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Cécile Parcelier

Scott Gist

Reading/Writing 105.2

26 May 2009

The benefits of the death penalty are an ilusion

Last February, Marc Machin was released after six years in jail for a crime which he didn’t commit. Fortunately, capital punishment has been abolished for a long time in France, but in some states in the United States this act hasn’t been stopped. The pro death penalty think that is justice against killers. Actually, the capital punishment doesn’t have any affect, it just has disavantages because crimes keep increasing and the justice has made many mistakes by killing the wrong person.

The death penalty is not the solution to deter crimes. In other countries where there isn’t capital punishment, the total of murder is smaller than in USA. For example, there are six times more murders in the United states than in England, and five times more than in Australia (« Reasons to be against DP »). Another comparaison is with the different states in America. It’s not possible to compare the number of dead people between two states because of the different numbers of populations, but the New York Times made a survey which has showed in 20 years « the death penalty has been 48 to 101 percent higher than in states whitout the death penalty ». (« The death penalty and deterrence »). In other words, the death penalty doesn’t make us safer from crimes. Most of the time killers don’t think about their

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future during the crime. They thinks about what they are doing and not about the consequences (Sihera). As this result, even if we kill or torture people in order to show the good example, the future killers won’t be touched or increase their awareness of the bad act to kill.

The major problem with capital punishment is justice can make mistakes. « since 1973, over 100 people have been released from death » because they were