Among the retentionist States, the criminal systems differ according to the type of offense, and the method and application of death penalty. To take this study further would require comparing the criminal law systems of to each jurisdiction in their entirety, however this paper will focus its analysis on the capital crimes and the various execution methods used, putting aside the different processes used during the trial and appeal phase.
1) Offenses subject to the death penalty
At the federal level, capital punishment can result from 42 offenses, including 38 related to homicide. However, some states have stricter laws that apply in other cases. As shown in the appendix on page 81[26], crimes subject to the death penalty vary by jurisdiction. All the jurisdictions which use capital punishment (38 retentionist states, the U.S. Government and U.S. Military) designate the highest grade of murder as a capital crime. In addition, there are a growing number of states that allow the execution of convicted child molesters. In
At the federal level, death penalty crimes include various degrees and types of murder as well as treason, espionage, large scale drug trafficking, kidnapping across State lines resulting in the victim's death, and attempting to kill any officer, juror, or witness in cases involving a continuing criminal enterprise.
Under U.S. Military law; there are 14 crimes subject to the death penalty. Some of them, such as desertion, are only applicable in times of war.
Despite the variety of capital crimes among the various criminal systems, no one has been executed for a crime which was not a homicide since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976. The last execution for a rape was in 1964.
1) The different methods of execution used
Five methods of execution are prescribed in the
a) Description
- Lethal injection
The procedure of lethal injection is the most common, and varies from state to state. However, in most jurisdictions, a combination of three drugs is used. The first is a barbiturate that makes the prisoner unconscious. The second one is a muscle relaxant that paralyzes the diaphragm and lungs. Finally, the third causes a cardiac arrest. Each chemical is fatal in the amounts administered and the procedure is supposed to last between three and seven minutes after the first injection. Nevertheless, sometimes it can happen that a vein collapses or the injection cannot be properly inserted. Some states give an extra sedative injection to facilitate the insertion.
Lethal injection is considered as the most ‘humane’ method, in comparison with the other methods, but it has been more and more criticized due to problems with the executions. For example, on May 3rd 2006, Joseph Clark was executed in
“Data from autopsies following 49 executions in
Another example the same year, on the 13th of December, 2006, with the execution of Angel Diaz in
- Electric chair
The electric chair is the second most used method of execution. The procedure is generally divided into three different electrocutions. The first one lasts eight seconds, programmed at 2,300 volts, followed by 1,000 volts for 22 seconds, then 2,300 volts for eight seconds. If the offender is not pronounced dead, the execution cycle is then repeated from the beginning.
The most common problems encountered are burning parts of the body, and a failure to cause death despite repeated shocks. If it is seen as violent, the electric chair is still the second most commonly used method right up till
- Lethal gas
For the lethal gas method, the inmate is strapped down by different parts of his body (chest, waist, arms, and ankles), and wears a mask. The room is equipped with metal containers where a sulphuric acid solution and cyanide pellets are placed. If the prisoner takes a deep breath, they would be unconscious within a few seconds. However, if they hold their breath, it can take much longer, and the prisoner usually goes into convulsions. Death usually occurs within 6 to 18 minutes of the lethal gas emissions caused by hypoxia, the cutting-off of oxygen to the brain.
For this method, the most common problems are the obvious agony suffered by the inmate and the length of time before they actually die. A federal court in
- Hanging
For execution by hanging, the "drop" must be tailored to the prisoner's weight, to deliver the precise force to the neck (1260 lbf² [pounds per square foot]) to ensure a quick death. The rope is then placed around the convict's neck. If properly done, the inmate dies by dislocation of the third and fourth cervical vertebrae, or by asphyxiation. If the rope is too long, the inmate could be decapitated, and if it is too short, the strangulation could take as long as 45 minutes. However, instantaneous death rarely occurs with this method.
