With Scott Peterson's sentencing now underway this week the big argument is narrowed down to whether he'll rot in a cell or gets a needle jabbed into his arm. In short, the argument is not over his guilt but how severe his punishment should be. At center is the death penalty, the most emotionally charged aspect of the U.S. justice system.
Everyone on all sides can concede it is the strictest of sentences and the most distasteful. Beyond this, the Peterson case provides the opportunity to revisit the subject in clearer light.
The death penalty is just punishment in the American judicial system and has enjoyed constitutional protection since our nation's birth. In the Bill of Rights, capital cases are expressly referred to in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. The Supreme Court has also upheld its constitutionality multiple times. But beyond the fact that it is legal, there are legitimate and powerful societal reasons for its application.
First, the death penalty establishes the certainty of punishment. It firmly establishes that if an individual violates one's right to life by terminating it by unnatural causes then they will be severely punished for that crime. It makes the statement that denying a person the right to life their life to its fullest extent is the most heinous of all crimes.
Criminologists note that certainty of punishment is an effective tool in preventing crime. The corollary is that if one does commit the crime, their fate is known and held fast. That consistency is necessary in our justice system.
Second, the death penalty correctly places the value of the victim over the perpetrator. By utilizing the death penalty is establishes that the victim's life is inherently valued because the punishment mirrors the crime: execution. To not employ the death penalty implies that the life of the criminal is valued above the victim's. To wit: life in prison means the criminal gets housing, three squares a day, health care and cable television on the taxpayers' dime for the rest of their life. What a grand punishment: the taxpayer suffers more than the perpetrator does.
Some will argue this is the "eye for an eye" principle and that we should not be visiting evil with evil. The second part is valid but the first is not because it misinterprets that principle. "Eye for an eye" refers to proportional punishment regarding the crime committed. It is not an unjust application for the justice system to take the life of a person who robbed another of theirs.
Third, it is an effective deterrent against future crime. This claim gives opponents fits because they'll scream that it's not but several recent studies using statistical analysis bolster the deterrence claim. Deterrence is closely linked to the certainty of punishment. In other words, the more the death penalty is upheld the more effective deterrent it is. A recent study found that for every execution an average of eighteen fewer murders occurred whereas as each death penalty commutation resulted in five more murders on average.
Lastly, the death penalty is neither cruel nor unusual as its opponents purport. As noted above, it was written into our Bill of Rights in 1791, making it hardly unusual. It is also not cruel to say that if you viciously murder someone that your life is forfeit under due process of law because you have deprived another of their life. Moreover, one should note that the perpetrator gets off easy compared to the victim.
Scott Peterson provides an excellent dichotomy for this. He brutally murdered his wife and son. If he is sentenced to death, his death will be a breeze as lethal injection starts with rending the convicted unconscious before stopping the heart; he'll never know when he dies. His wife didn't have that luxury thanks to her husband's barbarism.
Should the jury determine that Peterson gets the death penalty, it will be a just penalty for human scum who murdered his wife and unborn child and then attempted to elaborately cover it up. While life in prison would be sufficient as punishment, the application of the death penalty herein is necessary. It shows that, above all, lives are valued by taking from the criminal the greatest thing they have: their own life.
Write to Jeff at mannedarena@yahoo.com
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