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Lisa Delaney
Professor Jessica Alzen
English 123
31 January 2016
Capital Punishment: Research Project Proposal
Capital punishment in the United States of America has been a controversial issue since
colonial times, and it is not a simple issue to address. The use of the death penalty in the United
States has been around far longer than the country has been established. Capital punishment was
brought over with European settlers who first came to this country. The first recorded use of the
death penalty on these shores happened in 1608 in the Jamestown colony of Virginia, 168 years
before the United States became a country (Death Penalty Information Center, History). Today,
there are currently 2,960 inmates of death row in the United States. California is responsible for
twenty-five percent of those inmates with 743 individuals sitting on death row. However, the last
time California actually executed anyone was January 17, 2006, yet according to the DPIC the
cost of the death penalty in [California] has been over $4 billion since 1978, (Fact Sheet, page
4). From a financial standpoint for the United States, the death penalty is no longer justified.
With exonerations increasing yearly, effectiveness as a deterrent lessening, and the costs
continuing to skyrocket, it is time for the United States to abolish capital punishment.
When it comes to the argument to abolish the death penalty in the United States, most
would probably agree that the thought of executing an innocent person is pretty high on the list
of reasons to get rid of capital punishment. Since 1973, 156 people have been exonerated from
death row in the United States. In his TED talk, lawyer Bryan Stevenson states, For every nine
people who have been executed, weve actually identified one innocent person whos been

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exonerated and released from death row. With something as serious as the death penalty, no
margin of error should be acceptable. If we look closer at the state level, Florida for example, has
had ninety-two executions since 1976 and has exonerated twenty-six people from death row.
That means in Florida for every three people executed, one has been exonerated. According to
the National Registry of Exonerations (NRE), five defendants were exonerated from death row in
2015. Data from the DPIC shows that from 1973-1997 there was an average of 3 exonerations
per year, and that number increased to an average of 4.88 exonerations per year from 1998-2015.
Twelve exonerations from death row in the past two years alone.
Besides an increasing amount of exonerations every year, the death penalty is no longer
an effective deterrent against violent crimes. Instead of being used as a deterrent to prevent
crimes from happening in the first place, the death penalty has become more effective as a way
to force a confession, even if it isnt true. The NRE uses defendant Shawn Whirl as an example
in their report stating, In 1991, Shawn Whirl pled guilty to first-degree murder in Chicago to
avoid facing the death penalty (Page 8). Richard Dieter, the Executive Director of the Death
Penalty Information Center (DPIC), polled police chiefs across the nation and asked if they
believed capital punishment was effective in preventing violent crimes from happening. His
report states that Fifty-seven percent (57%) said that death penalty does little to prevent violent
crimes because perpetrators rarely consider the consequences when engaged in violence (Page
10).
In premeditated murder cases, it would be hard to argue that the thought of the death
penalty did any good to prevent the crime from happening. In acts of passion or in the heat of the
moment, it would also be hard to argue that the consequence of capital punishment did any good
to stop the crime from happening. It is not until after the crime is committed that the thought of

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consequence comes into play. Frances states in his article, And what is societys reward for all
this effort and expense? Precious little. In many states and in federal cases, the death penalty has
become purely symbolicAnd in the states committed to actually following through on the
death penalty, there is no evidence that executions have any more deterrent value than life
without parole (Page 2). In fact, most inmates sit on death row for so long the public forgets
about them, lessening the effectiveness the death penalty has to deter crime.
Lastly there is the argument of the cost of life in prison versus the cost of the death
penalty. Those who agree with the death penalty are either not aware of the actual cost it requires
to seek the death penalty, or think that life sentences cost more over time. According to the
DPIC, In Texas, a death penalty case costs an average of $2.3 million, about three times the cost
of imprisoning someone in a single cell at the highest security level for 40 years (Fact Sheet),
and that is just the cost of the case seeking the death penalty, not the cost incurred after
sentencing either with appeals or life imprisonment. Richard Dieter did a good job of comparing
the cost of the two when he stated,
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 trails, followed by incarceration for lifeEverything that is
needed for an ordinary trial is needed for a death penalty case, only more so: more pretrial time, more experts, twice as many attorneys. Two trials instead of one will be
conducted: one for guilt and one for punishment. And then will come a series of appeals
during which the inmates are held in the high security of death row. (Testimony)
With the length of appeals and with some states, like California, not actually executing inmates
on death row, taxpayers are paying a premium for life imprisonments under the sentencing of

