- In the beginning of all the death penalty cases, the defendant must first be proven guilty. Once they’re guilty, they go through a penalty phase trial. At this trial they decide whether the crime was bad enough to receive the death penalty. After this, they can appeal. Then there is another post-conviction review where evidence can be newly considered and misconduct of jury members and other things like that. Then they go through Federal Habeas Corpus, this ensures that the prisoners arrest is legal. Then they may go on to ask for Clemency from the governor and that would pardon their death penalty, and give them a less punishment of jail time. One the website they say that most evidence is provided either from an eye witness or a confession. I recently have been learning about memory in my Psychology class. We learned that eye witnesses rarely ever know who the person is and most eye witnesses chooses the wrong person as the murder or rapist. I think that the stages put in place, so a good job making sure that the crime fits the punishment, but I think that they could go through another case, with another jury to be 100% positive that the defendant is indeed guilty of the crime.
- The most humane method of execution would be lethal injection. The inmate is given a chemical that puts them to sleep, then one that stops their muscle functions and stops them from breathing, and then they get a shot that stops their heart. Even though none of these ways are human, this is the most painless way to be executed. I think the method of hanging is considered cruel and unusual punishment; there are so many things that could go wrong and potentially make someone die and slow and painful death. If the prisoner has strong neck muscles, or the drop is too short, or something goes wrong with the rope, then it’s basically torture. Even more extreme then hanging, Firing squad causes the inmates to die from lose of blood, which means it is a very slow and painful death. The inmate is shot by five shooters to ensure his death.
- This data has opened my eyes to the amount of death row inmates around the country. There is over 400 in Florida alone, I always though that there would be two or three in each state. Seeing the amount of inmates that were sentenced in the south alone was unbelievable. I can see that the South is very strongly in favor of capital punishment. Another thing I noticed about the death penalty was that it seems to be pretty based on race. In Georgia 51 out of 53 of the executed were African American, and in Alabama 96 out of 100 executed were African American. This tells me that our system of capital punishment has a lot of flaws as well as our justice system.
- This information further supported my opinion about capital punishment. This article proved that the death penalty system was actually more expensive than then life in jail. The death penalty system is very racist, having a majority of the death row inmates be black, with white victims. 48% of people are against the death penalty and for life in jail. 65% of people were in support of the death penalty, which is down from 80% in 1994. This source clearly was against capital punishment. There statistics were very powerful and shocking. I think most people that read this would start to think in the way of the writer. They did not include anything about the victims of these murders. I would want to know what percent of the victims families were against the death penalty.
In the Frontline movie about Clifford Boggess I found myself confused about my position on his case. Part of me knew he was a cold blooded murderer and realized that there is something seriously wrong with him. An other part of me felt like he had changed and that his death row experience had made him truly sorry for the murders he had committed and trusted his new way of life. He fully admitted to his crimes and knew that he did something wrong. But then again, when his ex-girlfriend was interviewed she knew he was a threat to society and wanted him to die because he was threnting her. I personally don't believe in the death penalty. I can understand a families want for the murderer of their loved ones to die, but I think suffering in jail is a lot worse then spending a couple years on death row and being then being done with life. Boggess is a prime example of a criminal, he is manipulating and can swing situations in his favor. I still believe he is a horrible person, with little repentance, but I don't think he should have died. Some people my have justified the lives he took, with this own death, but its just a cycle. We can't teach AAmericans that it's okay to solve violence with violence.
