LAHORE: The recent carnage of innocent children at the Army Public School in Peshawar and Premier Nawaz Sharif’s reflex action to lift the moratorium on the death penalty might soon re-ignite the debate on this thorny issue in Pakistan. However, human rights organisations arguing against the ‘eye for an eye’ code of justice might still opt to remain tight-lipped on this subject for a few more days in a bid to avoid a likely backlash from the mourning general public.
There is no doubt that the world is visibly divided over capital punishment and debates on this touchy issue are frequently being held in the United States, Europe and elsewhere.In fact, death penalty is one of the most debatable issues in the criminal justice system all over the world, as a lot of arguments on retribution and punishment are being aired vociferously by both sides—-whereby the need, ethics and legality of capital punishment are discussed.
However, while discussing the pros and cons of death penalty, even the best jurists in the world are seen and heard laying too much emphasis on the convicted murderers and not on the victims and their aggrieved heirs, which again is quite natural.
It goes without saying that in most countries where death penalty exists, the number of people actually executed per year (as compared to those sentenced to death) is usually a very small proportion.
Here follow 10 major arguments in favour of death penalty:
1). Executing convicted murderers will deter the would-be murderers from killing people. It is an ultimate warning against all crimes. It is state’s responsibility to bring such criminals to justice, because if it doesn’t, it will lead to vgilante Justice, where people will take law in their own hands.
All guilty people thus deserve to be punished in proportion to the severity of their crime. In countries like Iran, Singapore, Iran and Saudi Arabia etc, where death sentences are carried out, serious crime is far less.
In United States, during a period of increased use of the death penalty, the murder rate had dropped by 26 per cent from 24,562 in 1993 to 18,209 in 1997, the lowest for years. During this time period, 311 executions had been carried out.
America still had five times as many murders per head of population as did Britain in 1997, whilst Singapore had 15 times fewer murders per head of population than Britain.
Various recent academic studies in America have shown that capital punishment is a deterrent because there is absolutely no hope of reprieve for the killers once they are caught and brought to justice.
It is imperative to note that in United States, five legal methods of execution: lethal injection, electrocution, firing squad, hanging and gassing are used to award the death penalty in line with the Eighth Amendment to the American Constitution that prohibits the imposition of “cruel and unusual punishments” and the “infliction of unnecessary pain in the execution of the death sentence.”
In Britain, the murder incidents have more than doubled since abolition of capital punishment in 1964 from 0.68 per 100,000 of the population to 1 .42 per 100,000.
The British Home Office figures show around 300 unlawful killings in 1964, which rose to 565 in 1994 and 833 in 2004. The number of killings recorded by police rose to 640 (10.43 per million population) in 2010- 2011. In 2011, this figure had stood at 577. In 2012, this figure had rested at 552. And till April 14, 2014, as research shows, some 551 murders had been registered in Britain.
According to the British Home Office, a total of 35 people released after being convicted of murder and manslaughter, had gone on a killing spree again between 2000/2001 and 2010/2011.
Figures released in 2009 showed that since 1997, some 65 British prisoners, who were released after serving life, were convicted of a further crime. These crimes included two murders, one suspected murder, one attempted murder, three rapes and two instances of grievous bodily harm.
The above-mentioned trends indicate that the death penalty is a deterrent in most countries where execution is a virtual certainty. However, where the crime is committed in the heat of the moment, there is no likelihood that any punishment will act as a deterrent.
This can happen anywhere in the world though.Real justice requires people to suffer for their wrongdoing and to suffer in a way proportionate to the crime. Each criminal should get what his crime deserves. The courts must respond to society’s cry for justice against criminals, so as to reflect the public abhorrence of the crime.
Justices A.S. Anand and N.P. Singh of the Indian Supreme Court had given the following verdict in the case of Dhananjoy Chatterjee, who was executed in a Kolkata jail by hanging for raping and murdering a 14-year old girl in March 1990.
