Capital Punishment
Mirella Reyes
California State University of East Bay

Capital Punishment
Capital Punishment is the execution of a person convicted of committing a capital crime. Capital punishment has been around for many years since the first settlers came into the US. Many people had been executed for many different crimes that they have committed, and there has also been many people that ware innocent and that were sent to the death row. This is a topic that is very controversial. Many people think is something unethical to do, but the majority of the people believe that the criminal deserves the death sentence. Most people believe that the death penalty is something that the criminal deserves because of the crime that she/he committed, therefore they need to pay with their life. But some other people believe that capital punishment is something morally wrong and should let the criminal pay and suffer throughout their life in prison. In my opinion I believe that it is something wrong and that no one had the right to take anyone else’s life.
There are currently thirty-two states in the US that have the Capital punishment. Everything started when the first settlers came in the US, the first recorded execution was in 1608 in a colony in Virginia. When the British came and started their colonies “[a] colonists in Virginia could be executed for crimes as trivial as stealing grapes, killing chickens, or trading with the Indians.” (ProCon.org).The first person to be executed in here in the US was Captain George Kendall he was hanged in Jamestown, Virginia for the capital offence of treason. The other more serious crimes that in the colonies at that time were murder, rape, heresy and witchcraft. In April 30, 1790, the US Congress established the Federal Death Penalty. The crimes that lead to execution at that time were murder, disfigurement, and robbery, and those crimes had to be committed in the federal jurisdictions and on the high seas. The judges had the right and were authorized to convict murders to surgical dissection after execution. In June 25, 1790, the first person was executed under the US Federal Death Penalty, “U.S. Marshall Henry Dearborn coordinates the hanging of Thomas Bird in Massachusetts. Dearborn spent five dollars and fifty cents for the construction of a gallows and a coffin” (ProCon.org).
Punishment is something that is supposed to teach a person a lesson. When committing a crime the criminals should pay for what they do. In a way punishment should be something that other people look and be afraid of committing a crime and go through the same or worse punishment. But the people really do not think about what they do, they believe that they are going to get away with and that no one is never going find out. There is not perfect crime, in a crime scene there is always something that the suspect leaves such as a prints, DNA, an object or he/ she is going to take something that is always going to be linked to the crime. Death penalty is something very controversial. Some people are against it because they believe that no one has the right to take other’s life, but other people believe that the death penalty for someone that committed a horrible crime should pay for what they did with their life. There has been many people in the death row that have been innocent and after their execution they have found out that they were innocent. Here are some of the innocent people that have been executed for a horrible crime that they supposedly committed but after the execution there has been some more evidence that concludes that these men were innocent:
Carlos de Luna (Texas Conviction 1983, executed 1989), Ruben Cantu (Texas Conviction 1985, executed 1993), Larry Griffin (Missouri Conviction 1981, executed 1995), Joseph O’Dell (Virginia Conviction 1986, executed 1997), David Spence (Texas Conviction 1984, Executed 1997), Leo Jones (Florida Conviction 1981, Executed 1998), Gary