Political Science

The rationale behind punishments is that it can deter people from taking to crimes or committing them. When crimes are not punished, everyone would indulge in crime and be benefited by harming their victims.  When punishments appropriate for the crimes are in place, people would think before engaging in such acts of crime. The threat of a punishment and its likely implementation would cause people to assess the risks of the crime and its gains, against the punishments. When punishments are severe, people are more likely to refrain from committing the crime. When the threat of punishment is effective and fully implemented, it serves a huge purpose of reducing the occurrence of future crimes  (Law.jrank, 2008). When the society punishes the perpetrator, it is presumed to have restored morality. Punishments are more directed at offsetting the gains or pleasure sought from the act of crime and not to make up for the loss or trauma of suffered by the victim. No amount of punishments can reverse the crime and the effects of the crime committed. Although the society has realized that only punishments could deter criminals, the situation has come when the need and morality of harsh punishments need to be debated. Capital punishment or death penalty is today a widely debated punishment.

Although many developing countries have put an end to it, a large number of countries including the United States still have them in their law books (DGER, 2007). It needs to be emphasized here that while the European Union requires abolishment of the death penalty as a condition for its membership, the US has only re-imposed it, on grounds that the no-death penalty state has only emboldened criminals to commit heinous crimes. The Eight Amendment of the Constitution, which became effective in 1971, is directed at preventing unusual and cruel punishments. However the Supreme Court refused to view death penalty as an unusual punishment. In 1976, hearing the case of Greg vs. Georgia, 428 US 153, the Supreme Court observed that the death penalty is crucial in serving two social needs namely retribution and deterrence of social crimes. The Court projected capital punishment as societys expression in condemning horribly offensive conduct. The Supreme Court also observed that while studies do not convince that capital punishments is an effective deterrence compared to lesser punishments, there are no convincing studies refuting this too (Palmer, 1998).

With the execution of Luis Monge on June 2, 1967 and the declining pubic opinion for death penalty, the death penalty was considered a violation of the Eight Amendment and banned throughout the US subsequent to the case Furman vs. Georgia (1972 408 US 238). It was however introduced on July 2, 1976 after guidelines and directions were issued to judges as to the grounds on which a death sentence can be pronounced (Delfino  and Day, 2008). Utah became the first state to reinstate the death penalty when it executed Gary Gilmore by a firing squad. Currently about 36 states, the federal government and the military incorporate death penalty in their punishments. However rape of an adult woman does not attract capital punishment, which was evident in Coker vs. Georgia (1977) 433 US. 584. The venue of the crime committed can thus make a vast difference of life and death to the perpetrator, since some states are more likely to impose the death penalty than others.

In 1994, the death penalty was introduced for sixty new offenses for the first time under the Federal Death Penalty Act. The death penalty was introduced under a new chapter 228 of Title 18 of the United States law code.  The sections appropriate under it are attributed to the codes 3591-3598. Signed by the then President Bill Clinton, these new offenses fetching death penalty include murder of federal officials, serious drug offenses and also treason and espionage. The death penalty is also handed over for any attempted murder undertaken or ordered by any leader of a drug mafia to stall a drug trafficking investigation or prosecution (Schabas, 1997). Death penalty under the new law was introduced as an optional punishment for seven kinds of planned and intentionally carried out murders including killing of a rape victim or a police officer.

The costs associated with capital punishments are enormous. It must be remembered here that last year Governor Martin OMalley had argued before the Maryland Senate that death penalty need to be abolished in order to cut costs. He noted that the costs associated with the capital cases were about three times of those homicide cases where there is no death penalty (Urbina, 2009). Capital cases costs more as the trials are longer, needing more lawyers and expert witnesses, with the cases themselves having multiple appeals. Many other states too have lawmakers arguing in the same way and there are plenty of chances for revoking capital punishments in several states too. In New Mexico, lawmakers supporting the abolishment of capital punishment point out that despite the higher costs, many defendants finally end up with life sentence.

