Different Aspects on Death Penalty: Political, Social, Economical & Ethical

1.0 Introduction

On September 21, 2011, Alireza Molla-Soltani was hanged to death after stabbing Iran's most well-known athlete. Alireza was only 17 years-old at the time he was executed. Hassiba Sahraoui, Amnesty International's Deputy Director, quote "The fact that Iran has decided to execute a 17-year old shows how little respect the authorities have for international human rights standards." end quote. According to international law of justice, juveniles are strictly prohibited in receiving any capital punishments. Therefore, do we have to consider this case a justice? Among many nations worldwide, there are five countries that have the most executed people hiding behind the veil that we do not know about. China has the most people sentenced to death than any other country in the whole world. Next comes Iran, with more than 300 people put to death every year. Most which are considered drug-related or political offenses rather than murder cases. Iraq holds the most even compared to China, in 2009, with at least 1,129 people since 2007. Lastly, Pakistan is holding thousands of prisoners still remaining in death row. So what gets through our mind as looking at the statistics? Whether we are for or against death penalty, it is still and will be considered a strong controversial issue to deal with.

2.0 Different Aspects on Death Penalty: Political, Social, Economical & Ethical

Around the world, the capital punishment debate revolves around a number of questions. What happens to the innocence? What are the social problems that occur due to death penalty? Are capital punishment convictions given in a discriminatory manner? How costly effective is it, or is it ever costly effective? Is it ethical to execute some for vengeance? These are the questions that are going to be answered through this report to attempt to fully weigh on its demerits focusing mainly on political, social, economical, and ethical viewpoints.

2.1.0 Political Aspect: Wrong Conviction

Pro-death penalty often argues that there is no justice system which operates accurately without making any errors. Then how are we going to defend innocent lives being sentenced to death? What is worse, those crimeless people are receiving capital punishments without any evidence to prove that they are guilty. For instance, the case of Troy Davis is one of many wrongly convicted to death. It is considered the worst of which can come out of the justice system. How can the government justify or have the right to kill a man? Consequently, judicial system can never guarantee that a certain case will not be miscarried in the middle of the process.

2.1.1 Torture Used to Innocents

How deep are we going to trust the government for justice if they are the ones who turn their back on us? In 1997, a Taiwanese man named Chiang Kuo-ching was killed at the age of 21, despite having no evidence on him. He was convicted of raping and killing a five-year-old girl. However, he failed a lie detector test because he was scared, leading to an execution at the age of 21 despite Chiang insisting his innocence. His parents opened a campaign and finally at the year of 2010, the case was reinvestigated resulting shocking news. The government admitted that they had tortured Mr. Chiang into confessing and late last year apologized to his family. So what made the government do such an act? Dumbfounded by what they said, the government just wanted to quickly solve the case and bring justice to the victim's family. To make it short, not until the death penalty is abolished, at least one out of four will be convicted with no material for evidence. Legal expert, Lin Feng-Cheng quote, "The mistakes made in Chiang Kuo-ching's case are typical of mistakes still made in Taiwan, we believe if we continue the death penalty, the risks are very high." end quote.

2.1.2 Amateur Attorney

In capital cases, the defense counsel must not only prepare for the guilty or the innocent but also for themselves. This means that mistaken conviction is likely to occur if the attorney is inexperienced. According to a study, surprisingly in a total of three death penalty convictions, two have been failed to receive appeal. Due to the fact that they had serious errors by the defense lawyers who had little experience just willing to try for capital cases. Another problem evoked by this issue is for those unable to afford an adequate representative. Statistics show that the numbers of death sentenced prisoners lack legal representative. Among 3300 persons in United States who are in death row, 99.5% of them are indigent. The government must never use an inexperienced attorney when handling a serious case such as capital cases.

2.2.0 Economical Aspect: High Cost of Death Row

After a long twisted journey's the highest courts, the death penalty policy was abolished by several countries for one simple, but important reason: money. In recent times, the death penalty has come under a lot of analysis on how effective it is to its cost. Surprisingly, according to many research studies, it turns out that it is cheaper by tens of millions of dollars to execute killers. This is due to its complex public policy. To ensure execution works in a socially acceptable manner--that is, administered without any possible discrimination with special safeguards to protect the innocent and with lethal injections to reduce the pain during the execution--is not only time consuming but ultimately, a lot more expensive to the tax payers than life in prison without the possibility of parole. The nation just cannot afford it! The below sections are mainly focusing on the United States death penalty system in Log Angeles Counties. The reason for such a focus is that it is interesting to the number of execution in the United States can surprisingly be compared to countries generally known for their disregard for the human rights: China, Iran, South Africa, Iraq and the former Soviet Union. Any wider attempt to study the death penalty of the whole California or US or of the world will exceed the time and resource constraints of this report.

2.2.1 Plea Bargaining

According to the freeonlinedictionary.com, plea bargaining is to make an agreement in which a defendant pleads guilty to a lesser charge and the prosecutor in return drops more serious charges. This practice has been a potent tool in courts. In capital cases, however, it is not very effective; the prosecutor offering a lesser charge means non-capital cases. This process in death penalty will have to go through jury trials, not average ones, but one with far more complex issues and terms, plus