Briel Sims
Argumentative Essay
Eng. DO6 101
4/20/2015

Against the Death Penalty
As humans we make mistakes and do bad things. Consequently, depending on how bad of a slip-up you’ve made, you could pay the price for it with your life. The government refers to the ultimate debt paid to society as the death penalty. The death penalty is the punishment of execution administered to someone legally convicted of a capital crime. Although it gives closure to a victim’s family, the death penalty should not be reinstated in Illinois because of the inevitability of error and the lack of morality is portrays.
A victim’s family suffers severe loss. However in my opinion capital punishments gives the family a sense of comfort. For the most monstrous crimes, offenders deserve the worst penalty. We can argue the fact that we cannot control who we are, or what we are, but I am a strong believer when it comes to being held accountable for one’s own actions. You are in fact responsible for the things you do. And if what you choose to do results in the violation of another sovereignty, that’s where the death penalty is concrete. We as a society find a great deal of relief with the “eye for an eye” revenge mentality. It helps us sleep at night knowing that the one who hurt or even killed our loved ones, no longer breathes the same air we do.
Nevertheless, the judicial system is not fool proof. There have been a multitude of cases where the innocent were wrongfully convicted and later set free. Some have spent over twenty years of their life behind bars before DNA came to light and exonerated them. For example, half-brothers Leon Brown and Henry McCollum were exonerated of all charges after spending thirty years in jail for a crime they did not commit. They were excused of rape and murder of an eleven year old girl in 1983. (Pilkington). Those men spent thirty years on death row and even though now they can walk free, what about all the time they can’t get back; and even worse what if