Discrimination in Applying the Death Penalty - Essay Example

From the above, an individual may ask why others would go through while others do not. To answer this question some scholars have managed to find out the racial discrimination that takes place in passing out judgments. The race of the victim and that of the defendant determines the judgment passed. One significant problem is the fact that prosecutors are capable of choosing death penalty cases without review. This allows racial discrimination to continue occurring. Results show that 81 percent of all death penalties involve white victims while only half of the total murder cases countrywide entail the white victims.

This implies that the chances for getting a death penalty for murdering a white a high. This is even worse when the murderer involved is black. From 1987, 211 blacks were accorded a death penalty for killing whites while only 14 whites got the same punishment for killing blacks. This racial biases against blacks and Latin Americans continue as efforts to stop the act has proven unsuccessful. Prosecutors, according to research, have concealed evidence and even at times using threats to coerce confessions.

Race, in this country, is a basis for passing a death sentence. Regardless of the prosecutor’s immunization against lawsuits, the government should put more effort into cubing this act.