Open Letter to Congress
Hello my name is Owen Soy and I go to a charter school in the Bay Area. In my English class, we have have been completing a project about the nature of evil. Through this project, I have realized that the death penalty should be changed. I wanted to write to you specifically, because as a nation we should abolish the death penalty. To provide some context the death penalty has been around since eighteenth century B.C. and has been implemented in the U.S. in 1600’s. In 1612 Virginia Governor Sir Thomas Dale enacted the Divine, Moral and Martial Laws, which provided the death penalty for even minor offenses such as stealing grapes, killing chickens, and trading with Indians. Can we keep using an obsolete punishment that has been around for more than 400 years. Based on my research, I argue that the U.S. needs to ban the death penalty because it doesn’t deter crime and it’s too costly.
To give some context on this issue research on determining whether capital punishment actually deters crime isn’t available. According to John J. Donohue, a professor of Law at Stanford Law School, and a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research in a piece of their work titled “ There’s no evidence that death penalty is a deterrent against crime” he stated,” A panel of the National Academy of Sciences addressed the deterrence question directly in 2012 and unanimously concluded that there was no credible evidence that the death penalty deters homicides.” In other words there isn’t evidence that the death penalty affects people from not committing crimes. This information is important because why would you keep the death penalty if it doesn’t stop people from perpetrating crimes? Additionally,in the same article John writes,”A number of studies purported to find deterrent effects but all of these studies collapse after errors in coding, measuring statistical significance, or in establishing causal relationships.” This information is important because it builds understanding that studies on determining whether the death penalty deters crime struggle to measure statistics and find important relationships. Overall, this data shows why we should ban the death penalty.
To give more context on death penalty costs, life imprisonment is a way less costly penalty, since locking someone up is far less expensive than both locking them up and paying a team of lawyers for many years — often decades — to debate whether a sentence of death should be imposed. According to Torin McFarland, a PhD Student in Finance from Drexel University’s LeBow College of Business in their work “ The Death Penalty vs. Life Incarceration: A Financial Analysis” Torin writes,” […] costs could even become higher, pending the outcome of various lawsuits against various states for their “botched” executions. Each death penalty inmate is approximately $1.12 million more than a general population inmate.” This means that the U.S. is nearly throwing millions of dollars away for each death penalty criminal. This information is significant because it shows the amount of money spent on capital punishment inmates relative to prisoners. Additionally, according to Kimberly Amadeo who has 20 years senior-level corporate experience in economic analysis and business strategy, in her article “ What Criminal Sentence Costs More: Death or Life in Prison?” she writes,” In California, the death penalty has cost more than $4 billion since 1978. That includes the costs of trials, appeals, and incarceration on death row.” This information matters because it shows how much money only one state uses in the time span of 35 years for the process of capital punishment. Overall, this data shows that the death penalty is excessively expensive.
Some might argue that some criminals deserve to be punished for the crimes that they have done like rapists and serial killers. However it is also true that while some crimes deserve punishment we can give criminals an opportunity to get rehab. Imagine this: a citizen only committing a crime because he/she was mentally unstable. This person can still be saved. Do you believe killing this person is justified, right, or fair? Therefore, we should ban the death penalty because we can offer criminals rehab to stabilize them into society.
Therefore, I implore you to ban the death penalty. This will make a difference because the U.S. will have more money to use. They can use money to hire properly trained police officers to stop homicides. If you could ban a government-sanctioned practice which is a sinkhole for money and doesn’t deter crime would you? Of course you would, so ban the death penalty. Millions will be happy with your choice.
Thank you,
Owen Soy