“Many people find that this argument fits in their inherent sense of justice. It’s often supported with the argument- ‘An eye for an eye.’ But to argue like that demonstrates a complete misunderstanding of what that Old Testament phrase actually means. In fact the Old Testament meaning of “an eye for an eye” is that only the guilty should be punished, and they should be punished neither too leniently nor too severely.”
Execution is a very real punishment rather than some form of “rehabilitative” treatment. The criminal is made to suffer in proportion to the offence.
In his October 17, 1983 “New York Times” article, Professor Ernest Van Den Haag of New York’s Fordham University had viewed: “Common sense, lately bolstered by statistics, tells us that the death penalty will deter murder... People fear nothing more than death. Therefore, nothing will deter a criminal more than the fear of death... life in prison is less feared. Murderers clearly prefer it to execution — otherwise, they would not try to be sentenced to life in prison instead of death... Therefore, a life sentence must be less deterrent than a death sentence. And we must execute murderers as long as it is possible that their execution protects citizens from future murders.”
Bruce Ellerin, Doctor of Oncology Radiation at the Sierra Providence Health Network in Texas State, had stated in July 6, 2006: “Accepting capital punishment in principle means accepting it in practice, whether by the hand of a physician or anyone else... If one finds the practice too brutal, one must either reject it in principle or seek to mitigate its brutality. If one chooses the latter option, then the participation of physicians seems more humane than delegating the deed to prison wardens, for by condoning the participation of untrained people who could inflict needless suffering that we physicians might have prevented, we are just as responsible as if we had inflicted the suffering ourselves. The American Medical Association’s position should be changed either to permit physician participation or to advocate the abolition of capital punishment. The hypocritical attitude of ‘My hands are clean - let the spectacle proceed’ only leads to needless human suffering.”
2). An American Cardinal, Avery Dulles, argues that executions, especially where they are painful, humiliating, and public, may create a sense of horror that would prevent others from being tempted to commit similar crimes. Some proponents of capital punishment like John McAdams of Wisconsin State’s Marquette University argue that capital punishment is beneficial even if it has no deterrent effect. These pro-death penalty advocates are heard saying that if murders are executed, the step reduces the number of killers in the world. On the other hand, if murders are not executed, it allows the killing of more innocent victims, which is a risk.
3). The offenders are able to expiate their evil deeds and so escape punishment in the next life. Of course capital punishment doesn’t rehabilitate the prisoners and return them to society, but people condemned to death can repent and express remorse and in many cases, experience profound spiritual rehabilitation. This is not a very strong argument in favour of capital punishment, but it demonstrates that the death penalty can lead to some forms of rehabilitation.
4). It is undeniable that those who are executed cannot commit further crimes because capital punishment permanently removes the worst criminals from society and should prove much safer for the rest of the world than long term or permanent incarceration.
5). There is a Japanese argument on this issue also. It says that the death penalty reinforces the belief that bad things happen to those who deserve it. This reinforces the contrary belief that good things will happen to those who are ‘good.’ Official statistics, backed by an opinion poll, suggest that 81 per cent of the Japanese population supports this logic. Nonetheless there is also a small but increasingly vociferous abolitionist movement in Japan.
Life imprisonment without parole is no alternative to death penalty. It does not protect the society adequately. The offender may no longer be a danger to the public, but he remains a danger to prison staff and other inmates. Execution would remove that danger.
Dr. J. Budziszewski, Professor of Government and Philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin, had commented in his 2004 research paper: “Society is justly ordered when each person receives what is due to him. Crime disturbs this just order, for the criminal takes from people their lives, peace, liberties, and worldly goods in order to give himself undeserved benefits. Deserved punishment protects society morally by restoring this just order, making the wrongdoer pay a price equivalent to the harm he has done. This is retribution, not to be confused with revenge, which is guided by a different motive. In retribution, the spur is the virtue of indignation, which answers injury with injury for public good. Rehabilitation, protection, and deterrence have a lesser status in punishment than retribution.”
6). Money is not an inexhaustible commodity and the government may very well better spend its limited resources on the old, the young and the sick etc., rather than on the long-term imprisonment of murderers and rapists etc.
