Criminal Law Paper Justine Dejesus

Week 1 Criminal Law Paper Justine DeJesus

Justine Amanda DeJesus

CJS/305

January 23, 2017

Jon Sperling

Week 1 Criminal Law Paper Justine DeJesus

In 2015, the United States Supreme Court ruled that it would uphold support of lethal injection as a main method of carrying out executions in capital punishment cases. Even though capital punishment is constitutional, there technically must be a constitutionally approved way of completing it because it is considered so controversial. This preceding took place after three men suffered pain and did not die immediately after being injected with the final lethal doses for a completed execution. The claim and major issues needing to be addressed was that the drug in use led to an unconstitutional level of suffering. The lethal injection process is supposed to be the most humane and painless method of carrying out capital punishment. Unfortunately, because there was no alternative method of lesser suffering presented to replace lethal injection; the idea of lethal injection being unconstitutional was shot down 5-4 (Gossip v. Gross, 2015).

        Capital punishment has always been an intriguing topic for conversation and for study. By far, many times more often then not, it stirs up a heated debate. Glossip v. Gross, which was presented to the Unites States Supreme Court, was in regards to the possibility that the method of lethal injection is not as painless as we once proposed. This case contains a highly intriguing topic personally because of my support of capital punishment. It will always remain a controversial part of our criminal justice system because killing someone, even though they may appear to deserve it, does not make us God. This is the strongest argument heard for many who oppose capital punishment as a means of justice. Majority argues the same concept over and over, but those who support the death penalty believe it has been made purposely more complicated just to be deterred from utilizing it across the nation. The myth that is has been abolished is false, it is the methods and laws surrounding it that have been altered to ensure no prejudice or false accusations are made against someone sentenced to die. The utilization of legally using capital punishment also varies state to state based off majority preferences.  If our nation utilized the right to capital punishment, supporters believe our nation would be cleaner of crime and funding would be made much more readily available to others in need. The problem is finding a balance between what is seen as humane, as well as the cost for each state overall, which everyone is misled on. Our system for death row and technology now put in place the thorough ability to ensure someone is guilty, and if they are sentenced to death, then it should be carried out constitutionally, but still carried out. Cases like this further prove the point that the system still needs help in progressing and that this could just be another attempt of deterrence.