- Firing squad
The last method, firing squad, which is the least used, is also the least precise and can last very long. The offender is bound to a chair and has a white cloth circle attached by Velcro to the area over the offender's heart. The chair is surrounded by sandbags to absorb the inmate's blood. The squad, made up of three to six shooters, fires simultaneously. One of them has blank rounds in his weapon but no one knows which member has them. The shooters aim at the chest, because it is easier to hit than the head, causing rupture of the heart, large blood vessels, and lungs, so that the inmate dies of hemorrhage and shock. Sometimes, the officer in charge gives the prisoner a pistol shot into the head to finish them off after the initial volley has failed to kill them.
b) The application of each method
The majority of retentionist states utilize the lethal injection method. Among the 38 States with death penalty statutes, 19 States and the federal government only authorize lethal injection as the sole method of execution and 18 others offer this method as an alternative method of execution, to be used depending on the inmate’s choice, the sentence, or the unconstitutionality of the main method. Electrocution is the sole option in 10 States (
Fig. 11) Methods of Executions and their Frequency Since 1976[30]
Lethal Injection | 903 |
Electric Chair | 153 |
Gas Chamber | 11 |
Hanging | 3 |
Firing Squad | 2 |
Since 1976, lethal injection has been the method most commonly used, as displayed in the table above. Of the 1072 inmates executed since 1976, 903 were killed by lethal injection, representing more than 84% of the total. The electric chair has been the second most used method since 1976 (14% of the total), the last electrocution being in
B. Regional analysis and first explanations
As we saw earlier, there have been many more executions and death row inmates in the south of the
1) Is there a link between the Republican Party and the death penalty?
It is also important to recall that, even if we have a picture of the Republican Party as a very right one, it “was born from a spontaneous revolution against slavery, [but] it proclaimed itself in favor of “law and order”, that is to say in favor of a rigorous policy on the racial issue.”[31] According o J.P Lassale, The Republican Party is influenced by “the “new right wing”, and the religious fundamentalism which supports it. (…) Today, the Republican values correspond to the strongly conservative tendencies of American public opinion.”[32]
Some studies have tried to establish a link between the political parties and the presence or absence of the death penalty as well as its application. Such investigations have been carried out to determine precisely why or why not the death penalty is employed. According to the conservatives, deterrence is the best antidote for crime:
The threat of the death chamber will save many innocent victims from criminal violence. But liberals believe that crime is caused by inequitable conditions (…), so they are skeptical about harsh sanctions. (…) We expect more death sentences where conservative values dominate.[33]
Thus, a parallel can be done between the Republican Party, the most conservative one, and a strict application of the death penalty. Let’s now try to analyze the facts.
Fig. 12) Party control, Governors as of January 2007[34]
At the beginning of the year 2007, 22 states were ruled by a Republican governor and 28 by a Democrat one. Since 1975, the
Nevertheless, one can observe that among the states with the highest number of executions (see figure 9 on page 20) the majority of them are ruled by the Republican Party. Indeed, among the nine states most likely to execute (
There may be a link between the Republican Party and the death penalty, considering where it is applied, but apparently, not concerning its presence or absence in the law. It would be interesting to continue this analysis of the death penalty’s conspicuity in the law, but we will stop it there in order to pursue another hypothesis.
2) The historical explanation for a stricter application in the South
Various studies also have been carried out to show the link between the more widespread application of the capital sentence in the southern states and the fact that they were pro-slavery before the American Revolution.
In the article ‘Vigilantism, Current Racial Treat, and Death Sentences’, from the American Sociological Review, a group of scholars attempted to highlight the link between the slavery past of the southern States and the fact that they use the death penalty more strictly and more often. “The states that once had the highest lynching rates now appear to use the death sentence most often. (…) Death sentences [are] especially likely in states with the largest minority populations that also had a history of frequent vigilante violence.”[35] They also explain the stricter application of death sentences in the south by what they call the ‘racial threat’. “Larger black populations produce increased votes for anti-minority candidates (…), who often support harsh punishments.”
In ‘From lynch mobs to the killing state’, a collection of essays edited in 2006, Timothy Kaufman-Osborn makes an insightful and well-developed examination of the contention that pervasive racism in the criminal justice system renders the contemporary execution of African-American men as unjust as the historical lynchings that occurred throughout the United States. Ultimately, he uses the term “lynching” to describe the contemporary capital punishment, which “conceals as much as it reveals.” It is clear that some authors believe racism is a root cause of discrimination in the capital justice system.
Thus, racial discrimination seems to be at the origin of such differences of application of death penalty. In order to justify such a hypothesis, we will try to compare death penalty numbers to other figures, related to social, economic and racial parameters.
