The Cost of Capital Punishment

Life in Prison is Cheaper then Death Row

Capital punishment , or the death penalty , is the execution of a convicted criminal by the state as punishment for crimes known as capital crimes or capital offences . Historically , the execution of criminals and political opponents was used by nearly all societies - both to punish crime and to suppress political dissent . The Ancient Laws of China established the death penalty . In the 18th Century BC , the Code of King Hammurabi of Babylon allowed the death penalty for 25 crimes but murder was not included

[1] . The first recorded death sentence was in 16th Century BC Egypt . A member of nobility , was accused of magic and ed to take his own life . Non nobility were usually killed with an ax . Legal executions came to America in 1776 when British soldiers hung Nathan Hale for spying during the Revolutionary War "The first person to die in the electric chair was William Kemmler , an ax murderer from New York on August 6 , 1890 . In 1972 , the US Supreme Court ruled state executions unconstitutional . Legislators lifted the moratorium on capital punishment in 1976 . US has the distinction of joining China Iraq , Iran , and Saudi Arabia as nations that execute their citizens Critics of the Death penalty cited statistics that it is carried out disportionately , are racist , unfair to poor and the mentally retarded and often ends in the state sanctioned murder of innocents . Less than 1 of all murderers are condemned to death , 2 of death row inmates are actually executed and today more than 75 death row inmates have spent 20 years on the Row , capital punishment is applied to a higher percentage of minorities than whites , is not cost effective , and does not deter crime

The two states with the most executions in 2003 , Texas 24 , and Oklahoma 14 , saw increases in their murder rates from 2002 to 2003 . Both states had murder rates above the national average in 2003 . The top 13 states in terms of murder rates were all death penalty states . The murder rate of the death penalty states increased from 2002 , while the rate in non-death penalty states decreased . The Death Penalty has been abolished in all other Western Countries and civilized societies , except the US

One of the least obvious , but most important problems with the death penalty is it 's enormous cost . Cost studies in North Carolina , Kansas Texas , Kentucky , Nebraska and New York all show varying costs but similar ratios with regard to expense of death as a sentencing option

In New York each death penalty trial costs 1 .4 million compared with 602 ,000 for life imprisonment [2]

In Florida the cost of each execution was estimated to be 3 .2 million about 6 times the amount needed to incarcerate a convicted murderer for life [3]

In Kentucky the cost of a capital trial varied between 2 and 5 million dollars [4]

North Carolina spends 2 .16 million more per execution than for a non-capital murder trial...