Death Penalty: Deterrent for Crime or Ineffective Measure? - Research Paper

Introduction

Over the years, the prevention of crime has been the most widely regarded objective of the death penalty. When juries serve death sentences, the expected outcome is that violent crimes will reduce. The rationale behind this claim is that the fear of being hanged or beheaded forces people to refrain from committing crimes. However, there is a concern as to whether the death penalty dissuades possible felons from murdering people, which a lesser penalty would not achieve. This paper explores arguments that support the death penalty and those that oppose it to determine if it is effective in preventing crime. The arguments that support the death penalty in preventing crime that this paper explores revolve around the deterrent effect, plea bargaining and the need for a just society. Conversely, the paper presents a counterargument that there is no statistical evidence that substantiates the deterrent effect of death sentences and that statistics indicate a reduction in murder rates after the abolishment of the death penalty.

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Arguments That Death Sentences Have Deterred Crime

The Deterrence Theory and the Deterrent Effect

Muhlhausen (2007) cited the deterrence theory as his basis for the position that capital punishments prevent further killings. This theory maintains that increasing the threat of penalization discourages people from law-breaking since people respond to the price and benefits of violating the law. In this line, Muhlhausen (2007) argued that lawbreakers are similar to law-abiding individuals when comes to analyzing the repercussions of various actions. Law-abiding individuals, such as businessmen, make their investment choices based on the total outlays and benefits of each option. Equally, lawbreakers rationalize their criminal intentions based on the constraints, such as the returns and costs, which would result from their acts. Muhlhausen (2007) used results from studies on murder incidents and capital punishments to justify his claim.

One such study that Muhlhausen (2007) mentioned was by Dezhbakhsh, Rubin and Shepherd (2003) that revealed 18 fewer killings for every death sentence. Another study was by Dezhbakhsh and Shepherd (2006), who compared murder incidences and death penalties using state-level data between 1960 and 2000. This study also assessed the effect that the suspension of executions by the US Supreme Court had on murder incidents. The findings were that death penalties had a negative correlation with murder incidences, whereas the suspension of the death penalty led to an increase in murder rates. Based on these findings, Muhlhausen (2007) reinforced his argument that capital punishments save lives.

Plea Bargaining

As stated above, criminals always assess the possible consequences of their actions. If the costs are too high, such as executions for murder crimes, they are likely to shun from committing such crimes. Bessette (2018) used the concept of plea bargaining to argue that capital punishments are highly likely to prevent crime. Plea bargaining allows suspects to accept their culpability for crime in exchange for a lesser sentence after trial. For instance, a suspected murderer may be charged and opt to plead guilty to avoid being convicted to death. After pleading guilty, the judge will probably sentence him for life, which certainly does not instill much fear in a criminal as the death sentence would.

Bessette (2018) further stated that only a small percentage of convicts on death row are willing to be executed. They are likely to appeal the judgment, which often requires a considerable amount of capital and time. As such, murderers would rather act rationally by cooperating with prosecutors and attorneys and admit to having killed someone, then get the less stringent life sentence rather than pleading not guilty and being sentenced to death if proven to be guilty.

The thought that plea bargaining reduces the sentence for any crime is attractive to possible murderers (Bessette, 2018). For example, a hired assassin will assess the costs and benefits of killing someone and discover that if he is arrested, the cost of pleading guilty is worth the amount of money he will be paid by his client. Ultimately, other assassins will not be deterred from murdering targeted people. However, if the option of plea bargaining is not allowed or does not necessarily result in a lesser sentence, other assassins will be dissuaded from crime since they will be aware that a death penalty awaits them after being found guilty.

The Death Sentence is Necessary for a Just Society for Taking Life

Murderers disturb the balance of social justice after killing people. For that reason, social order and justice will prevail by taking the murderer's life, through which society demonstrates that murder is an inexcusable act that is punishable on an equal measure. Even though the murder victim or his family cannot recover to the state they were before the crime, they will feel that justice is served if the murderer is sentenced to death. After the execution, the family can then get closure. This justification of retribution was developed from spiritual values that have traditionally supported an "eye for an eye" rule as a way of restoring social order ("High School Curriculum on the Death Penalty", 2012).

Perpetrators of violent and heinous crimes deserve the most severe penalty, which is the death sentence after been found guilty. A less severe penalty dents society's value of safeguarding people's lives and does not dissuade potential offenders from committing crimes. Robert Macy, the DA of Oklahoma City, puts this claim into context by describing the case of a woman in 1991, who was a victim of atrocious acts. Her baby was killed as she watched helplessly. She was then maimed and executed. Sentencing the murderers to life imprisonment, where they sleep and enjoy three meals daily does not uphold justice to the mother, her baby and family. The only way they will get justice is if the judges convict the murderers to death ("High School Curriculum on the Death Penalty", 2012).

