Capital punishment as a form of justice

Now without further ado – The Death Penalty wastes both time and money:In my opponent’s response, he essentially concedes that the implementation of the death penalty will cost states tens of millions of dollars and that this outrageous cost has negative impact on society. Thus, I have established that cost is one of the reasons why the death penalty should not be implemented. The only feeble attempt at a rebuttal my opponent offers is an oversimplification – he asks me to choose between money and justice. This is a logical fallacy because my opponent poses a black and white scenario, depicting people who oppose the death penalty as choosing money over justice. In reality, this is clearly not the case; just because I don’t believe in pouring millions of valuable taxpayer dollars into extraneous costs doesn’t mean I don’t value justice. It simply means I don’t buy into my opponent’s distorted notions of right and wrong. For example, according to the New York Times, “(The State of California’s) death row costs taxpayers $114 million a year beyond the cost of imprisoning convicts for life… the state has executed 13 people since 1976 for a total of about $250 million per execution”. The kind of money that funds my opponent’s “justice” could have paid for over one thousand full time police officers, who in turn could have potentially saved hundreds of lives. Clearly, the question is not whether I value justice - it’s whether my opponent values public safety. At this point, I’d also like to point out that my opponent needs to begin sourcing his arguments, because the descriptions of prison life he’s posting sounds more like media propaganda than hard facts. Life in a maximum security prison, which is the type of prison a convict like Braivik would go to, has cells only slightly bigger than a washroom housing 7 convicts each. Most convicts usually sit in cramped idleness, with only 2 inadequate meals a day, and one “yard hour” where they are actually allowed to mill around inside a barbed wire fence with the other convicts. Other than that, it’s basically wasting away with no toiletries, little to no hygiene, and nothing constructive to do. If this is what Pro envisions as “everyday life” for ordinary people, I cannot even begin to imagine what he believes punishment should be like. Finally, Pro’s idea of the Death Penalty helping ease overcrowding in prisons is bogus – with most states totaling less than 25 executions, I won’t even bother addressing such a ridiculous statement. Source: . http://www.nytimes.com...Source: . http://mostlywater.org...The Death Penalty carries the risk of wrongful executions:In my sources this round I have attached an article on Wayne Felker to clear up any confusion my opponent has experienced. I request that he read it, because that’s exactly what happened; Wayne Felker was charged and arrested for murder 17 years before he was executed. Back then, DNA testing was a lot less reliable, not to mention more expensive. Wayne Felker was among the first recorded cases of an attempt at exonerating the deceased. Additionally, the statistic I provided showed that 1 in 17 death row inmates were pardoned, with the possibility of more being innocent but not exonerated. I apologize for not clearing this up earlier, although I disagree with my opponent; the judicial system already spends millions of dollars and years of time on each death row case, it’s neither possible nor practical to dedicate even more resources to each individual case. The reality is that the death penalty is both wasteful and runs the risk of murdering innocent people, and abolishing capital punishment is the best way to take care of both issues. Finally, I need to address some of my opponent’s comments about the judicial system, because he is misinformed. First of all, a life sentence averages 25 years, not 15 as my opponent has stated. For most murderers like Braivik, who received 21 years, early parole is denied in advance. It’s also ironic that my opponent uses the term “threat to society”, because the judicial system reserves the right to deny release if any convict is deemed a “threat to society”. If we add up the years, most murderers will be over 50 by the time they leave prison, and at that point they still remain on probation. Clearly, my opponent’s fantasies of dangerous, blood thirsty murderers being released into society are untrue. Source: . http://www.truthinjustice.org...The Judicial system is not built solely on punishment:I have little more to say about this point, other than the fact that Pro seems to concede in that he acknowledges that the vengeance is not the exclusive thought process behind the judicial system. I do need to point out that comparisons between states with and without capital punishment find no correlation between the death penalty and murder rates. 88% of criminologists also agree that there would be no major change in crime rates if we abolish capital punishment, implying that most murderers are not afraid of death as a punishment like I had stated in my previous round. Finally, it is worth noting that my opponent contradicts himself when he states that mentally unstable convicts should be sent to the psychiatric ward and not to death – Braivik was diagnosed with multiple mental disorders at the time of his sentencing, including paranoid schizophrenia. Source: . http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org...Conclusion:I think it should be clear at this point that there are really no major motivations behind implementing capital punishment other than vengeance. My opponent may attempt to dress up facts with ambiguous terms such as “justice”, but in reality, he’s really advocating draining hundreds of millions of dollars a year on a meager, as few as 13, handful of convicts, some of them being innocent at that! I believe I have thoroughly debunked all of my opponent’s arguments, including the point about deterrence. Although my opponent states that he does not believe that the judicial system is solely based on vengeance, his willingness to dedicate our valuable resources to shooting already incarcerated criminals rather than save lives suggests otherwise. Thank you. Back to Pro.