Death Penalty

Like abortion, the death penalty is a hotly debated issue: everyone has different beliefs about it. Through this presentation, I don't want to influence you or change your opinion; I just want to give the facts, the simple reality about the death penalty in the United States and then arguments in favour or against this punishment. I'll give you an outline of this issue and I'll show you the debate

So what could we say about the death penalty?

1/some statistics about death penalty in United States

There are Thirty-eight states which use capital punishment and they can choose several methods like lethal injection, electrocution, gas chamber, hanging and firing squad.

-In the United States alone there have been 4047 executions since 1930.

-during the 2000 year there have been 85 executions and most of them have occurred in Texas.

-Currently, Texas leads the nation in the number of executions

-Most executions take place in the Deep South

Public opinion polls indicate that crime is mentioned as the greatest problem in the USA.

A 1983 poll revealed that nearly 70% of the American population are in favour of capital punishment.

-Nevertheless death penalty has a cost: in Texas for instance, the procedure to condemn a prisoner is very lengthy and costly: each case costs about 2.3 million dollars. That is three times more than a price for keeping a prisoner in a single cell at the highest security level for 40 years.

- In comparison with men, women are less frequently sentenced to death: women have constituted only 3% of U.S. executions

Paradoxically, in the past ten years, the number of executions in the U.S. has increased while the murder rate has declined.

There can be abuses in using the capital punishment such as condemning innocent or for example, during the anti-Communist period with all its hysteria and its fears, the Texas Governor seriously suggested that the capital punishment should be the penalty for the members of the Communist Party.

2/ some sensible questions

Is the death penalty fair?

********The world has more than 190 nations. Since 1979, only five of those nations have executed juveniles: Rwanda, Pakistan, Barbados, Bangladesh, and the U.S.A who have stopped it since March 2005.

What about the execution of minors under age of 18 at the time of murder?

On June 2002, the Supreme Court declared that executing the mentally retarded is cruel and unusual and it is a violation of the U.S. Constitution.

A few months later, on October, this same Court refused to put an end to executing juveniles

But the 1st of March of 2005 the court abolished the execution of juvenile under the age of 18 at the time of murder.

************ -furthermore race continues to play an unacceptable and powerful role in the capital punishment

Maybe that the death penalty discriminates the minorities and the poor and is not administrated fairly.

There is approximately 20.000 murders each year, but only a hundred murderers are sentenced to death.

Almost half of those sentenced to die are black and 84% of those were convicted of killing a white.

In United States, a black man who kills a white man has got four more chances to be condemned that if a white man kills a black man.

Furthermore, more than 90% of the inmates currently on death row were too poor to hire a lawyer to represent them at their trial.

In nine cases over ten, a lawyer, officially given, is designated by the State.

Thanks to, the death penalty the societies could find a scapegoat for its incapacity to resolve crime - and that victim may be the black man.

3/ The different way to execute capital punishment

The three most common death penalties are the gas chamber, lethal injection, and the electric chair.

Let us examine the different ways of executing:

-Hanging used to be a classic form of execution in the last century.

-Electric chair: the prisoner is strapped into a chair. Electrodes are attached to his head and legs, the current is set in motion, his body will strain and smoke will issue from his head. His flesh will burn, but he will probably no longer be aware of it.

Electrocution came onto the scene in an unlikely manner.

Edison Company with its direct current electrical systems began attacking his concurrent and its alternative current electrical systems.

Effectively, to show how dangerous alternative current could be, Edison has done public exhibition by electrocuting animals.

People reasoned that if electricity could kill animals, it could kill people.

In 1888, the state of NY approved the dismantling of its gallows and built the first electric chair...

-Gas Chamber: Here again, the condemn will be strapped into a chair; a container of sulphuric acid will be placed underneath him. Cyanide is dropped into the acid to produce the lethal gas. His eyes will pop, and he will turn purple. Perhaps he will drool.

It is difficult to foresee how long it will take him to lose consciousness.

-Lethal injection: three persons are involved in opening the valves but anybody knows which one is releasing the fatal dose. This shows that capital punishment might be a problem for those who authorize it.

Oklahoma uses the death by lethal injection, more for economical reason than humanitarian reasons. An old electric chair requires generally expensive repairs and the construction of a gas chamber cost about$200.000, while lethal injection would cost no more than ten to fifteen dollars "per death".

There are many methods of execution used by the various states.

These methods are extremely barbaric as you could see,