[Shasown]

Originally Posted by Jords

To reduce the amount of murder crimes? People wont be inclined to do it as much if they know they could end up dead for it.

I dont really like the idea, but Im looking at it more openingly. But Dezzy has a good point that prison could be a lot harsher.

A good working example of the use of capital punishment as a deterrent to murder would be to look at the United States of America, Several states have the death penalty while other states dont. The murder rate in states that do not have the death penalty is consistently lower than in states with the death penalty. The South, which carries out over 80% of the executions in the U. S., has the highest murder rate of the four regions. The obvious conclusion is then, it is no deterrent.

There is also an effect that doesnt gain much publicity, if someone was on the jury where the death penalty could be applied, most people would be more reluctant to convict knowing that once the person was dead, they couldnt later be made undead if further evidence came to light that proved their innocence, or simply called to question their conviction. Consequently you have the potential for real criminals to actually be found not guilty, in cases where the balance of evidence would have found them convicted if the punishment was a term of imprisonment.

There are also arguements against it on moral grounds, its retribution albeit state authorised.