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capital punishment.
Using the Brian Nichols case, Wood explains how seeking the death penalty in that case
immediately started off $350,000 over budget for the Georgia legislature. The costs only
continued to rise throughout the trial and caused issues including delays and what could have
been a very costly overturned verdict. When the state refused to give any more money to the
defense, the case was halted until the defense was paid. Had the defense not been paid it was
likely the verdict of the case could have been overturned due to Sixth Amendment issues and,
the state of Georgia [would] have paid nearly $7 million for a trial that [would have
accomplish] nothing (Page 179). In the end, Nichols was sentenced to multiple life-in-prison
sentences when the jury could not come to a unanimous decision on the death penalty. This
sentence could have been achieved at a much lower cost to the state of Georgia had the death
penalty not been pursued.
While our country still practices the death penalty, more often than not, jurors are unsure
about actually sentencing someone to death, like in the Nichols case. Bryan Stevenson addresses
this stating, Its interesting, this question of the death penalty. In many ways, weve been taught
to think that the real question is, do people deserve to die for the crimes theyve committed? The
other way of thinking about it is not, do people deserve to die for the crimes they commit, but do
we deserve to kill? In the Ten Commandments we are forbidden to do so, You shall not
murder (English Standard Version Bible, Exodus 20:13). Of course, this commandment is meant
for us as individuals, and capital punishment is dealt by government, However, individually as a
part of a jury, we are asked to make a decision regarding the value of a life. This moral issue may
be why juries are having a harder time condemning people to death. In her book, Scherdin points
out that in 2013 there were 49,000 inmates serving life sentences compared to the 3,200 inmates

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on death row. However, by the time a jury makes its decision, most of the money has already
been spent. According to the DPIC website, The most comprehensive study in the country
found that the death penalty costs North Carolina $2.16 million per execution over the costs of
sentencing murderers to life imprisonment. The majority of those costs occur at the trial level
(Fact Sheet). Life sentences have become the standard in the United States, yet taxpayers are still
paying millions of dollars each year for executions that do not happen.
At the end of this year, California voters will have a chance to abolish the death penalty
in the state when it appears as a measure on the ballot. The last time it appeared on the ballot for
voters it narrowly lost with a vote of forty-eight percent to fifty-two percent, that was four years
ago. The death penalty has lost credibility in this country. Every time someone sitting on death
row is exonerated, the integrity of capital punishment is questioned. The margin of error is too
big to be ignored. The death penalty holds no weight when it comes to deterring violent crimes,
and even when the death penalty is sought in court, juries are unwilling to sentence criminals to
death. From a financial perspective, the cost is too great for the United States to continue using
the death penalty. It is time for capital punishment to be abolished.

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Working Bibliography
Davidson, Douglas. God and the Executioner: The Influence of Western Religion on the Use of
the Death Penalty. William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal 9.1 (2001): 137-70.
Death Penalty Information Center. n.p. n.d. Web. 10 Jan. 2016
Dieter, Richard C. Testimony to the Judiciary Committee of the Colorado State House of
Representatives Regarding House Bill 1094 Costs of the Death Penalty and Related
Issues. 2007. Print.
Dieter, Richard C. Smart on Crime: Reconsidering the Death Penalty in a Time of Economic
Crisis. Death Penalty Information Center, Oct. 2009. Web. 10 Jan. 2016.
Evans, Kim Masters. Capital Punishment: Cruel and Unusual? 2012 ed. Detroit: Gales, 2012.
Information Plus Reference Series. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 10 Jan. 2016.
Exonerations in 2015. The National Registry of Exonerations, Feb. 2016. Web. 6 Feb. 2016.
Frances, Allen. The US Cant Afford to Continue the Death Penalty: Not a Cost Effective Way
to Reduce Crime. Psychiatric Times 31.7 (2014): 1-2 2p. CINAHL Complete. Web. 10
Jan. 2016.
Garland, David. Capital Punishment and American Culture. Punishment & Society 7 (2005):
347-76. Print.
Megivern, James J. "Capital Punishment." Contemporary American Religion. Ed. Wade Clark

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Roof. Vol. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 1999. 95-98. Gale Virtual Reference
Library. Web. 10 Jan. 2016.
Palmer, Louis J. The Death Penalty in the United States: A Complete Guide to Federal and State
Laws. 2nd ed. Jefferson: McFarland, 2014. Print.
Scherdin, Lill, ed. Capital Punishment: A Hazard to a Sustainable Criminal Justice System?
Burlington: Ashgate, 2014. Webcat Library Catalog. Web. 10 Jan. 2016.
Stevenson, Bryan. We Need to Talk About an Injustice. TED2012. Long Beach Performing
Arts Center, Long Beach. Mar. 2012. Lecture.
The Holy Bible: English Standard Version: The ESV Study Bible. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles,
2008. Print.
Thompson, Bruce E.R. The Greenhaven Encyclopedia of Capital Punishment. Detroit:
Greenhaven Press, 2006. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 10 Jan. 2016.
Wood, Dennis Brandon. "Driving up the Costs: An Examination of the Brian Nichols Trial and
the New Attack on the Death Penalty The Journal of the Legal Profession 33. (2008):
173. LexisNexis Academic: Law Reviews. Web. 10 Jan. 2016.