...countries in the debate. Some oppose this form of punishment based on moral and judicial grounds. These grounds include wrongful conviction base on DNA tests. Other grounds include wrongful conviction based on race. Those supporting death penalty argue that death penalty creates a feeling of safety since it instills fear in potential criminals. They also hold that those convicted despite their race actually did the crime they are convicted for. Some countries like Canada and New Zealand do not believe in the administration of death penalty as a means of punishment. Therefore, until today there is no agreed provision used by the judiciary to reach at a decision of such cases. United States, China and Japan among other countries believe that death penalty is a favorable sentence. United States has authorized death penalty in most federal governments, including the military. Some of the methods used in death penalty include the electric chair. Most of these procedures used in death penalty have been considered to be violating constitutional rights. Though fewer legislatures have been made to change these procedures, death penalty should be abolished. This is the position that is appropriate and offer should be supported. It is a racist tool of criminal punishment. Evidences explaining the reasons against this issue are clearly highlighted in the issue. The arguments behind the support of death penalty as a criminal punishment tool are at no point strong enough to be supported...
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...Title: Thompson V. Oklahoma Citation: 487 US 815 (1988) Argued: (Nov 9, 1987) Decided: (Jun 29, 1988) Facts of the Case: On the night of January 23, William Wayne Thompson brutally murdered his brother in law Charles Keene with the help of his three other companions. During the time of murdered Thompson was only fifteen years old while his friends were older than him. He was tried as an adult and later him and his friends were found guilty and sentenced to death. Thompson’s lawyer didn’t agree with the decision of the lower court and take it to the Oklahoma Appeals Court but they also confirmed the lower court decision. Then Thompson’s lawyer went to the Supreme court and said that giving a capital punishment to a minor child is a violation...
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...sentenced by a jury to death on account of capital murder charges as well as armed robbery and abduction. In response, Atkins appealed the ruling of the trial court on the ground that sentencing a mentally retarded criminal to death was a cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment. Prior to Atkins, in 1989, merely 13 years earlier, the United States Supreme Court ruled the Eighth Amendment does not categorically prohibit the execution of mentally retarded capital murderers in the case Penry v Lynaugh (“Penry v Lynaugh”). The verdict of this case gave state legislatures the ability to decide whether to adopt the death penalty or not, however, the United States Supreme Court limited the states' ability to execute. States are prohibited from executing minors and the insane; for reason that, these defendants' diminished capacity for reasoned judgment limits their culpability. Yet, the Supreme Court case, Atkins v Virginia, challenged the constitutionality in executing the mentally retarded, ultimately revisiting the limitation verdict of Penry v Lynaugh. The legal...
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...penal jurisprudence in abolishing the capital punishment. This is to counter the plenary provisions of Article 5 of International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 1966 and its protocol in 1989 where the State parties believed that abolition of death penalty should be in the scale of enhancement of human dignity and progressive development of human rights and recalling Article 3 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted on 10th December, 1948 as well as Article 21 of our Constitution.1 It can be judicially said “I don’t punish you for killing the man but so that the other cannot be killed.” That is, the chief aim of capital punishment is to make deterrent to others for same crime . Now this concept is having a new direction. The Supreme Court and High Courts in India interpret the cases before giving the death sentence as rarest of rare cases. The Court moves its eye also for other aspects of society. The landmark cases where death sentences were awarded in India are Ranga Billa case2, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi Assassination case, Laxman Nayak case 3 and the lastly, it was awarded to Dhananjoy Chatterjee on 14th August, 2004 in connection with Hetal Parikh case of West Bengal after the Supreme Court affirmed the death sentence awarded by lower courts and President also refused to grant him pardon. In the year 2003, Government laid a bill in the Parliament which proposed to add a provision of the punishment, like death sentence in the Drugs...
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...retribution. The punishment as a whole is flawed and there will always be a substantial risk of executing an innocent person. This negative aspect cannot be overlooked. Furthermore, the cost of this farce is completely appalling and we should not continue to irresponsibly waste crucial funding of the criminal justice system in this way. Capital punishment is hurting our government more than it is helping. Unless the research proves that it is an effective form of deterrence, we should abolish this form of punishment outright. I do not see how the death penalty would deter anyone from committing a heinous act. This is because someone in the commission of a crime is not thinking about sitting in a court room and being sentenced to death. Many people use the term “eye for an eye” but is this the right way to uphold justice? For the reasons of lack of substantial evidence of capital punishment being an effective deterrent, the wasteful spending of valuable funds, and the potential death of innocent people, I do not support the use of the death penalty. For centuries, governments have tried to utilize the death sentence for deterrence and to keep the crime rate lowered. We must ask ourselves, does executing wrongdoers actually lower the rates of crime punishable by death? In my research, I have come to the conclusion that this is not a successful deterrent. It has been debated for many years as to what is a better deterrent, life in prison or capital punishment. In a journal...
