Death_Punishment

Christopher Hylton Sociology 2 Professor Ramos November 6, 2011 The Negative Attributes of the Death Penalty The death penalty has been enforced for as long as recorded history, but is it morally acceptable' Capital punishment may deter crime, but at the same time, it may also be considered a cruel and unusual punishment. Questions of the death penalty have reduced executions, but have crowded the death row with inmates. Many people support the death penalty, although it is an extremely controversial. Capital punishment creates debate over racial biases, and does not stop crime; it kills many innocent people. Capital punishment has been around for more than three hundred years in the United States. It has been a notorious matter for as long as it has been established. Capital punishment has caused issues of discrimination. I feel that non-whites are discriminated against in capital cases. Capital punishment has been an instrument of racism; black people are 41% of the death row population. Defendants without a lot of money cannot defend themselves. The poor and middle class must rely on public defenders or court appointed lawyers who are poorly paid and inexperienced. Those people who have financial resources or who are members of a racial or ethnic minority will be more likely to die, while those who are well off can avail themselves of the legal talent to present their cases in as convincing a light as possible. In my opinion the death penalty should be abolished because it is an immoral form of punishment, which should not be allowed in the United States. The death penalty would not obtain its goal even if it remained legal in the U.S. Capital Punishment is brutal and immoral and should not be considered part of our criminal justice system. Who pays the ultimate penalty for crimes' The poor. Who gets the death penalty' The poor. After all the rhetoric that goes on in legislative assemblies, in the end, when the net is cast out, it is the poor who are selected to die in this country. And why do poor people get the death penalty' It has everything to do with the kind of defense they get. Money gets you good defense. That's why you'll never see an O.J. Simpson on death row. As the saying goes: 'Capital punishment means them without the capital get the punishment. There are currently 38 out of 50 states which allow the death penalty in law. By 1990, more than 2000 people had been sentenced to death and were awaiting the outcome of legal appeals Of the 365 men on death row, there are 130 blacks; 217 whites; 18 other. There are six women on death row. Studies have shown no unusual increase in murders when the penalty is abolished" (World Book Encyclopedia 193). In conclusion capital punishment was made people aware that as humans our system is developed to suppress versus progress. A example of capital punishment at its worst is the Troy Davis Case. He was convicted of and executed for the August 19, 1989, murder of police officer Mark MacPhail a crime which no evidence is shown that he commit. Troy Davis did not possess a physical weapon and he was convicted solely on the base of witness testimony which was contradicted. Recently Troy Davis has become an incredible symbol of everything that is broken, everything that is wrong with the capital punishment in the U.S and with that hopefully society wakens and take action by protecting against these evil tactics of inhuman punishment..