(no subject)
FRIDAY = FIRST SNOW DAY OF THE YEAR and CHRISTMAS DANCE.
right so this is the first year i went to christmas dance and i'm not gonna lie it was fun. althou it was more fun after at hannahs. i heart hannah, by the way. jajaja sorry that was random. anywhoooo. so woke up at 5.45 that morning when my alarm went off and i like stumbled into my parents room to listen to the report for snow days. heard the st. schools and i didn't hear regis and i was like SHIT WE HAVE SCHOOL but then i hear rice so i happily returned to bed. got up at 11.08, left at 11.30. picked up justins flowery thing and then went to hannahs. we went and got our hair and our eyebrows done and then we got our makeup done and speth came and got us and we went to marissas. took four hundred trillion pictures and went to xmas dance. food, music, fun so on and so forth. back to hannahs house. jp and i found shiny and spinny things in hannahs christmas village. jajaja i like shiny things. the boys went home. i ate about 400 trillion cookies. we watched mean girls. it was a party.
saturday and sunday consisted of absolutely nothing.
school today was oddly entertaining. well this morning with britt was entertaining.
discussions about white america
the black eyed pies
are you looking for a party?
o how i love brittany lofton. she is my hero. well one one of them jajaja.
photography got turned into study hall which got turned into me and britt wandering around school talking about a certain something.
expos we got our papers back and i got a wicked bad grade.
please let me kno what u think....
Ashley Pagac
Mrs. Peters
Expository Writing 11
30 November 2005
Capital Punishment
Capital Punishment is putting a condemned person to death. Since 1976, 985 people have been executed with another 3,415 (“Facts", 1-4) waiting on death row for their turn. American’s spend millions of dollars a year to support the appeals of criminals in the 38 states that allow the death penalty. Execution is the only way to insure the safety of society from those convicted, beyond a doubt, of murder, treason, airplane hijacking, rape etc. Capital punishment provides an effective consequence for heinous crimes and should remain legal.
Although, often considered morally wrong, the death penalty functions as a deterrent. Knowing the risk of death exists stops potential criminals, and spares the lives of potential murder victims. Execution of criminals is really the only way to ensure the safety of communities. No one can be killed if a murderer is dead. Condemning criminals to life in prison provides them with a lifetime to escape.
31 May 1984, the Briley brothers escaped in the largest death-row breakout in US history (Lee, 160). Although all criminals that do escape from prison are caught, usually fairly quickly, allowing them out into society can be very harmful. Even if the time they are out is very brief, it provides the escapee an opportunity to kill, again. We, as a people, have a moral requirement to make sure that these criminals are not allowed back into society.
Stories are on the news almost daily about murders, the people that commit these crimes deserve to die for the ways they force their victims to suffer. The victims families deserve the chance to have their loved one’s killer locked up and eventually executed, much like the one they loved was. Although, the wound will never fully heal because it’s impossible to ever forget someone that was killed; it does help in the healing process and bring families some closure.
There are eight major crimes that can get the death penalty. First-degree murder is the most common crime. Train wrecking, treason, capital felony, aircraft hijacking, kidnapping with bodily injury, rape of a victim under 12 (Louisiana only) and criminal homicide (Crimes, 2) are what 1,432 Blacks, 350 Hispanics, 1,553 Whites and 80 Others (Capital, 2) are on death-row for. 1.58% on those on death row are women (Capital, 2), these inmates will most likely spend over a decade awaiting their execution.
Generally, they are isolated from other prisoners and are forced to spend as much as 23 hours a day alone in their cells. Often they are excluded from employment programs and sharply restricted in terms of visitation. America’s death row population is aging significantly, a record of 110 prisoners were at least 60 years old as of 2003. The aging of death row inmates is due to the many appeals that the courts must process and the U.S. people must pay for (Capital, 2).
Governments should not be so concerned with the rights of criminal defendants. Although everyone does deserve a fair trial, the criminals on trial have chosen not to be part of our society by doing something that people do not support. In turn, society should not have to pay for them to be, repeatedly, tried fairly. Constant appeals and numerous trials are what cost tax payers the most. Courts should not allow appeals. Appeals halt the actual date of execution while costing tax payers more and more and allowing the criminal defendant more and more time to escape.
Capital punishment costs are extremely high; no society should have to pay to house, feed, clothe and often educate convicts. Costs, worked into the extremely high taxes, include those of housing the convicts and paying those who work in the prisons. Costs are high in the 12 states that do not allow the death penalty, as well. Instead of having to pay for the many appeals tax payers must pay to house the inmates until they naturally expire.
Innocence does remain an issue. