Death Penalty

I will not re-post my sources at this late juncture. If you examine the materials I have provided, you will see that the costs of holding a death row inmate are greater than the costs of switching to a purely life sentencing system." I read your source and the funny thing is your source never explains how it will only cost 11.5 million dollars. It is a completely absurd number. Even if you take the costs of how much it costs to keep a regular inmate it still does not add up. The average cost per inmate (not on death row) in California costs the state 49,000 multiply that by 680 inmates charged with the crime of murder and you will get 33,320,000 the average cost of medicine per inmate is $6,935 multiply that by 680 you get 4,715,800 add that number with 33,320,000 you get 38,035,800(per year). As you can the price of holding a regular inmate exceeds that number. The fact of the matter is the reason that our current system is as costly as it is, is due to the lack of executions in California not because of them. In 30 years California has only executed 13 out of the hundreds of people on death row. As a result most of the inmates on death row die of natural causes what you fail to understand is that you can hardly call it death penalty system its more like a life imprisonment system with a very very low possibility of execution. Please explain how a purely life imprisonment system is cheaper explain to me how your source got those numbers. http://savecalifornia.com... "The source is posted. Reforming the system would cause it to cost twice as much." Are you saying that putting a couple of bullets into the murderers the moment they are convicted of the crime costs twice as much? That's my idea of death penalty reform. Not this mostly life imprisonment system we currently have. "Due process only applies when you are accused of breaking the law. I am not saying that the death penalty is unconstitutional. I am saying that any penalty applied without due process is unconstitutional." That is exactly where your wrong every single person accused of murder gets a fair trial. That is exactly what due process is. Due process of law- the regular administration of the law, according to which no citizen may be denied his or her legal rights and all laws must conform to fundamental, accepted legal principles, as the right of the accused to confront his or her accusers. Everyone accused of murder has the right to confront their accusers. "Also, what good does it do to focus on lost rights? That doesn't fix anything. All it does it provide retribution … costly retribution." People who are convicted of murder obviously do not get to enjoy their right to life since they have taken somebody Else's right to life therefore they should be put to death immediately. "The problem with studies is that they are prone to flaws in methodology." Yes, every study has a margin of error but how can you look at that graph I cited and not admit that the death penalty is working in some way. "The benefits of a death penalty should show up in the numbers, with fewer incidents of murder in those states with a death penalty than without, and with an increase in murder for those that eliminate it. This has not happened; therefore, the deterrent prediction is false." That is the great thing about most studies is they weigh in all the factors. No, to see if something is working or not you must obviously have to look at a national level rather then a state level. On the national scale the graph I cited above shows that with more executions leads to less murders. " Here's another event that correlates with the increase in number of murders" I do not see how your source correlates with the increase murders. My source correlates with the increase of murders with the decrease of executions seem a lot more logical to me. Again I tried reading your source but read nothing about the correlation between drugs and murder. "Note that we have also been steadily killing more people, which would not be what I would call deterrence" Your source does not say we are killing them it simply states the number of people on death row. There is two reasons for that. 1.population increase in the U.S. and 2. there has been a decline in executions in many states such as the example I made with California. If you look at murder rates there has been a increase but not by much. In 1950 the murder rate was 4.6 then over time less executions were being performed leading to the murder rate high 10.2 in the 1980s then the execution rate started to climb leading to a rate at 5.5. "You also can not legally kill someone if they are incapacitated and no longer could be reasonably considered an immediate threat." But, there is immediate threat how about those prison guards who are killed while watching inmates? The threat will always be there until they are rightfully put to death. "Punishment is a process that occurs after people are caught, not in the middle of the act." Capital punishment is the punishment murderers receive. "Most are going down, by the way." Whether that is true or not I am sure you will find that the most heinous crimes you can think of are on the rise. I am sure you can equate that to a moral decline. "Actually, North Carolina began reducing the number of executions for a number of reasons entirely unrelated to the penalty itself" North Carolina banned executions of the mentally ill. Giving people who aren't mentally ill a defense for claiming a illness they do not have.