Death penalty indeed runs into several years, even in the military. When Maj. Malik Nadal Hasans case came up, law enforcement officials anticipated a long trial. Hassan had killed thirteen people when he fired indiscriminately at the Fort Hood processing center in Texas. The military court requires the 12-member jury to unanimously give death penalty, which should ultimately be signed by the president. Hasan is entitled to a military defense attorney free of costs and even has the option of claiming insanity.   Michelle Lindo McCluer of the National Institute of Military Justice at Washington College of Law suggests that appeals in the military domain, like its civilian counterpart can stretch for decades (Searcey D et al, 2009).

When an individual is sentenced to death, it normally takes several years before the actual execution. The convicted person meanwhile is housed in the death row, which is the housing reserved for prisoners awaiting death. Awaiting death itself a horrible experience, which is never considered as an extra punishment. Supporters and advocates of the death penalty say that the fear of death penalty can refrain people from indulging in heinous crimes. However it has been pointed out by human rights activists that the occurrence of crime warranting the death penalty is much less in countries without death penalty, than where it is imposed. There is an increasing public support for the abolishment of the death penalty, wanting the society to look into other ways of crime prevention. Relying only on killing criminals to reduce crime is not in line with societal development. Criminals would get emboldened when they know that they would be sentenced to death for the crime committed, and that there is no hope. The society doesnt gain by executing a murderer. By executing a murderer we only prove that murder is a very heinous crime and the only appropriate punishment is committing the same on the offender. The society has a moral responsibility of protecting its members and looking after their welfare, in the best possible way. However, in its efforts to ensure these, the society should not break its own principles.

The handing over of death sentences is also not uniform throughout the world. Some countries like the Islamic countries impose it very stringently. Death sentences are handed down without proper investigations and judicial procedures too. The erratic nature of these punishments is evident from the fact that many Islamic countries forgive the offenders when the family of the victim forgives them. In most cases the perpetrators are the relatives themselves who carry out honor killings on their women folk. Death penalties are handed over for issues like abandoning religion, prostitution and drug smuggling (Brea, 2008). It should be noted here that before the US Supreme Court had struck down juvenile death penalty in 2002, there were over 22 relevant executions in the country.

It is increasingly perceived that imposing death penalty reflects the societys, particularly the law enforcement personnels weakness and inhumanity. We carry out the reciprocative act, in a more inhuman way than the crime itself. Not only are the state officials present to witness the execution as if it was a privileged entertainment, we also invite the family of the victim to join them. We forget that the family of the criminal is undergoing an immense plight, coping up with the fact that their loved one is to be executed. The lengthy, planned, collaborated circumstance under which the perpetrator is losing his life is totally different from the situations in which the victim died. Countries have varying execution methods from hanging, firing squad, electric chair, gas chamber, lethal injection and sometimes even public stoning. Not all executions go well as intended. Several executions had been carried out where the procedure turned faulty leading to severe injuries on the face and body of the criminal, requiring postponement of the event. The electric chair malfunctioning in particular has caused burns and charring of the victim on many occasions. The trauma both physical and mental borne by the criminal is definitely not part of his punishments. The barbaric side of the episode is the wanting to still go ahead and complete the execution.

Its high time that the people responsible for preventing crimes seek other effective ways of preventing crime rather than by killing criminals. All criminals are part of our society and should not be eliminated to ensure the safety of the rest. We need to give them hope, which would only refrain them from such further activity. When they see no hope, it only aggravates the situation for themselves and thus for the rest of the society. Judicial and social reforms must be appropriately implemented for preventing heinous crimes, rather than capital punishment. Opponents of capital punishment feel that living a life in anticipation of death is itself a torture. Any person awaiting an imminent death suffers much more than his victim. Consider the plight of a person who has been sentenced to death for homicide. The killing could have occurred instantly or result from temporary loss of sanity, which the perpetrator may repent later.  When offered a death sentence, the criminal apart from repenting his crime is also pained by his own death sentence. Unlike all other punishments, the death penalty cannot be reversed and the accused set free. History holds evidence of last minute cancellation of death sentences due to lack of evidence or proper procedures, when subjected to case review. Today there are many past executions, which still hold doubt if the executed person, was indeed the real perpetrator. While the opponents of death punishment in the US hope and work for its abolishment, somewhere among the solitary, high security, death rows of the US, prisoners ponder over ebbing of their lives.