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...new situations. Since Justices are appointed for life, when the Supreme Court rules on an issue involving the interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, that judgment is final unless altered by a constitutional amendment or the Court’s subsequent ruling (Booklet). The Court decides whether specific state statutes are applied rightly or whether a person’s Constitutional rights have been violated. The Constitutionality of the death penalty in the United States has been decided by the Justices of the Supreme Court based on cases appealed from different states. The people who founded the United States came from England and European countries where there had always been a death penalty. This does not mean there are no reasons for states to abolish the death penalty; just that it is currently legal for the states to have this punishment. The present controversy started when the Supreme Court decided in Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238 (1972), that imposition and carrying out of the death penalty in the cases before it constituted cruel and unusual punishment and violated Mr. Furman’s rights under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. There was no argument that Mr. Furman committed a violent murder. The problem was that the Georgia statute used to sentence him to death was badly written. An extremely severe punishment was being imposed in an arbitrary and capricious manner. The Georgia...
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...Running Head: CAPITAL PUNISHMENT The Problem of Capital Punishment Charles W Lortz Kaplan University CM220-T The Problem of Capital Punishment The issue of capital punishment is a troublesome topic that encompasses many moral and empirical aspects of human justice. Ultimately, the key issue regarding the death penalty is as follows: is the death penalty as appropriate form of punishment for the United States of America’s judicial system to impose? This key issue incorporates the empirical and moral claims of those both for and against capital punishment in America. The main empirical issues center on whether or not the death penalty is imposed with bias, whether it serves as deterrence for future crimes, and whether it is an economically beneficial option for the country. Moral concerns include the idea of justice being “an eye for an eye,” whether or not capital punishment is “playing God,” and if the death penalty is a cruel and unusual form of punishment. The position we recommend to our legislators is opposition to capital punishment because evidence demonstrates that it is biased, unjust, fails to deter crime, is not cost effective, and cruel and unusual government action. The death penalty in America dates back to the colonial period. Its use was fragmented at best throughout the colonies and eventually the states, with each state having its own laws concerning the use of capital punishment. As long as it has existed in the United States, there has been controversy...
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...Clementina Arriaga Racial Discrimination in the Death Penalty The death penalty is a punishment in which a person is executed for having committed a serious crime. This punishment has been carried out in many different ways all over the world and has been around for many centuries. Since it started here in the United States, however, we have been seeing racial discrimination in sentencing to the death penalty. An African American man who kills a white man is more likely to be sentenced to this punishment than a white man if he kills an African American. African Americans form most of the minority group here in the United States and they are a majority that are falling in this discriminating situation. Being sentenced to the death penalty is an unjust way of punishment for any crime committed, and it is even worse to be sentenced to the death penalty because of the race or class standing of a convict. The race of the convict and the race of the defendant in capital cases are major factors in determining who is sentenced to die in this country. This is ethically wrong. It is choosing to end someone’s life because we do not like their physical appearance or because they cannot afford their way out of it. This is unconstitutional and is definitely not a way to practice for our safety. It is a choice made by a judge that can easily be protected by the law, and that is unfair. We need a system that affords the same fairness to everyone, that does not accept racial discrimination...
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...version of your title should be in all capital letters. On subsequent pages, the shortened version of your title should appear on the lefthand side, with a page number on the right-hand side. For additional information, visit the Ashford Writing Center located in Constellation. Click on Ch 7 -Sample Paper with Formatting Instructions. [Jayno Aki-Siler (TA)] The Death Penalty: Is it a Flawed System? PHI103 Informal Logic – Week 5 Final Paper Instructor: Galen Johnson December 16, 2012 -1- 2 Death Penalty The Death Penalty: Is it a Flawed System? People have many arguments against the death penalty, and most citizens do not believe that it is a discouragement for the crimes that it punishes. American societies that use capital punishment do not find that they have lower crime rates than those that don’t 1 use capital punishment. Most people would still not accept capital punishment even if it did reduce the crime rate. This indicates that capital punishment is focused on the financially deprived, and targets those who can’t afford to pay for a good lawyer. Research shows that people with little or no money get the highest penalties in society. A lot of people have no respect for what they do and care very little about their jobs as well as other people. A lot of these same people are running our criminal justice system. This same racial discrimination in the United States has entered into our legal system making capital punishment a mistaken and flawed program. If these...
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...The Death Penalty In his essay "The Case Against the Death Penalty", this appears in Crime and Criminals: Opposing Viewpoints, Eric Freedman disputes that the death penalty not only does not avert violent crime but also works against compressing the crime rate. Professor Freedman is a distinguished educator who has two essential areas of academic interest. The first is constitutional law and history, with a special emphasis on the history of the Revolutionary period, First Amendment topics, and separation of powers The second is litigation-centered and includes the fields of civil and criminal procedure and strategy, with a focus on the death penalty and habeas corpus. Freedman says, "The death penalty not only is useless in itself, but counterproductive . . ." (140). This paper will examine Freedman's article from the viewpoints of a politician, middle-age working man, and a poor person. In Freedman's article, he argues that the death penalty does not deter crime. He also argues that states that use the death penalty have crime rates that are nearly identical from those states that do not have the death penalty. He also states that criminal cases in which the death penalty is wanted are much more costly to investigate and try, thus denying much-needed funds to programs that have been proven to diminish crime. A politician is likely to disagree with Freedman because he believes a price tag should not be put on doing the things that are right. In Freedman's article he stated...
