Is the Use of the Death Penalty Justice and Is It Fair Essay

It is fair to say that outstanding penalization is under attack, particularly in the South where it is intimately comm nevertheless practiced. Not only have sober criticisms been raised by scholars in criminal umpire, criminology and cerebrate disciplines, but newspapers have published scathing news reports suggesting that gratis(p) mickle have been sentenced to devastation and pull d ingest executed, and totallyeging racial discrimination in detonator penalization practice. According to Robinson (2011), four basic facts establish the realities of American capital punishment. The foremost is that capital punishment is practiced in most but non all United States jurisdictions.Specifically, there argon 34 pass ons with the expiration penalisation, and 16 without. The federal government also maintains capital punishment, as does the military, but the District of Columbia does not carry out exercises. However, of these demise penalty jurisdictions, only nine regularl y carry out an execution, meaning they have averaged at least one execution a year since 1976 when capital punishment was reinstated thus only about one-quarter (26%) of oddment penalty states (nine of 34) and 18% of all states in the country (nine of 50) average one or more executions per year.Further, only one state has carried out at least ten executions per year since 1976, Texas. In fact, only about 10% of counties with the demise penalty imposed a death sentence between the years 2004 and 2009. Justice is classifiablely delimitate as administering and maintaining what is just or properly. Robinson (2011) says that there are three broad manages discussed and debated by scholars of justice system freedom, benefit, and virtue. Some justice theorists argue that what matters most for deciding what is right(a) or just is freedom whether somebody rights are respected and protected.Another school of thought is the egalitarian libertarians. These scholars suggest that what m atters most for justice is equivalence of opportunity in society and taking care of the least advantaged citizens. Other justice theorists focus on welfare, or general well-being and happiness of people in society. They argue that what matters most for justice is the welfare of society, or its boilersuit happiness. Finally, other justice theorists argue that what matters most for justice is virtue, or moral probity and righteousness.The purpose of the death penalty is incapacitation, intimidation, and retribution. Incapacitation is understood as removing the ability of offenders to grant future shames. Incarceration is the typical form whereas execution is the ultimate form. Deterrence refers to creating fear in would be offenders through punishment to oppose future crimes. Capital punishment can only be aimed at preventing crime by would-be(prenominal) send offers, general deterrence, since it cannot create fear in murderers who have already been executed, specific deterren ce.Retribution refers to righting or rebalancing the scales of justice through punishment in order to achieve justice for crime victims. Executions are often visualised as retribution for the crime of murder, as well as a source of closure for murder victims families. Robinson (2011) claims that criminologists and capital punishment scholars overwhelmingly indicate that the death penalty fails to achieve these goals, mostly because of the rarity of death sentences and executions. Logically, if death sentences and executions were more common, capital punishment would be more potential to achieve these goals.Yet we also k presently that the more frequently the death penalty is used, the colossaler the costs associated with the policy, including not only extra financial costs but also a greater risk of convicting, sentencing to death, and executing the innocent. This ultimately has great significance for the justice of capital punishment. Van lair Haag (1986) says that the death pen alty is an effective form of deterrence because it is feared more than life imprisonment. Many of the convicts under death sentence appeal their sentence and try to convey it reduced to life imprisonment.Van Den Haag argues that even though there is no factual license that the death penalty deters would be criminals more than life imprisonment, the fact that more people fear the death penalty makes it a crack deterrent. Reiman (1985) agrees with Robinsons view that the use of the death penalty is not boffo as a deterrent. He gives four main springs that refute Van Den Haags argument. His first reason is that although people fear the death penalty more than life in prison, nobody wants to lead life in prison either.People do not have the mentality that they can commit a crime because they will only get sentenced to life in prison. Although the soulfulness will be alive, they will have all freedom taken from them, which after awhile, can be seen just as horrible, if not worse, than death. Reimans second point is that if a person is contemplating committing a crime, they are already face up an enormous risk of being killed in the process. Roughly 500 to 700 suspected felons are killed by law of nature in the line of duty every year and many Americans own their own guns.When taking that into account, it does not seem very likely that the would be criminal will be able to commit the crime without at least being injured by the police or the would be victim. His third reason against Van Den Haags view is that development the death