C. Comparison with other figures
As we have seen, the figures show that the southern states use the death penalty more often than the northern ones[36]. But it is necessary to use demographic, racial and economic parameters to prove any discrimination. This section will compare the death row population and the number of executions to the number of inhabitants by state before putting forward a hypothesis that the southern states use death penalty more readily or more discriminatorily. It will also analyze the composition of the prison population by race and compare the figures of the death row inmates to the inequality of income to provide evidence of a racial, social and economic discrimination. Finally, we will present the crime rates by region.
1) Demographic analysis
a) Proportion of death row inmates to state population
According to the following spreadsheet, the overall number of death row inmates in the population of each State varies considerably, with disparities reaching 400%. This ratio between the death row population and the total population of each state is a better source of information with which to compare the number of death row inmates. Indeed, it permits to rationalize the number of inmates in
Fig. 13) Number of inmates per 10.000 inhabitants in 2006[37]
State | 2006 Population (x 10,000) | # of death row inmates | Rate per 10.000 pop. | |
| 459,9 | 195 | 0,424 | |
| 249,6 | 80 | 0,321 | |
| 357,9 | 88 | 0,246 | |
| 291,1 | 66 | 0,227 | |
| 1809 | 397 | 0,219 | |
| 85,3 | 18 | 0,211 | |
| 885,7 | 185 | 0,209 | |
| 428,8 | 88 | 0,205 | |
| 616,6 | 124 | 0,201 | |
| 1244,1 | 226 | 0,182 | |
| 3645,8 | 660 | 0,181 | |
| 603,9 | 107 | 0,177 | |
| 2350,8 | 393 | 0,167 | |
| 1147,8 | 191 | 0,166 | |
| 432,1 | 67 | 0,155 | |
| 146,6 | 20 | 0,136 | |
| 281,1 | 37 | 0,132 | |
| 936,4 | 107 | 0,114 | |
| 420,6 | 41 | 0,097 | |
| 370,1 | 33 | 0,089 | |
| 584,3 | 51 | 0,087 | |
| 78,2 | 4 | 0,051 | |
| 176,8 | 9 | 0,051 | |
| 51,5 | 2 | 0,039 | |
| 631,4 | 23 | 0,036 | |
| 255 | 9 | 0,035 | |
| 276,4 | 9 | 0,033 | |
| 764,3 | 20 | 0,026 | |
| 350,5 | 8 | 0,023 | |
| 94,5 | 2 | 0,021 | |
| 561,6 | 8 | 0,014 | |
| 639,6 | 9 | 0,014 | |
| 872,5 | 11 | 0,013 | |
| 195,5 | 2 | 0,010 | |
| 1283,2 | 11 | 0,009 | |
| 475,3 | 2 | 0,004 | |
| 1930,6 | 1 | 0,001 | |
| 131,5 | 0 | 0,000 | |
Total | 26115,9 | 3304 | | |
Average | 687,3 | 86,95 | 0,114 |
It is interesting to notice that, aside from
b) Actual number of executions per inhabitant
The same comparison can be done taking into account the number of executions per inhabitant. Indeed, as shown in the following spreadsheet (figure 14), the states of
Fig. 14) State execution rates (2006)[38]
State | 2006 Population (x 10,000) | Total # of executions | Rate per 10,000 pop. | |
| 357,9 | 84 | 0,235 | |
| 2350,8 | 388 | 0,165 | |
| 85,3 | 14 | 0,164 | |
| 764,3 | 98 | 0,13 | |
| 584,3 | 66 | 0,113 | |
| 281,1 | 27 | 0,096 | |
| 432,1 | 36 | 0,083 | |
| 459,9 | 35 | 0,076 | |
| 428,8 | 27 | 0,063 | |
| 249,6 | 12 | 0,048 | |
| 885,7 | 43 | 0,049 | |
| 936,4 | 39 | 0,042 | |
| 616,6 | 22 | 0,036 | |
| 1809 | 64 | 0,035 | |
| 94,5 | 3 | 0,032 | |
| 631,4 | 17 | 0,027 | |
| 255 | 6 | 0,024 | |
| 291,1 | 8 | 0,027 | |
| 1147,8 | 24 | 0,021 | |
| 51,5 | 1 | 0,019 | |
| 176,8 | 3 | 0,017 | |
| 1283,2 | 12 | 0,009 | |
| 561,6 | 5 | 0,009 | |
| 146,6 | 1 | 0,007 | |
| 639,6 | 4 | 0,006 | |
| 370,1 | 2 | 0,005 | |
| 420,6 | 2 | 0,005 | |
| 195,5 | 1 | 0,005 | |
| 3645,8 | 13 | 0,004 | |
| 350,5 | 1 | 0,003 | |