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...The word “murder” often makes people think of knives, criminals, and guns. However, a method of murder that no one talks about is the death penalty. The death penalty is an inhumane technique of serving punishment to criminals with major crimes and currently legal in thirty-one states (“Death Penalty”). It is “...the most extreme form of criminal sanction that the criminal justice system can implement” (Ross 183) and has been a controversial topic throughout the United States. Those for the death penalty often say, “a life for a life” or that it is “costly to keep them in prison” (Ziesel 289). Those against it say it is “wrong to take a life” or “punishment should be left to God” (Ziesel 289). This tactic has a discriminatory nature, violates...
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...CAPITAL PUNISHMNET: THE RIGHT TO KILL Capital Punishment: The Right to Kill Debra Gonzalez University of Phoenix Axia Capital Punishment: The Right to Kill Capital punishment has been a source of debate since its inception; the public continues to dispute this highly controversial issue. A struggle exists between Americans who are fighting for a safe and secure society and those individuals who want to abolish the death penalty. Capital punishment may be a controversial subject; however, it is a critical issue that must be addressed in today's violent society. Many people can not decide if the death penalty provides the necessary punishment and deterrent effect that is needed for criminals but, capital punishment is an aspect of criminal sentencing that needs to be evaluated. The United States Supreme Court judgment in Furman vs. Georgia in 1972 came to the decision that the death penalty was a violation of the eight amendment because of the inconsistent manner by which it was carried out. However, in the 1970s, 34 states across the nation ratified new legislation on capital punishment that met the standards set by the Supreme Court. The most significant change in the history of death penalty cases transpired when United States legislators and the Congress passed what is now know as the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act .This made a capital punishment sentence possible for various federal crimes. Across this Nation there were approximately...
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...evokes strong feelings, pro and con. These feelings and responses to certain crimes provide a virtual emotional roller coaster ride depending on circumstances. The killings of two Detroit Police Officers earlier this year proved to be no different. 3 Table of Contents Abstract ………..……………………………………………………………………..2 Table of Contents………………………………………………………………….....3 Introduction…………………………………………………………………………..4 Background and Significance…………………………………………………….....5 Michigan Connection………………………………………………………………...8 Literature Review…………………………………………………………………..12 Results/Summary.......................................................................................................25 Cited Works………………………………………………………………………...29 4 Introduction Capital punishment is the imposition of the death...
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...the lower court, the opportunity for review by an alternate court initialized by filing a claim stating that the trial court committed legal errors impacting the outcome of the case. Grounds for an appeal may include insufficient evidence, a violation of rights, or even possible mistakes made by the judge or the jury (Lawfirms.com, 2012). In order for an appeal to proceed, the appellate court must determine that the appellant (the party bringing the appeal) has the legal right to bring the case and whether the appellant has standing, meaning that the appellant has a legally recognizable interest in the case. The party opposing the appeal is called the appellee. Once the appellant files the notice of appeal to the court, both the appellant and appellee each file a brief which outlines the basic facts of the case, the argument made by the party filing the brief, and lists cases serving as supporting precedents (Meyer & Grant, 2003). Appeals are integral to criminal procedures and processes. Some types of appeals include the direct appeal, discretionary appeal, and interlocutory appeal (University of Phoenix, 2011). A direct appeal is filed when the consequences of errors are significant enough that the appellate courts are mandated to review them; such as a judge excluded evidence that may have helped the defendant. A discretionary appeal is filed by the appellant based on specific errors in a case such as laws improperly applied to the facts of the case. The...
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...another, s/he will be punished with capital punishment. This basic proposition has been accepted by most of the earlier human societies and it has not been questioned until the modern humanitarian movement has taken momentum. Capital punishment is a relevant issue for every human society and it constitutes a “dilemma of hidden human divinity versus hubristic capital punishment.” The concept of a right to life is central to debates on the issues of capital punishment, euthanasia, self defense, abortion and war. In 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly declared in article three: “Everyone has the right to life, liberty, and security of person.” A central principle of a just society is that every person has an equal right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Within that framework, an argument for capital punishment can be formulated along the following lines: some acts are so vile and so destructive of community that they invalidate the right of the perpetrator to membership and even to life. Those who violate the personhood of others, especially if this is done persistently as a habit must pay the ultimate penalty. This punishment must be inflicted for the sake of maintaining the community whose foundation has been violated. We can debate whether some non-lethal alternative is a fitting substitute for the capital punishment. But the standard of judgment is whether the punishment fits the crime and sufficiently honors...
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