CRUEL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT

Cruel and Unusual Punishment

Cruel and Unusual Punishment

Capital punishment is a very controversial issue in America. Americans who are against capital punishment might say that innocent people get sentenced to death, because some people are wrongly convicted of murder. Some Americans would also argue that some forms of capital punishment such as the electric chair, firing squad, gas chamber, and hanging are cruel and unusual punishment. Other Americans who agree with capital punishment would argue that murderers have relinquished their rights by their actions and should be punished accordingly. To reduce the number of murders each year in the United States, this country's judicial system needs to use the death penalty more often.

More frequent death penalty sentences would reduce murders in America. In Detroit, hurt by the auto industry's woes, there were 163 murders reported in the first six months of 2009 (Berman, 2009). This country needs to lead by example. If a person is proven beyond a shadow of a doubt guilty of murder then they should automatically get a death sentence. Offenders should not get weaker sentencing for testifying against another, or for petty technicalities. If firm death penalty consequences were known before the criminal committed the murder, they may think twice about committing the crime.

In recent years, DNA profiling and forensics have helped solve many murder cases, even ones that are decades old. DNA can be found in blood, skin cells, tissue, organs, fingernails, muscle, bone, saliva, mucus, urine, feces, hair, teeth, semen, brain cells, and perspiration (Lotter, 2007). Every person has a different DNA sequence, except for identical twins (Lotter, 2007), so this makes it easier than ever to pinpoint a murderer. Saliva left on a single cigarette butt left at a crime scene can identify the killer's DNA. Therefore, with the ...