| 603,9 | 2 | 0,003 | |
| 1244,1 | 3 | 0,002 | |
| 475,3 | 1 | 0,002 | |
| 276,4 | 0 | 0 | |
| 131,5 | 0 | 0 | |
| 872,5 | 0 | 0 | |
| 1930,6 | 0 | 0 | |
| 78,2 | 0 | 0 |
These tables were put together in order to take into account the number of executions of death row inmates per inhabitant of each state. In doing so, one notices the ostensible predisposition of the southern states to sentence an inmate to death, and to execute more liberally. The differences between the two spreadsheets can be explained by the different durations spent on death row due to different trial procedures, especially in appeal. For example in California the high number of death row prisoners is not enough on its own to denounce the criminal system, because as seen from the other table, it condemns and executes relatively less than other states.
It is also interesting to compare the death row population to the total population and the execution rate. If the classification of the state of
The analysis of the differences among the retentionist States shows how difficult it is to deal with the
State disparities. In order to try to analyze such discrepancies in the application of the death penalty, it is necessary to take into account other parameters such as the composition of the death row population, compared to the wider population, taking into account the race of the victims.
2) Racial analysis
a) The
First of all, the composition of the population of the
Fig. 15) Population of the
Race and Hispanic or Latino | Number | Percent of Total Population |
RACE | | |
Total Population | 281 421 906 | 100 |
One Race | 274 595 678 | 97,6 |
White | 211 460 626 | 75,1 |
Black or African American | 34 658 190 | 12,3 |
American Indian and | 2 475 956 | 0,9 |
Asian | 10, 242,998 | 3,6 |
Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander | 398 835 | 0,1 |
Some Other Race | 15,359, 073 | 5,5 |
Two or More Races | 6 826 228 | 2,4 |
| | |
HISPANIC OR LATINO | | |
Total Population | 281 421 906 | 100 |
Hispanic or Latino | 35 305 818 | 12,5 |
Not Hispanic or Latino | 246 116 088 | 87,5 |
As shown in the following map, the repartition of the different communities varies geographically. The majority of the black population lives in the Southeast of the country. It is interesting to notice that the concentration of the African American community corresponds to the same areas where the death penalty is most used (see figure 9 on page 20 ‘Executions by state’):
Fig. 16) Percentage of Black or African American (2000)[40]
b) Death row, a demographic account
It is interesting to compare the composition of the national population (detailed in the previous spreadsheet) to the death row population (in the following pie chart). One notices that although the proportion of African Americans in the country is 12.3%, this minority is much more represented on death row[41]. Indeed, 42% of the total death row population is black i.e. 1397 inmates of the 3350 total nationwide. This difference also exists conversely for the white population: although they account for 75.1% of the population, only 45% of the death row population is white. This means that 0.004% of the black community in the
Fig. 17) Race of Death Row Inmates (2007)[42]
Fig. 18) Race of Defendants Executed
*including inmates sentenced by both the US Government and the US Military.
7 inmates were sentenced in more than one state, resulting in a total slightly higher than 3,344 when the individual states are combined.