penalty is hypocritical. The law states that a person cannot take the life of another, but when they do, their punishment could be death. It is not possible to say murder is embezzled and then have it as a possible punishment. He argues that not having the death penalty better exemplifies that idea that murder is wrong.His last point is that it is illogical to practice the death penalty simply because it is feared more than life imprisonment. He says that people would fear death by torture more than lethal injection, so does that mean we should begin the practice of death by torture because more people are numb of it? Unless it can be proven that the death penalty is a better deterrent than life in prison, Reiman (1985) argues that the death penalty should be abolished. Robinson (2011) says that as for the issue of innocence, there is little doubt that people are wrongly convicted of murder every year and that a handful are even sentenced to death.More than cxxx people have been freed from death row during the era of super collect process that began in 1976 when the US Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment. Wrongful convictions often occur due to honest errors such as mistaken eyewitness testimony and faulty forensic tell apart, but when they occur due to issues such as false confessions, lying informants, government misconduct, and ineffective defense counsel. There is also little doubt that innoc ent people have even been executed, although most of the cognize cases are from prior to the era of super due process in capital sentencing.There remain at least eight widely known cases where men have been recently executed despite serious doubts about their actual guilt. On the issue of executing the innocent, Van Den Haag (1986), makes the argument that the advantages of using the death penalty as a punishment outweigh the unintended losses. He states, Miscarriages of justice are offset by the moral benefits and the usefulness of doing justice (139). His argument is that mistakes have and do occur in innocent people being sentenced to death, but the benefits of using it are more important. It would be more of a detriment to society to stop the use of the death enalty than it is when an innocent person is executed.In regards to race, Americas death penalty has always been plagued by serious racial biases. Little evidence remains of the historic discrimination by race of defendant , although state-specific anecdotal evidence suggests blacks are still occasionally discriminated against, especially when accused of killing whites and when juries are overwhelmingly white. Robinson (2011) says that most experts now point to a race of victim effect, whereby killers of whites are far more likely to be sentenced to death and executed than killers of other races and.For example, a comprehensive show of race and the death penalty in north Carolina showed that killers of whites were more than three times more likely to receive death sentences than killers of blacks. In the state, 80% of those people executed since 1976 killed white people only about 40% of North Carolina homicide victims are white. Further, a study of capital punishment practice in the state from 1999 to 2006 found that blacks who killed whites were 14 times more likely to be sentenced to death than whites who killed blacks.Also, there were six executions of blacks who killed whites during the time pe riod, yet zero executions of whites who killed blacks. Van Den Haags (2011) stance on the distribution of the death penalty being discriminatory is that punishments are imposed on persons, not on racial or economic groups (138). The death penalty is not specifically issued to authoritative races. It depends on the crime that the person committed. Van Den Haag also says, Justice requires that as many of the delinquent as possible be punished, regardless of whether others have avoided punishment.To let these others escape the deserved punishment does not do justice to them, or to society. But it is not unjust to those who could not escape it (139). Van Den Haag does not view the fact that black people or other minorities receive the death penalty more than whites as being unjust. However, what is unjust is the white people who were not sentenced to death when they should have been. habituated these important empirical realities of the death penalty, the next issue to address is whi ch of them are relevant for the justice of capital punishment practice.As noted earlier, it depends on which theory of justice is being referred to. Libertarians ask whether capital punishment respects liberty or freedom. The most important question for egalitarians is whether capital punishment practice is decent or applied in an equal fashion. For utilitarians, the most important question is whether capital punishment increases overall utility or happiness in society. Finally, for virtue-based theorists, the question is whether capital punishment respects and promotes our values, our moral goodness, and whether it is the right thing to do.The questions above do not have universal answers. Everybody will have his or her own opinions on whether the death penalty respects a persons freedom or whether it is the right thing to do. Reiman, Robinson and Van Den Haag all made successful and convincing arguments so it is hard to prepare one view as more convincing than the other. It come s down to a personal choice and what a person chooses to believe as to whether the death penalty is fair and a proper form of justice.