, is available upon request
In this brief format, the reality of the death penalty in the United States, is presented, with the hope that the media, public policy makers and others will make an effort to present a balanced view on this sanction.
Innocence Issues
Death Penalty opponents have proclaimed that 128 inmates have been “released from death row with evidence of their innocence”, in the US, since the modern death penalty era began, post Furman v Georgia (1972).
That number is a fraud.
Those opponents have intentionally included both the factually innocent (the “I truly had nothing to do with the murder” cases) and the legally innocent (the “I got off because of legal errors” cases), thereby fraudulently raising the “innocent” numbers. This is easily confirmed by fact checking.
Death penalty opponents claim that 24 such innocence cases are in Florida. The Florida Commission on Capital Cases found that 4 of those 24 MIGHT be innocent — an 83% error rate in for the claims of death penalty opponents. Other studies show their error rate to be about 70%.
Therefore, 20-25 of the alleged 127 innocents MIGHT be actually innocent — a 0.3% actual guilt error rate for the over 8000 sentenced to death since 1973. The actual innocents were all freed,
It is often claimed that 23 innocents have been executed in the US since 1900. Nonsense. Even the authors of that “23 innocents executed” study proclaimed “We agree with our critics, we never proved those (23) executed to be innocent; we never claimed that we had.” While no one would claim that an innocent has never been executed, there is no proof of an innocent executed in the US, at least since 1900.
No one disputes that innocents are found guilty, within all countries. However, when scrutinizing death penalty opponents claims, we find that when reviewing the accuracy of verdicts and the post conviction thoroughness of discovering those actually innocent incarcerated, that the US death penalty process may be one of the most accurate criminal justice sanctions in the world.
Under real world scenarios, not executing murderers will always put many more innocents at risk, than will ever be put at risk of execution.
Deterrence Issues
16 recent US studies, inclusive of their defenses, find a deterrent effect of the death penalty.
All the studies which have not found a deterrent effect of the death penalty have refused to say that it does not deter some. The studies finding for deterrence state such. Confusion arises when people think that a simple comparison of murder rates and executions, or the lack thereof, can tell the tale of deterrence. It cannot.
Both high and low murder rates are found within death penalty and non death penalty jurisdictions, be it Singapore, South Africa, Sweden or Japan, or the US states of Michigan and Delaware. Many factors are involved in such evaluations. Reason and common sense tell us that it would be remarkable to find that the most severe criminal sanction — execution — deterred none. No one is foolish enough to suggest that the potential for negative consequences does not deter the behavior of some. Therefore, regardless of jurisdiction, having the death penalty will always be an added deterrent to murders, over and above any lesser punishments.
Racial issues
White murderers are twice as likely to be executed in the US as are black murderers and are executed, on average, 12 months more quickly than are black death row inmates.
It is often stated that it is the race of the victim which decides who is prosecuted in death penalty cases. Although blacks and whites make up about an equal number of murder victims, capital cases are 6 times more likely to involve white victim murders than black victim murders. This, so the logic goes, is proof that the US only cares about white victims.
Hardly. Only capital murders, not all murders, are subject to a capital indictment. Generally, a capital murder is limited to murders plus secondary aggravating factors, such as murders involving burglary, carjacking, rape, and additional murders, such as police murders, serial and multiple murders. White victims are, overwhelmingly, the victims under those circumstances, in ratios nearly identical to the cases found on death row.
Any other racial combinations of defendants and/or their victims in death penalty cases, is a reflection of the crimes committed and not any racial bias within the system, as confirmed by studies from the Rand Corporation (1991), Smith College (1994), U of Maryland (2002), New Jersey Supreme Court (2003) and by a view of criminal justice statistics, within a framework of the secondary aggravating factors necessary for capital indictments.
Class issues
No one disputes that wealthier defendants can hire better lawyers and, therefore, should have a legal advantage over their poorer counterparts. The US has executed about 0.15% of all murderers since new death penalty statutes were enacted in 1973. Is there evidence that wealthier capital murderers are less likely to be executed than their poorer ilk, based upon the proportion of capital murders committed by different those different economic groups? Not to my knowledge.
Arbitrary and capricious
About 10% of all murders within the US might qualify for a death penalty eligible trial. That would be about 64,000 murders since 1973. We have sentenced 8000 murderers to death since then, or 13% of those eligible. I doubt that there is any other crime which receives a higher percentage of maximum sentences, when mandatory sentences are not available. Based upon that, as well as pre trial, trial, appellate and clemency/commutation realities, the US death penalty is likely the least arbitrary and capricious criminal sanctions in the US.