By comparing the death row population (figure 17) and the race of the defendants executed (figure 18), one notices that the composition is very different. This must be the result of exonerations. Black people, then, are more often exonerated, because, as we will see further in this essay, trials involving African Americans, who are generally poorer, are unbalanced and expeditious, and the court appointed lawyers are not experienced or sometimes not even specialized in criminal law.
c) State by State composition of the death row population
Having shown that African Americans are over represented in the death row, thos paper will now study the composition of the death row
Fig. 19) Death Row Populations by Race and by State (2007)[43]
State | Total | Black | % | White | % | Hispanic | % | Asian + Native Amer. | % |
| 195 | 93 | 48% | 100 | 51% | 2 | 1% | 0 | 0% |
| 124 | 13 | 10% | 88 | 71% | 20 | 16% | 3 | 2% |
| 37 | 23 | 62% | 14 | 38% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 660 | 235 | 36% | 254 | 38% | 136 | 21% | 35 | 5% |
| 2 | 1 | 50% | 0 | 0% | 1 | 50% | 0 | 0% |
| 8 | 3 | 38% | 3 | 38% | 2 | 25% | 0 | 0% |
| 18 | 7 | 39% | 8 | 44% | 3 | 17% | 0 | 0% |
| 397 | 139 | 35% | 221 | 56% | 35 | 9% | 2 | 1% |
| 107 | 50 | 47% | 53 | 50% | 3 | 3% | 1 | 1% |
| 20 | 0 | 0% | 20 | 100% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 11 | 3 | 27% | 5 | 45% | 3 | 27% | 0 | 0% |
| 23 | 7 | 30% | 16 | 70% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 9 | 4 | 44% | 5 | 56% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 41 | 9 | 22% | 31 | 76% | 1 | 2% | 0 | 0% |
| 88 | 55 | 63% | 30 | 34% | 2 | 2% | 1 | 1% |
| 8 | 5 | 63% | 3 | 38% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 66 | 35 | 53% | 30 | 45% | 0 | 0% | 1 | 2% |
| 51 | 21 | 41% | 30 | 59% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 2 | 0 | 0% | 2 | 100% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 9 | 1 | 11% | 5 | 56% | 3 | 33% | 0 | 0% |
| 80 | 29 | 36% | 42 | 53% | 8 | 10% | 1 | 1% |
| 11 | 6 | 55% | 5 | 45% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 2 | 0 | 0% | 2 | 100% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 1 | 1 | 100% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 185 | 98 | 53% | 72 | 39% | 4 | 2% | 11 | 6% |
| 191 | 96 | 50% | 88 | 46% | 3 | 2% | 4 | 2% |
| 88 | 33 | 38% | 48 | 55% | 3 | 3% | 4 | 5% |
| 33 | 3 | 9% | 26 | 79% | 2 | 6% | 1 | 3% |
| 226 | 137 | 61% | 68 | 30% | 19 | 8% | 2 | 1% |
| 67 | 38 | 57% | 29 | 43% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 4 | 0 | 0% | 4 | 100% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 107 | 43 | 40% | 59 | 55% | 1 | 1% | 4 | 4% |
| 393 | 161 | 41% | 121 | 31% | 107 | 27% | 4 | 1% |
| 9 | 1 | 11% | 6 | 67% | 1 | 11% | 1 | 11% |
| 20 | 12 | 60% | 8 | 40% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 9 | 4 | 44% | 5 | 56% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| 2 | 0 | 0% | 2 | 100% | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
Considering the state of
This raises the question of whether death sentencing rates for African Americans are disproportionate to the rate of involvement of African Americans in capital offenses. According to Human Right Watch, in twelve states, between 10% and 15% of adult black men are in jail.[45]
Fig. 20) Racial Breakdown of
| Death Row Population (2005) | State Population (2000) | |
Race | Number | Proportion | Proportion |
White | 253 | 39% | 27.1% |
Hispanic | 128 | 20% | 32.4% |
African American | 233 | 36% | 6.7% |
Asian and others | 34 | 5% | 33.8% |
d) Racial discrimination by function of the defendant and the victim
In order to discover if there actually is racial discrimination at work in the application of the death penalty, this paper will investigate the role of race in capital sentencing, and in particular, whether the race of the defendant or victim influences the likelihood of the death sentence.
“Of the 205 people executed for inter-racial murders in the
According to a study[47] carried out by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, “in homicides where the race of the offender was known, 50.0 percent were black, 47.6 percent were white, and 2.4 percent were other races.” By comparing these rates to the composition of the death row population, we can see that 42% of death row inmates are black. It seems that death sentence is not given more quickly to black offenders.
One can also investigate the race of the victims in criminal cases.