7). Those who contend that executing someone costs more than the life in prison perhaps do not realise the fact that even in the United States, there are endless appeals and delays in carrying out death sentences. In the American legal system, the average time spent on death row is over 12 years. In Britain, in the 20th century, the average time in the condemned cell was from 3 to 8 weeks and only one appeal was permitted. This argument holds true about countries like Pakistan also where, according to Amnesty International, over 8,000 criminals are on death row and no execution has taken place since 2008!
Those in favour of death penalty in Britain are raising eyebrows over a high cost of life imprisonment for convicted killers. They have calculated that since an ordinary prisoner costs £700 per week, a typical life sentence for murder with a minimum tariff of 15 years would cost around £550,000——-which is quite a high amount to spend on somebody who might take a life again after being released from jail. Imprisonment, whilst expensive and largely pointless, just removes criminals from society for a given period.
Dudely Sharp, Director of an organisation “Death Penalty Resources—Justice for All,” had commented on his institution’s website on October 1, 1997: “Many opponents present, as fact, that the cost of the death penalty is so expensive (at least $2 million per case), that we must choose life without parole at a cost of $1 million for 50 years. Predictably, these pronouncements may be entirely false. JFA [Justice for All] estimates that life without parole cases will cost $1.2 million-$3.6 million more than equivalent death penalty cases. There is no question that the upfront costs of the death penalty are significantly higher than for equivalent life without parole cases. There also appears to be no question that, over time, equivalent LWOP cases are much more expensive... than death penalty cases. Opponents ludicrously claim that the death penalty costs, over time, 3-10 times more than life without parole cases.”
8). In modern times, murderers have often been able to “get off” on the grounds of diminished responsibility and their alleged psychiatric disorders or by using devices such as plea bargain. This tends to remove peoples’ faith in justice, which is very dangerous.
9). The typical psychopath is often a person of above average intelligence but is presently incurable and will continue to present a severe risk to society.
10). On the argument that some innocent people might be implicated in murders and given death sentence, Steven Stewart, the Prosecuting Attorney for Clark County Indiana, had said on August 6, 2008: “ No system of justice can produce results which are 100 per cent certain all the time. Mistakes will be made in any system which relies upon human testimony for proof. We should be vigilant to uncover and avoid such mistakes. Our system of justice rightfully demands a higher standard for death penalty cases. However, the risk of making a mistake with the extraordinary due process applied in death penalty cases is very small, and there is no credible evidence to show that some innocent persons have been executed at least since the death penalty was reactivated in 1976... The inevitability of a mistake should not serve as grounds to eliminate the death penalty any more than the risk of having a fatal wreck should make automobiles illegal.”
This message was posted on the Clark County Prosecutor website.
The California District Attorneys Association, while giving its perspective on this American state’s death penalty laws had stated on its website in May 2003: “Defence attorneys... routinely file all manner of motions and objections to protect their clients from conviction. Attorneys know their trial tactics will be thoroughly scrutinised on appeal, so every effort is made to avoid error, ensuring yet another level of protection for the defendant. They [death penalty opponents]... have painted a picture of incompetent defence lawyers, sleeping throughout the trial, or innocent men being executed. Their accusations receive wide media coverage, resulting in a near-daily onslaught on the death penalty. Yet, through all the hysteria, jurors continue to perform their responsibilities and hand down death sentences.”
Here follow 10 major arguments against death penalty:
1). If the foreknowledge of any punishment is meant to dissuade the criminal from committing the crime, then why do people still murder others? Those against capital punishment argue hat capital punishment does not appear to be doing its job; it doesn’t seem to be changing every criminal’s mind about killing innocent people. These activists against death penalty maintain that if it does not dissuade, then it serves no purpose. The warning of life in prison without parole must equally dissuade criminals.
