Advantages/Disadvantages of Capital Punishment

[rulezdaworld0]

Just some thoughts...

Adv.:
1) Protects the public from the worst criminals
2) More of a detterent than easy-going sentences (but is still not very effective at deterring crime)
3) In a way, it makes society stronger by removing those who would seek to hold it back
4) Is the life of a serial killer more important than 2 lives of their victims if they get free?
5) Custodial sentences often do not stick to organised criminals, like gangsters.

Disadv.:
1) Innocents sometimes killed
2) Do 2 wrongs make a right?
3) Costly and expensive
4) Defendant's family. What about them?
5) Could be difficult to decide what crimes deserve capital punishment

Anyone else got any?

 

[Aught3]

I thought capital punishment, as a deterent, was not as good as a spell in prison.

 

[rulezdaworld0]

I thought capital punishment, as a deterent, was not as good as a spell in prison.

Its a better deterrant than, say, 7 years defiantely. I mean what is prison, a seperation from society. daeth is a permanant seperation. In theory it should be, \I could be wrong.

 

[Fordi]

Actually, these are, for the most part, questions that can be studied, not well-established advantages or disadvantages.

Does capital punishment protect the public from the worst criminals more effectively than life sentence?

It can be argued that escape from prison is possible with a life sentence where it is not with capital punishment. In this case, we can look at the rate of prison escape, the percent of prisoners with life sentences that escape, the breakdown of what happens to those prisoners (disappear, caught in another crime, recaptured quickly). These answers can give weight and support direction to this question.

Does capital punishment deter violent crime more than life sentence?

Changed the wording to reflect the alternative to capital punishment - which is, in almost all cases, life.

With this, we can look at states with and without capital punishment, and look at the average murder rates as compared to other violent crime rates within each jurisdiction.

In a way, it makes society stronger by removing those who would seek to hold it back

Again, we can check this out and give it quantitative weight: what is the rate of procreation of life-sentenced felons? Of death-row felons? What is the rate at which the children of life-sentenced felons turn to a life of crime? Of death-row felons? What is the value of crimes committed by these two groups?

Is the life of a serial killer more important than 2 lives of their victims if they get free?

I will have to object to comparative valuation of lives; this is the United States. First, if they are freed, chances are that evidence has come forth that they didn't do the deed, or at least, that the evidence indicating they did the deed can't be trusted. Second, we don't get to say one person is worth more than another.

Custodial sentences often do not stick to organized criminals, like gangsters

This can be evaluated as well; what is the rate of post-trial acquittal for life sentences? For death sentences?

Innocents sometimes killed

Rate of post-humous acquittal or acquitting evidence vs. enacted death penalties.

Do 2 wrongs make a right?

Moral questions are subjective, and must thus be evaluated by the individuals that make up the society, not a central authority. i.e., the state votes on it. That said, it's pretty much the ONLY way we presently evaluate the death penalty - the population decides on the individual level whether or not killing a man is ever OK.

Costly and expensive

The death penalty is not expensive when compared to a life sentence (we're testing the feasibility when compared to the alternative, remember?). What is the cost of a life sentence? Of a lethal injection? I can qualitatively say that capital punishment is cheaper - but study would be needed to quantify it.

Defendant's family. What about them?

Average defendant's earning potential vs. probable contribution to family.

Could be difficult to decide what crimes deserve capital punishment

Oh, for deserving capital punishment, nothing short of murder will do. Texas has this down - the deserving, not the ethicality. The people who Texas has condemned to death, if they are actually guilty of the crimes they're convicted of, almost certainly deserve death. The real questions are illustrated above - and of course, whether or not the state has the right to provide death as a solution at all (again, a question whose answer is given by the voters; the state has the rights the people grant it).

 

[Aught3]

The death penalty is not expensive when compared to a life sentence (we're testing the feasibility when compared to the alternative, remember?). What is the cost of a life sentence? Of a lethal injection? I can qualitatively say that capital punishment is cheaper - but study would be needed to quantify it.

Actually, the cost of a death penalty is more than a life imprisonment. This is due to the more expensive trial, lengthy appeals process, and greater cost of housing the death row inmates in prison.

Its a better deterrant than, say, 7 years defiantely. I mean what is prison, a seperation from society. daeth is a permanant seperation. In theory it should be, \I could be wrong.

Oops, I assumed you were talking about life-imprisonment, but I can see you wrote short sentence now. I'll read more carefully next time Anyway, life imprisonment is more of a deterrent than the death penalty and Fordi has suggested how we can test this.

 

[Fordi]

Actually, the cost of a death penalty is more than a life imprisonment. This is due to the more expensive trial, lengthy appeals process, and greater cost of housing the death row inmates in prison.

