The process in which a criminal is sent to be executed is definitely more complicated than I thought. There is the arrest, the preparations for a jury, the jury itself, the conviction, the clemency process, analysis of the case, and of course, the execution. The way the justice system works with these types of cases is extremely carefully, and in my opinion, that is sufficent enough to guarantee that only the guilty are convicted. The process for these types of cases has been so fine-tuned that it would be very difficult to convict an innocent person. The case is analyzed by several groups of people, including the highest state criminal courts and appellate courts; by having different sets of eyes analyze the case, a collective understanding begins to form. Then there is the clemency process, which is a way to give mercy to the accused. By having these cases laid out in this fashion, the prosecutors and defendants have equal power which allows for the best free expression of ideas and assertions.
There are a few ways the death penalty is carried out: hanging, firing squad, electrocution, gas chambers, and lethal injection. To me, the most humane of these executions is lethal injection. For every other method of execution, it is reported that extreme pain is felt by the victim. Anything involving asphyxiation is bound to be painful, because your body is essentially sending signals to the brain that you're deprived of a vital molecule, and to get your attention of this predicament, you experience a strong feeling of pain. The same goes with electrocution and firing squads. Electrocution fries your entire body, and I don't think anyone would consider that painless. The same can be said for several bullets that penetrate the heart. Lethal injection, on the other hand, is easy, seemingly painless, and not messy at all. The victim is strapped onto a table, is injected an anesthetic to knock them out, and is then injected with a series of chemicals that shuts down the heart and all other organ systems. However, I would not consider any of these executions "cruel and unusual," as stated in the Eighth Amendment. The men that have the noose around their necks, the men that are sitting in the electric chair, the men that are waiting to be shot at, all of them are murderers. They took the life from another human being or beings. Why should their death penalty be any more humane than how they murdered their victims? I say it's up to the state and the Courts to decide which death penalties to use for which victims.
After looking at some maps of the spread of the death penalty throughout the country, I noticed a couple trends. From the first view, it seems that all of the countries (besides New Mexico) that prohibit the death penalty are located in the northern half of the United States. My guess is that the reasons for this probably originate back to Civil War times; along with the abolishment of slavery, perhaps the Union developed stricter juries as well. Another thing to note is that most of the deaths from the death penalty come from California, and I'm not quite sure why. For the people that believe race has something to do with the death penalty, the data may portray that blacks are discriminated against when it comes to capital punishment. Personally though, I believe that Courts have moved past convicting persons because of race or prejudging based off of race. It is frankly chance that more whites have been executed than blacks.
After reading the Illinois statute on the death penalty, I realized that the Illinois death penalty is no longer in effect and it is not explained why in the statute. The reason for this is probably due to influence from adjacent states or some sort of financing problem (since Illinois is completely broke). However, I find that death as a punishment for the crimes listed in the statute is perfectly reasonable. Anyone who murders another human being deserves to die. Looking at this CHART, you can see that the number of annual death penalties in the United States has gradually decreased since 1999, and states like Illinois that are prohibiting the death penalty facilitate this drop in executions. It seems that according to the statistics, the death penalty is slowly becoming obsolete; part of it is because some people believe that it is not necessarily economical, and part of it is because of a rise of public opposition to it.
Looking at all the information on the death penalty, it seems that the Death Penalty Information Center has a bias against the death penalty. The way they explain some of the methods of execution is quite gruesome. Also, they seem to explain the oppositions more thoroughly against the pro-death penalty assertions. I have a feeling that the country is slowly moving towards anti-death penalty, which I believe is detrimental to American citizens. The citizens have to pay for those people that avoided the death penalty and are now rotting in jail, living aimlessly. Most of those people will never come close to being human again, so what's the point in keeping them alive?
For all those Dexter fans out there:
The show Dexter is my currently favorite show on television, and surprisingly enough, the question pops up as to whether or not Dexter should be executed if he happened to be caught. Unfortunately, I would say yes. Dexter has good intentions, essentially doing the Court's job and executing people that deserve to die. However, he makes a slip-up in Season 3 when he murders an innocent man. That one murder could justify the authorization of the death penalty for Dexter.
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