They are of the opinion that it is unlikely that a handful of executions a year will have any real deterrent effect particularly on the people whom society would most like to be deterred, e.g. serial killers, multiple rapists and drugs barons. Yet these particular criminals are the least likely to be executed, the serial killers will be found insane and the drug barons will use any means to avoid conviction, e.g. intimidation of witnesses.
The American Civil Liberties Union had stated on April 9, 2007: “There is no credible evidence that the death penalty deters crime more effectively than long terms of imprisonment. States that have death penalty laws do not have lower crime rates or murder rates than states without such laws. And states that have abolished capital punishment show no significant changes in either crime or murder rates. The death penalty has no deterrent effect. Claims that each execution deters a certain number of murders have been thoroughly discredited by social science research.”
2). Capital punishment is vengeance rather than retribution and, as such, is a morally dubious concept. The anticipatory suffering of the criminal, who may be kept on death row for many years, makes the punishment more severe than just depriving the criminal of life.
In 2008, Raymong Schroth, the Jesuit Priest and Community Professor of the Humanities at St. Peter’s College, had gone on to say: “Retribution is just another word for revenge, and the desire for revenge is one of the lowest human emotions - perhaps sometimes understandable, but not really a rational response to a critical situation. To kill the person who has killed someone close to you is simply to continue the cycle of violence which ultimately destroys the avenger as well as the offender. That this execution somehow give ‘closure’ to a tragedy is a myth. Expressing one’s violence simply reinforces the desire to express it. Just as expressing anger simply makes us more angry. It does not drain away. It contaminates the otherwise good will which any human being needs to progress in love and understanding.”
3). Some of those executed may not have been capable of being deterred because of mental illness or defect. Some capital crimes are committed in such an emotional state that the perpetrator does not think about the possible consequences. The death penalty laws should thus have mercy on abnormal and mentally retarded people. Deterrence is most effective when the punishment happens soon after the crime—-to make an analogy, a child learns not to put their finger in the fire, because the consequence is instant pain. The more the legal process distances the punishment from the crime—either in time or certainty—the less effective a deterrent the punishment will probably be.
4). In United States, death is usually administered in private by relatively painless means, such as injections of drugs. Therefore, it might prove to be less effective as a deterrent. Sociological evidence on the deterrent effect of the death penalty as currently practised is ambiguous, conflicting, and far from probative.
This argument was endorsed by US Supreme Court judge William J. Brennan in his dissenting opinion in the Gregg versus Georgia Case on July 2, 1976.
He had observed: “ Death is... an unusually severe punishment, unusual in its pain, in its finality, and in its enormity... The fatal constitutional infirmity in the punishment of death is that it treats members of the human race as non-humans, as objects to be toyed with and discarded. It is thus inconsistent with the fundamental premise of the Clause that even the vilest criminal remains a human being having common human dignity. As such it is a penalty that subjects the individual to a fate forbidden by the principle of civilised treatment. I, therefore, would hold on that ground alone, that death is today a cruel and unusual punishment. I would set aside the death sentences imposed... as violative of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.”
However, in his decision April 16, 2008 decision on the Baze versus Rees Case, the then US Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts had observed: “Simply because an execution method may result in pain, either by accident or as an inescapable consequence of death, does not establish the sort of ‘objectively intolerable risk of harm. Throughout our history, whenever a method of execution has been challenged in this Court as cruel and unusual, the Court has rejected the challenge. Our society has nonetheless steadily moved to more humane methods of carrying out capital punishment.”
5). Many against death penalty say that apart from giving death penalty, there are other ways to ensure the offenders do not commit that offence again, such as imprisonment for life without possibility of parole. They state that although there have been cases of persons escaping from prison and killing again, these are extremely rare. The anti-capital punishment activists cite an Italian example here, saying that not fewer than 311 prisoners serving life sentences in Italy had petitioned their government in 2007 for the right to be executed——hence proving that life terms were more painful than death actually.
6). The anti-capital punishment campaigners in United States cite the higher cost of executing someone than life in prison.
Richard Dieter, the Executive Director of the Death Penalty Information Center, had given a testimony to the Judiciary Committee of the Colorado State House of Representatives regarding costs of the death penalty and related issues on February 7, 2007.