One would assume, all things being equal, that a trial for life sentence would have a similarly costly trial and appeals associated with them, and housing a death row inmate should be of comparable expense with the same term for a life inmate. Basically, while cost comparisons may be differentiated (and should be accounted in both types of sentencing), it still seems to me that the cost per unit year for death row imprisonment prior to capitol punishment would be similar to the cost per unit year for life imprisonment. I suppose a case could be made for the hastiness with which death row appeals are filed, thus increasing the overall yearly cost in man-hours for lawyer and clerk alike, but as far as the overall goes, they should be comparable.

Anyway, none of this is really salient without data, which I have lazily neglected to research. I'm really good at asking questions, but I get a little bored when it comes to the research - which is the reason I'm not a social scientist.

 

[Fordi]

Its a better deterrant than, say, 7 years defiantely. I mean what is prison, a seperation from society. daeth is a permanant seperation. In theory it should be, \I could be wrong.

I completely failed to notice this on first pass.

Can you give an example where one state gives capital punishment for a crime for which another state gives anything less than a life sentence?

Because I don't think 7 years is ever on the table here.

 

[Aught3]

One would assume, all things being equal, that a trial for life sentence would have a similarly costly trial and appeals associated with them, and housing a death row inmate should be of comparable expense with the same term for a life inmate.

Well you can assume that all the costs are equal but they are clearly not. This is actually quite well known so I'm assuming this is your first time talking about such things? Not having a go at you or anything, I also used to think "it was obvious" that the death penalty would cost less.

The reasons that a death penalty trial costs so much is that it goes on for much longer. More time is needed to prepare for both sides, more experts are hired, more motions are filed. There is also the need for two trials - one for guilt one for punishment. The jury is more carefully scrutinised as they have to be willing to give the death penalty to the accused.

Links: http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/costs-death-penalty
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29552692/

 

[Mapp]

The reasons that a death penalty trial costs so much is that it goes on for much longer. More time is needed to prepare for both sides, more experts are hired, more motions are filed. There is also the need for two trials - one for guilt one for punishment. The jury is more carefully scrutinised as they have to be willing to give the death penalty to the accused.

And that's not even counting the decades long appeal process that nearly every capital punishment defendant goes through. Amazingly even defendants who have decided that they want to die, and refuse to lodge an appeal, usually end up with one being lodged on their behalf by their lawyer. The general thinking being, "well he's clearly suicidal and thus not in a proper state of mind to act in his own defense."

 

[Ozymandyus]

I completely failed to notice this on first pass.

Can you give an example where one state gives capital punishment for a crime for which another state gives anything less than a life sentence?

Because I don't think 7 years is ever on the table here.

Well I think Norway doesn't have a sentence of longer than 22 years for anything. For example, a recent premeditated murder that was their first racially motivated 'hate crime' netted a 16 year sentence. Of course you asked for state, but when consider these issues it would be foolish not to take in all the data.

But they have this crazy idea that people can be rehabilitated. The fact that it seems to work certainly shouldn't mean anything.

 

[GoodKat]

Well I think Norway doesn't have a sentence of longer than 22 years for anything. For example, a recent premeditated murder that was their first racially motivated 'hate crime' netted a 16 year sentence.
But they have this crazy idea that people can be rehabilitated. The fact that it seems to work certainly shouldn't mean anything.

Whoa... Are their rehab programs that good? I wonder what percentage of released inmates end up back in prison there.

 

[thelastholdout]

To effectively decide whether capital punishment is worth keeping around, we must first ask the question: Why does violent crime occur in the first place? Some of you may write it off to an unchangeable aspect of human nature; however, I don't think that this is the case. The average sane, logically thinking man or woman will not commit a violent crime. Therefore, there must be root causes that drive people to commit these crimes. I don't think we should be debating about whether to throw these people in jail to rot for life or whether to kill them. I think that we should figure out why they kill and stop the problem before it occurs.

Also consider this: Soldiers and policemen are allowed to commit violent crimes, sometimes on a daily basis. So killing is considered *okay* under some circumstances. In fact, the goal of training in the military is to turn people into killers. Could this dichotomy between what we're allowed to do as civilians and what we're expected to do in service of our government be a factor in the mindset of people who do commit violent crimes?

 

[Fordi]

Well you can assume that all the costs are equal but they are clearly not. This is actually quite well known so I'm assuming this is your first time talking about such things? Not having a go at you or anything, I also used to think "it was obvious" that the death penalty would cost less.

The reasons that a death penalty trial costs so much is that it goes on for much longer. More time is needed to prepare for both sides, more experts are hired, more motions are filed. There is also the need for two trials - one for guilt one for punishment. The jury is more carefully scrutinised as they have to be willing to give the death penalty to the accused.

Links: http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/costs-death-penalty
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29552692/

I'm not really debating the point, just illustrating that it's counter intuitive on first glance. Careful quantitative analysis is really the only way to tell, just like anything else.