Christianity and the death penalty
The two most authoritative New Testament scholars, Saints Augustine and Aquinas, provide substantial biblical and theological support for the death penalty. Even the most well known anti death penalty personality in the US, Sister Helen Prejean, author of Dead Man Walking, states that “It is abundantly clear that the Bible depicts murder as a capital crime for which death is considered the appropriate punishment, and one is hard pressed to find a biblical ‘proof text’ in either the Hebrew Testament or the New Testament which unequivocally refutes this. Even Jesus’ admonition ‘Let him without sin cast the first stone,’ when He was asked the appropriate punishment for an adulteress (John 8:7) — the Mosaic Law prescribed death — should be read in its proper context. This passage is an ‘entrapment’ story, which sought to show Jesus’ wisdom in besting His adversaries. It is not an ethical pronouncement about capital punishment.” A thorough review of Pope John Paul II’s position, reflects a reasoning that should be recommending more executions.
Cost Issues
All studies finding the death penalty to be more expensive than life without parole exclude important factors, such as (1) geriatric care costs, recently found to be $69,0000/yr/inmate, (2) the death penalty cost benefit of providing for plea bargains to a maximum life sentence, a huge cost savings to the state, (3) the death penalty cost benefit of both enhanced deterrence and enhanced incapacitation, at $5 million per innocent life spared, and, furthermore, (4) many of the alleged cost comparison studies are highly deceptive.
Polling data
76% of Americans find that we should impose the death penalty more or that we impose it about right (Gallup, May 2006 – 51% that we should impose it more, 25% that we impose it about right)
71% find capital punishment morally acceptable – that was the highest percentage answer for all questions (Gallup, April 2006, moral values poll). In May, 2007, the percentage dropped to 66%, still the highest percentage answer, with 27% opposed. (Gallup, 5/29/07)
81% of the American people supported the execution of Timothy McVeigh, with only 16% opposed. “(T)his view appears to be the consensus of all major groups in society, including men, women, whites, nonwhites, “liberals” and “conservatives.” (Gallup 5/2/01).
81% of Connecticut citizens supported the execution of serial rapist/murderer Michael Ross (Jan 2005).
While 81% gave specific case support for Timothy McVeigh’s execution, Gallup also showed a 65% support AT THE SAME TIME when asked a general “do you support capital punishment for murderers?” question. (Gallup, 6/10/01).
22% of those supporting McVeigh’s execution are, generally, against the death penalty (Gallup 5/02/01). That means that about half of those who say they oppose the death penalty, with the general question, actually support the death penalty under specific circumstances, just as it is imposed, judicially.
Further supporting the higher rates for specific cases, is this, from the French daily Le Monde December 2006 (1): Percentage of respondents in favor of executing Saddam Hussein:USA: 82%; Great Britain: 69%; France: 58%; Germany: 53%; Spain: 51%; Italy: 46%
Death penalty support is much deeper and much wider than we are often led to believe, with 50% of those who say they, generally, oppose the death penalty actually supporting it under specific circumstances, resulting in 80% death penalty support in the US, as recently as December 2006.
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Whatever your feelings are toward the death penalty, a fair accounting of how it is applied should be demanded.
copyright 1998-2008 Dudley Sharp
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters
e-mail sharpjfa@aol.com, 713-622-5491,
Houston, Texas
Mr. Sharp has appeared on ABC, BBC, CBS, CNN, C-SPAN, FOX, NBC, NPR, PBS , VOA and many other TV and radio networks, on such programs as Nightline, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, The O’Reilly Factor, etc., has been quoted in newspapers throughout the world and is a published author.
A former opponent of capital punishment, he has written and granted interviews about, testified on and debated the subject of the death penalty, extensively and internationally.
Pro death penalty sites
homicidesurvivors(dot)com/categories/Dudley%20Sharp%20-%20Justice%20Matters.aspx
www(dot)dpinfo.com
www(dot)cjlf.org/deathpenalty/DPinformation.htm
www(dot)clarkprosecutor.org/html/links/dplinks.htm
www(dot)coastda.com/archives.html
www(dot)lexingtonprosecutor.com/death_penalty_debate.htm
www(dot)prodeathpenalty.com
www(dot)yesdeathpenalty.com/deathpenalty_co
yesdeathpenalty.googlepages.com/home2 (Sweden)
www(dot)wesleylowe.com/cp.html
Permission for distribution of this document, in whole or in part, is approved with proper attribution.