3 pages essay pessimism and optimism

Luan Tran

Professor: Jim Prothero

EMLS 101

DEATH PENALTY

For several years, different human rights organizations, including non –government

organizations, have tried to fight against the death penalty sentence. Various countries across the

world have different opinions about the death penalty. Although many states have already

changed this sentence with life in prison, a few countries still subject certain criminals to the

death penalty by hanging. The actual impact of death impacts of death can only be evaluated by

looking at the rate and type of crime that prove that the death penalty as a mode of punishing

criminals doesn’t reduce some of the most critical and notorious criminal activities that happen

within the community daily.

The primary objective of the death penalty sentence is to try and lower the number of conflicting

criminal activities across the world. However, statistical data still shows that this penalty hasn’t

yielded any positive outcomes yet. The world is still experiencing some of the dangerous

criminal activities. Those within the legal system or security agencies have argued that capital

punishment, which includes the death penalty, can highly help in fighting the crime that even put

police officers at risk. However, the fact is that even with the death penalty, the most dangerous

criminal activities can’t be controlled. From my point of view, some people are just criminal

mind oriented, and they can go beyond what people think only to accomplish whatever illegal

activities that they want. This factor implies that not even the possibilities of death penalties can

stop them from carrying out their activities. An excellent example of such people is the serial

who, in my perspective, seems to be driven by evil powers.

Looking at the US states with the highest number of criminal activities, 20 out of the 25 states

still sentence criminals considered to be highly dangerous to a death sentence. The fact is the

death penalty hasn’t scared or helped in reducing the crime rates in those states. The statistic

from the 20 states proves that the death penalty is not effective in reducing crime rates. Although

it is a legal procedure as approved by the state laws, the fact is pushing criminals through such

sanctions is very much different from the actual process of solving and fighting criminals within

the community. Many criminals look at it as any other legal procedure that they might face if

they get into the hands of the law, but that doesn’t hinder what they think to help them survive. I

guess to some such capital punishment is only an act of revenge and complete violation of

human rights.

Although others might think that the death penalty can reduce criminal activities, but we need to

look at the broader picture of things. In most situations, you find that a person is sentenced to

death only in-depth investigations to prove later on that the person was convicted and sentenced

without proper research and robust evidence. According to a static study by Harris (2018), about

137 inmates were released in 2017 after proving that they were innocent. With the death penalty,

the chances of some of such inmates being killed are always high despite their innocence.

Statistically, almost 4% of people sentenced to death are still innocent, which means that

abolishing such sentences is necessary to protect innocent people from losing their lives. Also,

the amount spent in such cases is high. This case costs almost $2.5 million; abolishing such

penalties will not only protect the lives of millions of people punished with strong evidence but

also save millions. The final point is that the death sentence is a direct murder and violation of

human rights.