If only I had a small army of graduate students at my disposal...

 

[Fordi]

Well I think Norway doesn't have a sentence of longer than 22 years for anything. For example, a recent premeditated murder that was their first racially motivated 'hate crime' netted a 16 year sentence. Of course you asked for state, but when consider these issues it would be foolish not to take in all the data.

I'm not so certain on that; if we're talking about policy changes in a locality within a nation, each Cost / Benefit analysis should be limited to the choices that are politically feasible, with extended data as an aside to determine long-term goals. That is to say, you might get Texans, as an example, to vote for life sentence as a replacement for the death penalty - but I don't think you'd get anything short of that.

 

[Fordi]

Whoa... Are their rehab programs that good? I wonder what percentage of released inmates end up back in prison there.

Given that they actually teach their inmates how their society works from a hands-on perspective within prison, rather than allow them to lay fallow within the reinforcing influences of other inmates, it's not really surprising. I don't know what their reincarceration rate is, but I do know that their per-capita incarceration is less than 1/10 of the US (66/100,000 vs. 738/100,000).

It seems to me that the US penal system got too focused on punishment, and lost grip of rehabilitation, and did this very early on. For example, in the US, about 90% of violent crimes are repeat offenses; that implies that what went on in the interim - imprisonment and punishment - was wholly ineffective at fixing the issues these individuals have. I would actually love to see the repeat offense stat for Norway, but I've been unable to find it.

Really, I've got to get better at wrangling linked data; there's so much of it out there and available if only I were to sit down and bang my head against it.

 

[Aught3]

Careful quantitative analysis is really the only way to tell, just like anything else.

Yeah, and it's been done. The death penalty is more expensive than life imprisonment.

 

[GoodKat]

Yeah, and it's been done. The death penalty is more expensive than life imprisonment.

If you care about whether or not the people you are executing are actually guilty.

 

[Fordi]

Yeah, and it's been done. The death penalty is more expensive than life imprisonment.

As I said above,

I'm not really debating the point, just illustrating that it's counter intuitive on first glance.

 

[Ozymandyus]

I'm not so certain on that; if we're talking about policy changes in a locality within a nation, each Cost / Benefit analysis should be limited to the choices that are politically feasible, with extended data as an aside to determine long-term goals. That is to say, you might get Texans, as an example, to vote for life sentence as a replacement for the death penalty - but I don't think you'd get anything short of that.

That wasn't what we were talking about, was it? We were not talking about practicality of getting states to change from death penalty - we were talking about whether the death penalty was undoubtedly a better deterrent than 7 years in prison or other less harsh punishments. You claimed they could not be compared because no one would propose 7 years for a crime that could get the death penalty...

I personally don't think that deterrent beyond a certain point has any bearing on whether someone commits a crime - and I think that point is much closer to 7 years than it is to life in prison. At some point the person is either saying 'damn the consequences', not thinking about consequences at all, or thinking they will get away with it.

I sincerely doubt that harsher deterrents have more than a very minor effect on whether we commit crimes.

 

[Komu]

I agree with thelastholdout:

Therefore, there must be root causes that drive people to commit these crimes. I don't think we should be debating about whether to throw these people in jail to rot for life or whether to kill them. I think that we should figure out why they kill and stop the problem before it occurs.

Well, I think that it has to be said that the crimes that death penalty is applied to (murder and rape) are inevitable. :cry: Human beings have evolved in such a way that given the right circumstances they will commit these offenses.

Take rape for example - most perpetrators are young men with a low social status, and from a Darwinian perspective this makes sense. A young man of low status will often be overlooked by the females, who want a more impressive mate. If this is the case, the young male can either risk violence to have a chance a reproducing or assign his genetics to the rubbish bin of history. Rape is a very impulsive act, and occurs most often in a highly charged sexual environment (e.g. date rape). The risk of being caught and executed is outweighed by the risk of not being able to reproduce. Of course, it all likelihood no babies will be made, but before abortion came along, low status men who resorted to this in the wild would have successfully passed on their genetics to the next generation. On the other hand, the number of rapists who have children is rather small, because they have already succeeded in fathering children.

The problem here is that the death penalty is not a deterrent, because the perpetrator's brain is telling him it's worth the risk.

If we were to apply the death penalty to the illegal downloading of MP3s, the related crime rate would drop to almost zero. It's not impulsive, it's a direct choice.

But, things are different with murder and rape, as evolved responses they defy (what seems to our rational side) logic and reason, but they serve a deeper evolutionary purpose.

Just as making sex illegal would not stop it at all, rape and murder are, sadly, in the category of impulsive crimes.

The best way to bring the rape and murder crime rate down is education. Well educated, prosperous men have far more important things to do than rape. "So what if that girl doesn't want me? A million more do." Maybe being a cocky bastard is beneficial to society! :lol: