ReviewEssays.com - Term Papers, Book Reports, Research Papers and College Essays
Search

Capital Punshiment

Essay by   •  March 14, 2011  •  Essay  •  448 Words (2 Pages)  •  958 Views

Essay Preview: Capital Punshiment

Report this essay
Page 1 of 2

First, punishment of criminals is supposed to serve two main purposes: to protect society from the same criminal repeating its crime and to act as a deterrent for other prospective criminals. Unfortunately, capital punishment fails in most cases. It does not prevent the criminal from committing their crime again. While some people may think that capital punishment would scare away other criminals from crime that is not the case. If a person compares crime rates of murder and other heinous crimes worthy of the death penalty of a country that uses the death penalty to one that does not, a person will see there is no difference. Studies show that the homicide rates in countries with capital punishment have been 48% to 101% higher than those with out death penalty (Bonner, n.pag). Another example, the murder rate in Canada has dropped by 27% since the death penalty was abolished in that country in 1976. While in America, where the death penalty is practicing the homicide rate has been 48to 101 percent higher than states without the death penalty (Amnesty International). If capital punishment is effective in reducing crimes, so why the rate of murders in countries where capital punishment use are higher than countries that do not practice death penalty; and if Therefore, the death penalty does not stop future murders as many people believe

The idea that capital punishment discourages or prevents criminals from committing crimes is based on a simple assumption that most people fear death. Therefore, the threat of capital punishment will influence criminals to refrain from committing crimes. Unfortunately, this assumption is incorrect. Starting with the simplest of statistics, if capital punishment reliably prevented murder, countries with capital punishment should generally have a lower murder rate then countries without. However, this does not occur (Capital...). The homicide rate in Canada has gradually been dropping since executions were stopped. This has also been seemed to be true in many other countries that have abandoned the death penalty (Robinson). As of in the United States, states that use the death penalty tend to have higher number of homicides than states that do not use it. Some statistics written in The Fence say that while there has been a nationwide increase in the number of executions, there has not been much of a change in murder rates. The murder rate was 8.8 in 1976, when the death penalty was made legal. From 1976-1995,

...

...

Download as:   txt (2.6 Kb)   pdf (57.3 Kb)   docx (9.4 Kb)  
Continue for 1 more page »
Only available on ReviewEssays.com