The death penalty should be abolished.

Rc3: InnocenceMy opponent states that no innocent people have been convicted since 2003 due to a boost in technology. Two things about this statement. First, my opponent concedes to my point that innocent people have been convicted due to the death penalty. If we abolish the death penalty, there would be a 0% chance of an innocent execution. Second, the technological advantages my opponent talks about can also be used to stop people on LWOP from escaping. It's also *because* of statistics like these that the escapes of LWOP are declining. Second, my opponent states that he showed me at least 10 people killed by murderers, which drastically outweighs my one innocent person that I cited. But surely you can not believe there was only one possibly innocent execution, right? The Innocence Project has found a few guys that were innocent and spent time on death row [1]:"Eighteen people have been proven innocent and exonerated by DNA testing in the United States after serving time on death row."This shows that judges actually aren't that reluctant to send someone to death row without rock hard solid evidence. My opponent also does not realise that out of over 1,000 cases of the death penalty, there is no way of telling how many executions were of innocent people, as the government has actually burned DNA evidence to get out of a possible innocent execution (see round 2, contention 3 (Jason O'Dell.) Plus, there have been 12 men that have been very close to being proven innocent, after execution (Larry Griffin, David Spence, etc [2].)Rc4: LessonsYour rebuttal doesn't make too much sense. You state that inmates have escaped, but you don't want them to learn a lesson? Also, my opponent seems to overestimate the quality of prison. Articles state prison food "poor quality" and one of their options is "buying overpriced food [3]." If we don't teach prisoners a lesson, they are way more likely to do the same crime again because they don't know it's wrong, which seems to be a concern of yours. Rc1: DeterrenceA. I have cited studies that have shown that the death penalty is not a deterrent, such as the expert study. There are more studies out there, such as [4], which says that deterrence studies are unreliable and there is no solid evidence for deterrence. "We show that with the most minor tweaking of the [research] instruments, one can get estimates ranging from 429 lives saved per execution to 86 lives lost. These numbers are outside the bounds of credibility." (The Economists' Voice, April 2006).My tenth source of round three was also a study that asked experts if the death penalty was a good deterrent, and most of them (with their reasoning) said no, it was not. Also, if you admitted your study was problematic then why did you use it? Now, I see I forgot to refute your quote. Your quote is only from one murderer with only one opinion. Opinions among murderers vary, so one simply does not cut it. This piece of evidence has an absurdly small sample size, only taking one murderer's opinion into count. Thus, it is not a strong, reliable piece of evidence. If we only had a $1,000 dollar fine, then yes, murders would go up. I believe the death penalty is not a strong deterrent and can be matched by LWOP. I used the word "deterrent" too strongly. If the death penalty is a big, good deterrent like my opponent says, then there shouldn't have to be a big number of executions to stop people from murdering. The simple threat of death should be enough to deter murders, as my opponent says, but the states murder record does not show so. As you state, the death penalty is really rare, but why? If it was really so big of a deterrent (and as you state, you can't put a cost on life) why don't we use it way more often? My source from ACLU never directly states that LWOP is a better deterrent than the death penalty, but suggests that it is by using personal opinions. See the article asking the families what they would rather have the prisoners go through: death, or LWOP. They say LWOP, which suggests that the public is more scared of LWOP than the death penalty. I have already refuted that the meals in prison aren't too good. Also, the social interaction in prison is not necessarily "good". My opponent attacks the Huffington Post with no evidence of it being "liberal bias." If you had actually read my text, I said it suggests that there is not any evidence it being a deterrent (as you pointed out) not that it *proves* it is not a deterrent. The Constitution obviously states that people should have the right to life, such as "pursuit of LIFE, liberty, and happiness" or "nor shall any state deprive any person of LIFE, liberty, or property. [5]" As for Amendment 5, I have shown we can lower and possibly diminish the chances of any murderer escaping from prison.B. RecidivismThe example that pro provided was obviously an avoidable error. It is absurd a man would only get 8 years in prison for a murder. This can be easily fixed by giving murderers more harsh sentences excluding the death penalty. His list that he cited was, once again, outdated. Technology has significantly improved to help stop prisoners from escaping, and there is no denying that technology is going to get greater and will likely pose a solution to stopping prisoners from escaping.As for Britain, the people who were released can also clearly be stopped by simply not releasing them. If we abolish the death penalty in California alone, we potentially save 300 million per murder. 300 million dollars is a big fund, and we could potentially build an extra 28 prisons [6] with the money saved. In more moderate states, we could build a new prison every 8 executions.RII. Justice It is cruel to kill a convicted murderer because regardless of what the person did, he does not deserve death. Plus, it isn't exactly a "gentle" way to kill a murderer. Most inmates on death row wait 20 years in terrible prison conditions, then doctors make them stare death right in the face. Also, could you please state the Mills quote? The UN Declaration of Human Rights is a document of proper morals, while not objective, it still portrays good morals in humans that we should follow. Even if rights are not absolute, we should fight to make them as absolute as possible. Con states a "social contract" which he has not stated. He also states if you break that "contract," you deserve death.I have not directly refuted your analysis on punishments needing to match the crime because I have shown that LWOP is a proper "capital punishment," and it is fit for the worst punishment. Basically, living life in a living hell and death are equal, maybe with living hell above death.R1: CostYou never said that you can't put a price on justice, just that you can't put a price on life. If you really can't put a price on justice, would you be willing to pay 10 trillion just to punish someone (it's an absurd example, but it goes along of the lines that "you can't put a price on justice.) So we can put a price on justice. I have said that rights should be as absolute as possible. The military does put a price on life, as we send people out to get killed and defend at a price of roughly $652 billion per year. We send people to the chair and get killed to try to defend the local population (teach them a lesson.) If we do abolish the death penalty and save money, then the state is going to do something good with it. It could be education, police force, state housing, etc.I think your next rebuttal was saying that I argued a link YOU posted? You were arguing a link I posted (source 5, round 2) and I was trying to defend it. If it was the deterrence study, then I have already refuted it by showing a little tweak in the instruments could cause as much as 500 lives saved or 87 lives lost according to the studies. I have already said I do believe the death penalty deters SOME murders, just not a good amount.Again with my source. It has another source at the bottom of the page. LOOK AT IT. My opponent doesn't show that the death penalty does deter more murders than LWOP, so therefore, his economic argument is not true. As for the plea bargaining, the costs of the death penalty are still higher than LWOP with the plea bargaining, which just goes to tell you how much the death penalty costs.Rc2: DeterrenceLike the state argument, my country argument is logical because if the thought of LWOP scares and deters more would-be murderers than the death penalty, the country would have a lower murder rate. Once again, the death penalty does deter some murders, just not a good amount.If LWOP was a worse sentence, not everyone would commit suicide. This is like saying all people on death row would commit suicide because they thing the death penalty is a terrifying punishment also state a few do, which just adds to my argument that LWOP is a good punishment. Rc3: InnocenceI have already refuted this argument by showing that if LWOP was the highest punishment, judges would be more cautious to throw people into the sentence. Overturned convictions haven't happened in a decade, but we have come close to killing innocent people (see my 144 people study.) LWOP is less urgent because it is the second worst punishment (as seen by society,) so is therefore less urgent. Releasing 3% of people in "vastly lower" amount of LWOP is scary, as it goes to show how many people could have been innocent if we are still releasing so many people with a small number of LWOPs.I'm out of characters. Thanks for the debate![1] http://www.innocenceproject.org...[2] http://madamenoire.com...[3] http://www.takepart.com...[4] http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org...[5] http://www.law.cornell.edu...[6] http://www.reedconstructiondata.com...