October 4, 2016

Dear next President,

I think the death penalty should be abolished in all states. It doesn’t happen often and it is not effective.

The death penalty doesn’t serve very much justice for the victims families. Its cost to much money that could be used on more useful things. It takes a while for the execution to even happen. Some of the inmates sentenced to death are innocent.

A death penalty case means more than a thousand extra days of courtroom resources are being used, Judges, prosecutors, public defenders, court reporters, jurors, bailiffs, and other courtroom staff all for one trial which means spending a lot of money from state coffers that could be used somewhere else. In the article by CNN Phillip Halloway said “for those who remain on death row, understand that everyone is going to die”. It is hard to see capital punishment as “cruel” or “unusual” when the victims will often have died much worse deaths than the killer will be subjected to, executions are actually less punitive than life without parole. Death penalty cases on average take 25 years or so to reach ultimate resolution. - CNN

So you as president should get rid of the death penalty so we save money and stop letting the criminals out the easy way and serve justice for the victims families.

Sincerely,

John McGuire