The Death Penalty: The Deterrent

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that capital punishment be imposed when justified and expanded to cover terrible crimes in addition to murder" (Lee 163).
Ever since executions have existed, there have been several methods of executing criminals. Firing squad, hanging, decapitation, and stoning people to death were some of the methods that had been used in the past to perform executions. The three most common forms of executions in the United States today are: electrocution, the gas chamber, and lethal injection (Mortimer 67). As of February 25, 1998, there have been nine lethal injections and one gas chamber execution this year in the United States (USA Executions). Being only a month and a half into the year, and already having ten executions, this tells us that there is a lot of crime in today's society. Law enforcement officials are protecting our nation to the best of their ability; therefore, it is our duty to see that justice is served.
Deterrence is a strategy that our justice system uses to reduce or ...

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for their offenses?
Deterrence uses punishment as an act to convince people who contemplate criminal activity that crimes will not be tolerated in society. Isaac Ehrlich, for instance, in an extensive statistical analysis of executions between the years 1933 and 1967, reached very different conclusions. He contends not only that the executions reduced the murder rate but that one additional execution per year between 1933 and 1967 would have resulted in seven or eight fewer murders per year (Monk 229). Although they are well aware of the crimes that they are committing criminals just do not anticipate being caught. Those individuals convicted of capital crimes are not good ...

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