The same study carried out California shows clear regional disparities in death sentencing, with counties in California that have a lower population density and a higher proportion of non-Hispanic whites in their populations to have the highest rates of death sentences. California leads the country in the number of homicides perpetrated (in 2001, there were 2,206 homicides in the state, followed by
The victimization rate for African Americans in
The study also found that those who killed whites were over 3 times more likely to be sentenced to death than those who killed blacks and over 4 times more likely than if a Hispanic had been killed.
Fig. 21) Race of Victim in Death Penalty Cases (2006)[48]
|
About 80% of the murder victims in cases resulting in an execution were white, even though nationally ‘only’ 49% of murder victims generally are white[49].
According to a study established by the
Justice should be equal towards each citizen, according to the 14th Amendment of the Constitution which stipulates, in Section 1, that a state government should not deny “to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” This equal protection clause should protect individuals from arbitrary discrimination by government officials. Despite this Amendment, it is known that black Americans do not enjoy equal protection of the laws. In the past already, the 1896 Supreme Court decision in Plessy v. Ferguson exemplified the denial of equality to black Americans in its sanction of “separate but equal” treatment of people based on race. Both before and after Plessy, racial segregation was a firmly established fact of American life, with the separate facilities for blacks hardly ever equal to those provided for white Americans, in front of economic and social conditions, education, work and, of course, justice. According to the authors of ‘The rope, the chair and the needle’[54], black defendants are much more likely to be sentenced to death in interracial rapes than white rapists and black murderers who rape their victims before killing them are the most likely of any group to receive the death penalty.
A comprehensive study[55] of the death penalty in
3) Economic influence concerning death penalty and its application
The following map demonstrates the inequality of income in the
Figure 21 goes further still, highlighting links between States where economic disparities are the lowest, and where the death penalty has been abolished (see figure 7 ‘Death Penalty Statutes in the United States’ on page 18). Indeed, most of the abolitionist states—such as North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Michigan, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Vermont—which are situated in the Midwest and Northeast of the country, correspond to those where there are the fewest income inequalities. In
One could pose the hypothesis that economic inequalities are at the origin of a stricter application of death penalty due to a certain racism and conflict between the different communities which compose American society.
Fig. 22) Household income inequality in the
Many studies have proven that poor people coming from minority populations are more likely to be sentenced to death, resulting in an equally poor representation during the trial. Indeed, most of the time a poor defendant — often from a minority — cannot afford a lawyer and is represented by a lawyer appointed by the State. Not only do economic disparities create social unbalance, but they also create inequality before the justice system.
4) Criminal rate and deterrent effect
As we know from different studies, films and documentaries, the
Fig. 23) Murders in Europe and the
The film-maker Michael Moore has suggested that the omnipresence of arms in the country and the general mistrust and fear of the American citizens could be the source of this violence. In his documentary ‘Bowling for Columbine’ (2002), he seeks the reasons for such high rates of violence and the legality of bearing arms. In 1997, 32,436 persons died because of a firearm, and 64,207 were injured. In the
The right to bear arms is almost a fundamental one, written in the United States Constitution in the Second Amendment “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a
In his book ‘Death penalty in the
As shown in the following document[60], the crime rate is much higher in the South than in any other region, with 6.2%, in comparison with 4.7%, the national rate. Economic disparities are a factor in the unbalance, confirming a link between relative poverty and crime.
Fig. 24) Murder and non negligent manslaughter
| Northeast | | South | West | |||||
Total | Rate | Total | Rate | Total | Rate | Total | Rate | Total | Rate |
10,335 | 4.7 | 1,305 | 3.2 | 1,621 | 3.8 | 4,388 | 6.2 | 3,021 | 4.7 |
The following document established by the Federal Bureau of Investigation confirms that the South is the region of the country where there is the bigger number of property crimes as well as violent crimes. According to the institution, the South accounts for over 80% of executions. The Northeast, which has less than 1% of all executions, again had the lowest murder rate.
Fig. 25) Regional Crime Rates per 100,000 Inhabitants[61] (2004)
The question of deterrence has been widely studied by organizations such as the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.
“The average murder rate per 100,000 people in
In 2000, the New York Times carried out a study[63] on 10 of the abolitionist states. It appeared that the average murder rate in death penalty states was higher than the average rate in non death penalty states. “
In 1976,
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Let's fight! No more executed innocent!
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