Why We Should Kill the Death Penalty
Background of the Death Penalty
The first known execution in this country occurred in 1608, when captain George Kendall was put to death for being a spy.
Fast forward to today, and 31 U.S. states currently allow the death penalty. This means that the majority of our nation allows prisoners to be put to death for capital crimes.
Racial Disparities
A major problem with the death penalty is that this sentence can be used as a way to discriminate against minorities. According to the Death Row U.S.A. Winter 2020 report, 41.56% of the current death row population is Black. However, a 2019 population estimate by the United States Census Bureau states that Black Americans only make up abut 13% of the general population. This shows that Black Americans are disproportionately sentenced to death and placed on death row.
Furthermore, a 2015 study declared, “minority defendants have been shown to be treated more punitively, particularly in capital cases.” In this study, participants were given a scenario where an individual was accused of a triple murder. The race of the defendant (Black or White) and the maximum penalty (life without parole or death) was manipulated by the researchers. The study found that participants who read about a Black defendant were more likely to convict than those with a White defendant if the maximum sentence was the death penalty. When death was the maximum punishment, 80% of participants with a Black defendant decided to convict while only 55.1% of individuals with a White defendant convicted. However, if the maximum sentence was life in prison without parole there was no significant difference, suggesting that the death penalty itself may be to blame for some of the racial disparities on death row.
Wrongful Convictions
Another problem with the death penalty is that innocent people could possibly be put to death. Unlike alternative sentences, such as life in prison without parole, executions cannot be undone. So, if an innocent person is put to death there is no way the error can ever be fixed.
Several statistics support the fact that mistakes are made during capital punishment cases. One study published in the scientific journal PNAS found that “at least 4 percent of people sentenced to death in the U.S. are likely innocent.” A Vox article also states that as of 2015, “at least 154 people have been exonerated from death row in the U.S. since 1973, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.”
Glenn Ford is one of these individuals that have been exonerated from death row. Ford spent 30 years on death row at Angola prison for the murder of Isadore Rozeman, a local watch dealer who was found dead in his repair shop in 1983. Ford’s trial lasted only one week, and he was found guilty and sentenced to death even though there were no eye witnesses and the murder weapon was never found.
In 2015, Marty Stroud, the lead prosecutor that helped put Glenn Ford on death row, came forward and apologized for the part he had in the wrongful conviction. During a video interview with ABC News (see below), Stroud admitted that he made sure Ford did not have a fair fight by making sure there was an all-white jury. While Ford was lucky enough to be exonerated before his execution date, the trauma of spending three decades on death row as an innocent man are evident when watching the interaction between Glenn Ford and Marty Stroud. After Stroud apologized for his involvement Ford stated, “It happened, it happened and… I’m sorry I can’t forgive you. I really am.” Ford can then be seen sobbing as the prosecutor who took 30 years from him walked out of sight. At the time of his release, Glenn Ford was “the longest serving death row exoneree in America.”
Another individual who was wrongly sentenced to death was Walter McMillian, who was convicted for the murder or Ronda Morrison, a white woman from Monroeville, Alabama. After only a day and a half a jury convicted McMillian and sentenced him to life in prison, even though several witnesses confirmed McMillian’s alibi that he was attending a church event at the time of the crime. However, according to the Equal Justice Initiative “the trial judge overrode the jury’s sentencing verdict for life and sentenced Mr. McMillian to death.” McMillian was released six years later, after Bryan Stevenson showed that the prosecutor’s only witness had lied on the stand during trial. Even though McMillian was eventually proven innocent, he still underwent years of trauma that he never forgot. For example, McMillian stated that during his years on death row he could smell others prisoners being executed. He claimed, “the smell of someone you know burning to death is the most painful and nauseating experience on this earth.” According to the Equal Justice Initiative, multiple other inmates were exonerated following McMillian’s release, partly due to the awareness that his case brought to the issue of wrongful convictions.
A new wave of consciousness was created when Bryan Stevenson, the defense attorney who helped prove McMillian’s innocence, wrote a book called Just Mercy that tells Walter McMillian’s story. This bestseller has since been turned into a major motion picture of the same name. By putting stories of exonerated individuals like Walter McMillian in the mainstream media, more people can learn about the lasting negative effects the death penalty can have when errors are made.
Costs of the Death Penalty
The death penalty is also a sentence that isfar more expensive than alternative approaches, such as life in prison without parole. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, “death penalty cases seem to cost from 1.5 to fourtimes as much as non-death penalty cases.” After Nebraska repealed the death penalty in 2015, a study was conducted to look into the economic effects of the sentence. The study concluded that “the death penalty costs Nebraska an extra $14.6 million a year.” Voters later reversed the repeal, allowing the penalty to remain legal in the state of Nebraska. While numbers vary across the country, studies conducted in other states have found similar results. For example, one capital punishment case in Maryland costs an average of $3 million, which is triple what cases for alternative punishments normally cost. Similarly, California spends around $137 million each year to maintain a system with the death penalty; however, if they abolished the death penalty the system would then cost only $11.5 million per year. This means that California could save $125.5 million annually just by getting rid of capital punishment.