Arguments That Death Sentences Do Not Deter Crime

There is No Evidence Supporting the Deterrent Effect of the Death Penalty

As opposed to the earlier claim that there exists a negative correlation between death penalties and murder incidents, Donohue (2015) rebuts by stating no reliable statistical evidence exists that shows a direct effect of death sentences in reducing homicide rates. He maintains that the econometric studies reveal no noticeable impact of capital punishment on criminal behavior. Comparisons of homicide patterns, for instance, between the US and Canada after the US reinstated capital punishment, or between Singapore and Hong Kong when Singapore strongly embraced the death penalty while Hong Kong abolished it in the mid-90s, do not depict an inverse relationship between execution and crime rates. This stance is also taken by Cohen-Cole, Durlauf, Fagan and Nagin (2006), after integrating and reanalyzing several studies on the deterrent effect of death sentences and discovered little empirical proof that supports the deterrence theory.

There Is Statistical Evidence of a Decrease in Homicide Rates After the Suspension of the Death Sentence

The Death Penalty Information Center (2019) stated that countries that suspend capital punishment witness a reduction in homicide incidences. This position is supported by research by the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center (2018) in 11 nations that have banned the death penalty to assess their homicide rates. The nations selected for this research had abolished the death sentence between 2008 and 2018, their courts had executed at least one convict between 1998 and 2008, and data on homicide rates were readily available. These nations included South Africa, Albania, Latvia and Poland. The results indicated that 10 out of the 11 nations reported a decrease in murder incidences in the decade after the suspension of the death penalty.

This research also involved a comparison of murder incidences in the 10 years after the suspension of the death sentence with the baseline rates during the year of suspension. The findings revealed that 6 nations experienced homicide incidents lower than the baseline rate, whereas 4 nations reported higher incidents in one or two years than in the suspension year. These results coincide with state-level data in the US that continuously reveals a decrease in murder incidents in states that have abolished capital punishment compared to states that impose this punishment. Therefore, the Death Penalty Information Center (2019) concluded that claims by the defenders of death sentences that the abolition of ultimate penalties will encourage possible offenders are untenable going by this statistical evidence. As such, the death sentence should be abolished.

An Analysis of Both Arguments

The advocates of the death penalty mainly use the deterrence theory and deterrent effect to justify the significance of this penalty in preventing crime. They believe that the motivation for crime is based on its costs and benefits. If the costs are too high, such as the death penalty, potential criminals are dissuaded from committing crimes. However, this argument is unfounded since, in as much as it makes hypothetical sense, empirical evidence rebuts the position.

Considering the case of the US, The Death Penalty Information Center (2018) purported that states that had recently suspended capital punishment did not experience an increase in homicide incidences that the champions of capital punishment had projected. Essentially, the homicide incidences reduced as revealed in the study by the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center (2018). This reduction negates unsubstantiated position taken by the champions of the death penalty that more crimes, especially the murder of people, police officers, and correction officers, would be witnessed if the death penalty is abolished. The abolishment of execution in some country seems to have provided an opportunity for initiating amendments in criminal justice laws to rehabilitate offenders and prevent recidivism and more crimes. Therefore, the tenable argument between those in support and those in opposition to the death penalty is that this penalty has not been proven to deter crime.

Conclusion

This paper has explored arguments that support the death penalty and those that oppose it to determine if it prevents crime. The arguments that support the death penalty in preventing crime revolve around the deterrent effect, plea bargaining and the need for a just society. On the other hand, the paper presents a counterargument that there is no statistical evidence that substantiates the deterrent effect of death sentences and that statistics indicate a reduction in murder rates after the abolishment of the death penalty. After analyzing both arguments, the paper concludes that the deterrent effect of the death penalty is only hypothetically true since it lacks the empirical basis to justify that homicide rates reduce due to the imposition of the penalty. Therefore, this paper upholds the position that the death penalty does not deter crime.

References

Abdorrahman Boroumand Center. (2018). What Happens to Murder Rates when the Death Penalty is Scrapped? A Look at Eleven Countries Might Surprise You. Retrieved from https://www.iranrights.org/library/document/3501

Bessette, J. (2018). How and why the death penalty deters murder in contemporary America. Retrieved from https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2018/01/04/how-and-why-the-death-penalty-deters-murder-in-contemporary-america/

Cohen-Cole, E., Durlauf, S., Fagan, J., & Nagin, D. (2006). Re-evaluating the deterrent effect of capital punishment: Model and data uncertai...