He had stated: “In the course of my work, I believe I have reviewed every state and federal study of the costs of the death penalty in the past 25 years. One element is common to all of these studies: They all concluded that the cost of the death penalty amounts to a net expense to the state and the taxpayers. Or to put it differently, the death penalty is clearly more expensive than a system handling similar cases with a lesser punishment. [It] combines the costliest parts of both punishments: lengthy and complicated death penalty trials, followed by incarceration for life... Everything that is needed for an ordinary trial is needed for a death penalty case.”
7). Some genuinely innocent people might be executed and that there is no possible way of compensating them for this miscarriage of justice. The families and friends of these innocent criminals thus have to go through very hard times leading up to the execution and for many many years after that!
American Senator Russ Feingold, while introducing the “National Death Penalty Moratorium Act of 2000” on April 26, 2000 had opined: “Since the reinstatement of the modern death penalty, 87 people have been freed from death row because they were later proven innocent. That is a demonstrated error rate of 1 innocent person for every 7 persons executed. When the consequences are life and death, we need to demand the same standard for our system of justice as we would for our airlines... It is a central pillar of our criminal justice system that it is better that many guilty people go free than that one innocent should suffer... Let us reflect to ensure that we are being just. Let us pause to be certain we do not kill a single innocent person. This is really not too much to ask for a civilized society.”
This is what US Congressman John Conyers, during the June 2000 hearing for the Innocence Protection Act, had shockingly contended before the Subcommittee on “Crime of the Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives: “A shocking two out of three death penalty convictions have been overturned on appeal because of police and prosecutorial misconduct, as well as serious errors by incompetent court-appointed defence attorneys with little experience in trying capital cases. How can we contend that we provide equal justice under the law when we do not provide adequate representation to the poor in cases where a life hangs in the balance? We, the Congress, must bear our share of responsibility for this deplorable situation. In short, while others, like Governor Ryan in Illinois, have recognised the flaws in the death penalty, the Congress still just doesn’t get it. This system is broken.”
8). When countries like the United States claim they cause minimum possible pain to criminals while administering death, they should realise that there is no such thing as a humane method of putting a person to death. Every form of execution causes the prisoner suffering, some methods perhaps cause less than others, but be in no doubt that being executed is a terrifying ordeal for the criminal. What is also often overlooked is the mental suffering that the criminal suffers in the time leading up to the execution.
In July 2006, the American Medical Association (AMA) had stated on its website: “The American Medical Association’s policy is clear and unambiguous... requiring physicians to participate in executions violates their oath to protect lives and erodes public confidence in the medical profession. A physician is a member of a profession dedicated to preserving life... The use of a physician’s clinical skill and judgment for purposes other than promoting an individual’s health and welfare undermines a basic ethical foundation of medicine - first, do no harm. The guidelines in the AMA Code of Medical Ethics address physician participation in executions involving lethal injection. The ethical opinion explicitly prohibits selecting injection sites for executions by lethal injection, starting intravenous lines, prescribing, administering, or supervising the use of lethal drugs, monitoring vital signs, on site or remotely, and declaring death.”
9). Most global jurists against death penalty say that since an overwhelming majority of criminal defendants end up penniless by the time their case is up for appeal, they think they are treated unfairly as compared to those killers who had money and thus fancied more chances to escape the death penalty net. These legal experts are of the viewpoint that murderers who do not have any money left for final phases of litigation, are more likely to receive death sentence.
Helen Prejean, renowned anti-death penalty activist and author of “Dead Man Walking,” had given the following point of view on this issue: “Who pays the ultimate penalty for crimes? The poor. Who gets the death penalty? The poor. After all the rhetoric that goes on in legislative assemblies, in the end, when the net is cast out, it is the poor who are selected to die in this country. And why do poor people get the death penalty? It has everything to do with the kind of defence they get. Money gets you good defence.”
10). It is strange that a nation would denounce the practice of murder by committing the very same act.
