Arguments in Favor of Capital Punishment and its Alternatives - Essay Example

Capital Punishment Should criminals, especially murderers and rapists, be hanged to death or offered life imprisonment on their heinous crimes? Indeed, this has become a serious debate as people argue that death penalty to felonies would help eradicating the hard core criminal elements in our society. The author himself is in favor of ‘Capital Punishment’ and would like to argue that offering Life Imprisonment is not among pertinent options as compared to sentencing malefactors to death. Capital Punishment refers to awarding death as a punishment or penalty to the murderers, assassins and serial killers, who subject people to death for any reasons. Indeed, this punishment has been applicable since ancient times to curb crimes and bring felons before justice. World’s major religions such as Christianity and Islam have also prescribed death for murder, necromancy and rape attempts as presented in Holy books including Bible and Quran. For instance, we have to consider the viewpoints, arguments, opinions, ideas and understanding of every individual as we live in the democratic society where every person enjoys freedom of speech, expression and open communication. It is worthwhile to mention the fact that anti-capital punishment campaigners usually disregard the universal truth that everyone is mortal, when defending Life Imprisonment against death penalty. For instance, such campaigners argue that life-long wait for natural death by criminals will increase their agony of torture and emotional anguish in comparison to pain and hurting they receive before hanging in public for death. However, they fail to provide a legitimate explanation against the argument raised by endorsers of death penalty “whether Life Imprisonment to culprits is the just decision for those who have lost their loved ones killed by felonies for personal reasons”. Some of the major arguments raised for and against capital punishment will now be demonstrated in the following sections to reach an appropriate conclusion. The first major argument in favour of Capital Punishment by supporters is that it leads to permanent eradication of notorious criminal groups, gangs or individuals from society. In addition, the death penalty serves as a example that no one is beyond the law as well as permitted to take law in one’s hand by brutally assassinating the innocents in society. Also, the punishment makes society safer and restores confidence of general public, which remains frightened from presence of such malefactors in prisons, as the probability that they could ditch law enforcement authorities and evade is always there, though, minimal. Next, the notorious personnel obviously would not commit any further crimes after death. The second major argument for death penalty is resources are scarce and governments have to utilize them efficiently to bring greater good to the society. Felonies, if offered life imprisonment, have to be kept in safest prisons that are, of course, not constructed, managed and maintained for free. Indeed, the government has to provide food, shelter, medical and clothing facilities followed by recreational activities to prisoners in case law supports the latter, which should be considered as additional financial burden. Why should this money be spent on proven criminals instead of deserving needy personnel that are victims of poverty and unemployment monster? Hence, it is justified to argue that economic and financial costs of life imprisonment are extremely high than death sentencing. Third, the malefactors should also be subjected to feel pain, agony and anguish of death to understand the real meaning of ‘offence and assault’ towards the innocents. Moreover, many people still convict in old principal of "lex talens" (an eye for an eye), because they view it as absolutely legitimate and lawful for atrocities. There are various arguments raised against the imposition of Death Penalty that will now be evaluated to prove if they are really relevant and legally acceptable. The most important argument against Capital Punishment is that the probability that genuinely innocent people will be suspected as guilty party or felonies is always there, no matter how stronger the law and investigation committees are. Now, the proponents of Life Imprisonment argue that if this probability increases than who will be responsible for the adverse consequences to families of innocents whose life will turn into an eternal torture? Could this miscarriage of justice be compensated by law enforcement agencies? The second important argument is that the person involved in the murder may have done that intentionally because of nefarious designs, yet he would not accept that the assassination was a killing; rather maintain that it was nothing but a mistake. In such cases, only the alleged and the victim (deceased) would know about the underlying truth; however, the absence of deceased makes the case complex and difficult to get resolved. Consequently, the lawyers remain busy in court sessions as well as in signing appeals or petitions, which benefits the culprit (in short run) but nettles both culprit’s and the victim’s families and other associated personnel. Indeed, the time and money is also involved in such hearings that could be devoted for better purposes. The third argument against Capital Punishment is that the law is strongly implemented in developed nations unlike most developing countries. Hence, the investigations could be conducted in a better manner in societies with stronger law, yet the probability that innocents could be suspected as notorious due to personal, ethnic, religious or language biases, is higher. The situation in most developing countries is much complex than estimates presented by researchers. In the light of above, the dangers of capital punishment would create unrest and uncertainty in society that might lead to civil disobedience. Well, the response to such above mentioned questions is that the possibility that innocents might suffer in a society is always there but very low (specifically in USA), and there are certain investigative techniques that further help in reducing such possibilities. Next, according to Utilitarian Principle of Ethics, the Capital Punishment will permanently wipe out such criminals from society that will bring greater good to society in general, even if some bad events happen due to miscarriage of justice. Next, life imprisonment is not even supported by our religion, which confirms that the guilty party should be sentenced to death if it had been deliberately involved in atrocious and unlawful crimes. Read More