Hello :) So today I thought after watching another episode of Inside Death Row, why not do a blog post on the death penalty...
So what are your views on the death penalty? Whereby those are sentenced to death by the state as punishment for a crime. Personally I am against the death penalty, but it's not for sympathy towards the criminals. When you look at it in the long term the death penalty is more like a punishment to the innocent family and friends who have to live with the loss of a loved one. Also, what is to say that you have the right person? We all know that there have been occasions when the wrong people where accused and lawyers/judges made mistakes. Do we really need the risk of an innocent person getting murdered? An innocent life taken, with their execution haunting their families and friends for the rest of their lives? At least if they were only imprisoned they could easily be released. Which is why a more effective punishment would be to spend the rest of their lives locked up as the thought of knowing you will never be released is more of a punishment than ending it right there right then.
As a British citizen once said 'We would not have to think about the death penalty, far less discuss it if ''life'' meant life and prisons were prisons'.
Another thing to also be aware of is, is the inequality in the courts. For example, the not so wealthy victims may have the worst lawyers who would not be able to defend them to the higher standards that a wealthy victims lawyer would. It's quite scary how a lawyer has the power to change your life, just like that.
As a British citizen once said 'We would not have to think about the death penalty, far less discuss it if ''life'' meant life and prisons were prisons'.
Another thing to also be aware of is, is the inequality in the courts. For example, the not so wealthy victims may have the worst lawyers who would not be able to defend them to the higher standards that a wealthy victims lawyer would. It's quite scary how a lawyer has the power to change your life, just like that.
A hard debate which I am still thinking about is, should the death penalty be imposed on serial killers such as Peter Sutcliffe aka The Yorkshire Ripper. One good point made by David Davis who is the shadow home secretary was ''The reason why people are against the death penalty very often is because of fears of getting it wrong. With serial murders, that is unlikely to happen'. Which is what left people in agreeing that the death penalty shouldn't be imposed on people who killed one person but on serial killers. However, a murder is still a death - a death of a loved one, hence this is a difficult situation.
After watching Inside Death Row with Trevor McDonald which viewers were able to see death row at Indiana State Prison. One of the inmates in this prison, Frederick Braer, from what I can remember... has been on death row for a number of years. The crime he committed was murder - he had the intention of raping a 24 year old woman but instead when entering her house, he ended up killing her and her 4 year old daughter. Frederick Braer was executed for his crime. However, even though I was disgusted by his actions - is this the right punishment? I will link an article here on this particular case if you want to find out more.
So this is it for today, but I'd like to finish this blog post with a quote that I just read that really made me think. 'Why should we have the right take someone's life when we did not give it to them?'
Hope you've found this post interesting and do not hesitate to comment down below with your views. Thank you :)
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