In America, the goal of the criminal justice system is to control the way we act, punish those who don't act according the to the law, and to hopefully prevent as much unlawful behavior as possible. One way legislators attempted to do so was by implementing the death penalty. The death penalty, also known as capital punishment, is where one receives the sentence of death for a crime. Although it's been around since colonial times (Anckar 1), the death penalty has recently been a very controversial topic, and the question on whether or not this form of punishment should still be enforced must be seriously considered. Some states and countries have chosen to go their own way on this debate. Currently, the death penalty is implemented in thirty-one states in the United States. The state of Texas is one that has chosen keep the death penalty while Illinois no longer implements it. The country of South Africa decided to abolish the death penalty completely in 1995 (Anckar 2). Many more countries and states have begun to abolish capital punishment in recent years, which could be due to many misconceptions and realizations that have surfaced about the death penalty, and the fact that society is changing. The Changing Nature of the Death Penalty Debates claims that public opinion of the death penalty today has changed compared to twenty-five years ago and that as a nation we are heading towards abolition of the death penalty (Radelet 1). Public opinion should matter to legislators, as should if what they are enforcing is right and effective. American law surrounding the death penalty should be abolished because it's an inhumane and ineffective form of punishment that is costly and losing public support. 

 The death penalty is carried out in a couple of ways today, but when it originated around the 1600's in colonial America there were many more techniques that were used (Acker 2). These techniques were much harsher than they are today and they were given for much smaller crimes including burglary, counterfeiting, and theft (Acker 2). Imagine if the death penalty was implemented for those crimes today. In the second paragraph of his article, Acker gives specific examples of what methods were used to execute people during colonial times like public hanging, putting people in posts, and firing squads. These often entailed wild public gatherings and "raucous behavior" by those who came to watch. These methods no longer exist today because they are inhumane, but firing squads are actually still authorized in the state of Utah. In fact, the state implemented this method as recently as 2010 (Balko). However, most states abandoned hanging and posts in favor of the electric chair and gas chambers by the mid-20th century (Anckar 12). These methods are very questionable though as well, as botched executions have been reported for decades (Six Reasons Why Support for Capital Punishment is Evaporating). 

Electric chairs have many stories of botched executions. The chairs are made to send a quilt jolt of electricity directly to an inmate's heart for a speedy death, but one of many horror stories provided by The Innocence Project shows the cruel reality of what America is doing to people. In 1983 a man named John Evans faced the electric chair. The article reports that after the first jolt of electricity, the observing physicians witnessed sparks and flames shoot out from the electrode straps on Evans's legs and smoke come out from under the hood, which was meant to keep the inmate in place. Evans maintained a heartbeat, so the physicians readjusted the chair and applied another jolt of electricity. More smoking and burning flesh occurred. They continued to find a heartbeat, and even with Evans's lawyer pleading for them stop, they administered a third jolt. The execution took a total of fourteen minutes and left his body charred and smoking. Botched executions like these are why the most preferred method today is lethal injection (Balko), but lethal injections can be problematic as well. 

Lethal injections are another method used to execute death row inmates. Most states began to legalize this method in 1977 because it was seen as the most humane and least painful (Salk), and since then it's become the most preferred method (Balko). Lethal injections resemble modern day medical procedures, so it eases peoples minds as compared to the older forms of executions (Balko), but it has now been uncovered that lethal injections aren't as consistent with performing as promised. A study done in 2005 found that four out of ten people who are executed by lethal injections have been given inadequate anesthesia (Balko). One specific example Salk gives from her text "Lethal Injection in Uncharted Territory" is the case of a death row inmate named Dennis McGuire, who faced his death sentence at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility. In his case, the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and and Correction experienced a drug shortage and could no longer proceed with their typical lethal injection protocol. Rather than extending McGuire's time on death row to wait for the proper drugs, they wanted to go on with his execution using an untested drug medley. Although it was argued by McGuire's attorney that he could severely suffer and it was unknown how long it would take for him to die, it was approved by the federal court. Observers on the medical team report seeing his stomach swelling, fists clenching, and hearing him coughing and gasping for air while time was dragging on. Salk reports in her article that lethal injections are supposed to fully paralyze the victim so they do not feel a thing, which is important to keep in mind. McGuire was not pronounced dead until twenty-six minutes after his injection, which is noted as "the longest time ever recorded for a lethal injection death in Ohio history" (Salk). For one of the most accepted methods of executions, its strikingly inhumane for us to let someone suffer this much, and this is just one of many cases of botched executions. "It's rare that someone lives to tell about it  --  how an execution felt" (qtd. in Barry). To live through an execution for twenty minutes and to be in that type of pain is unfathomable, and we are the ones who condone this torture. In the notes of her article "Lethal Injections in Uncharted Territory", Salk gives a quote by Tierny Sneed where he reports that, "[t]here have been issues with lethal injection since it first came into use". Clearly, there needs to be an end to these problematic execution methods, because humanity is at risk. "When we take a guilty person's life we only add to the violence in an already violent culture and we demean our own dignity in the process" (qtd. in Gardiner 4). 

Not only are we allowing guilty people to be brutally killed, but we cannot deny the fact that innocent people are at risk for, and currently are, being executed today as well. In the United States alone at least three-hundred-thirty-seven people have been exonerated by DNA testing to date, including twenty who served time on death row (Grisham). It's good that innocent people are being relieved, but the fact that numerous innocent people have been found guilty and killed for crimes they did not commit is troublesome. There are many reasons for the occurrence of wrongful convictions such as faulty evidence, government misconduct, inadequate defense, and even false confessions (Grisham). Its been uncovered that in more than twenty-five percent of DNA exonerations, defendants who were found guilty of a crime actually falsely confessed. While giving a false confession seems unfeasible, the suspect may be subjected to duress, coercion, or harm during questioning. (Grisham). One example of a wrongful execution given in "10 Infamous Cases of Wrongful Execution - Criminal Justice Degrees Guide", is of a man named Claude Jones who was executed in 2000 for murdering a liquor store owner in Texas in 1989. The facts of this case were that there were three men who could be linked to the murder, including Jones, and there were two witnesses across the street who saw a car pull into the liquor store parking lot but could not see the killer. Jones claimed he was innocent and that he was in the car at the time of the murder. The deciding factor for the case was a hair strand found at the crime scene. At this point in time DNA testing was available. Despite Jones's attorney's petitions to get the strand of hair submitted for examination, a forensic expert testified that the hair appeared to belong to Jones. All the courts and the Texas Governor George W. Bush denied Jones, and he was found guilty with the sentence of the death penalty despite the weak evidence. After Jones's execution, The Innocence Project lawfully obtained the strand of hair in 2007 and had it tested. It in fact did not belong to Jones, but to the murder victim. This shows that there was no proof that Jones was ever in the liquor store, and there was not enough evidence to convict him. For a criminal case the evidence must be beyond a reasonable doubt and the defendant is innocent until proven guilty. Clearly for Jones, he was not given these chances since not all resources, such as DNA testing, were used, and therefore he was not treated fairly by the system. This occurs to more than one out of four people who are also wrongfully convicted (Grisham). The fact that an innocent person, or multiple, could be sitting on death row right now possibly facing one of these many injustices, or enduring the brutality of capital punishment, is not right. It's better to save someone who has done nothing wrong than to let them suffer for a crime they did not commit by enforcing the death penalty. 

Still, many people believe in enforcing the death penalty. According to Balko, about sixty percent of death penalty supporters say vengeance and retribution are the main reasons for their backing, meaning that they want the guilty person to receive justice for what they've done and they believe death is the proper or only way (Radelet 10). Basically, vengeance and retribution are a means for revenge. While punishing someone for doing wrong by the law is a key element of the criminal justice system, the sentence of death is not the only way to do so and is actually not effective. Statistics show that crime rates have been inconsistently rising and falling since 1960 (Six Reasons Why Support for Capital Punishment is Evaporating). The death penalty has the purpose of deterrence, which is the idea that by punishing offenders, others will be discouraged and threatened to not commit crimes (Radelet 3).  Clearly, if crime rates are not decreasing, it shows the ineffectiveness of the death penalty and that the goals of capital punishment are not being achieved. 

Some countries believe highly in the effectiveness and use of the death penalty (Anckar 1). In Why Countries Choose the Death Penalty on page three, Anckar labels the United States as a retentionist country, meaning the death penalty is fully allowed and has been carried out within the last ten years, as opposed to other countries who have restrictions on their death penalty laws or who don't implement the death penalty at all. In the news article Six Reasons Why Support for Capital Punishment Is Evaporating a Gallup sample taken recently in 2013 showed that support for the death penalty in the United States was at sixty percent. While sixty percent is a relatively high number, its actually far less than what has been in the past, so although the United States is a retentionist country, trends have shown a decline in support for the death penalty over the past few decades. For example, a Gallup survey from 1994 reported that support was at eighty percent and peaked, so support for the death penalty has only decreased since then (Radelet 2). A Pew Survey from 2013 also showed that when given the choice between two punishments for murder, only forty-two percent chose the death penalty while the greater half preferred life imprisonment without parole (Six Reasons Why Support for Capital Punishment is Evaporating). So despite the belief that support for capital punishment remains high, it's evident it is not as widely accepted as it used to be. Even today, less than half of the countries in the world retain the death penalty and only thirty percent actually implement it (Anckar 3). 

Finally, money is a large factor that comes into play for supporters of the death penalty. As taxpayers, death penalty supporters do not want their money to go towards a criminal's rehabilitation in prison when they have the solution of executing them. In reality, the idea that execution is simpler and cheaper is just an assumption. David Dow says in his TED talk that the death penalty actually costs more than alternative solutions. In fact, in the state of Florida, holding an inmate on death row costs taxpayers fifty-one million dollars more per year than it would to hold them on life without parole (High Cost of Death Row). In the New York Times article High Cost of Death Row the author argues that the death penalty is actually an economic drain, because there are so many different parts. In this article, it's stated that not only are there multiple stages for pretrial and trials, but once an inmate is on death row, they will be there for a long time, and the methods of execution cost a lot of money. If all the money going towards the death penalty wasn't being spent on injections, electric chairs, and holding people on death row, it could be put to a much better use. We could spend money in a more positive and helpful way by putting new programs in place that would benefit society, rather than focusing on negative aspects that hurt people and people's wallets. We can step in at an earlier point in these criminals lives and try to be preventative, rather than waiting to punish them. In his TED talk, David Dow speaks about a variety of ways we can intervene in order to prevent crimes from being committed. He states that most of the offenders on death row happen to have gone through the juvenile justice system or have troubling childhoods. He explains that only some states offer early childhood care or special schools to help disadvantaged kids. Texas, the state that he is a defense attorney in, does not offer programs like these. Programs like these should be offered everywhere to help nudge kids off of the path that they are on. If we intervened early enough we could save the criminals before they became criminals. This would be a start to much more humane and effective way of solving the crime problem in America, and money could be spent on helping people rather than hurting them. 

The death penalty is an ongoing debate and it's important for people to be educated about this topic. Controversy will remain until society faces the truth about our flawed criminal justice system in America and realizes the misconceptions about capital punishment. It is clearly an inhumane and ineffective form of punishment with costly effects and decreasing public support, therefore legislation should abolish the death penalty. By abolishing the death penalty, it would spark a change in society, making America a more humane place. The lives of innocent people would be protected, since there would be no risk of executing them on death row. Without torturous execution methods, the violence cycle that currently exists can be put to an end. Also, since the death penalty has proven to be ineffective when it comes to crime rates, putting new programs into place that would intervene at earlier times in people's lives would help lower crime rates by being a preventative measure. These programs would also be a better use of taxpayer's money. Implementing life without parole is another alternative to the death penalty, and it's a cheaper and more humane solution. Actions like these should be taken against the death penalty because they would be a start to much more effective way of solving the crime problem in America.

 
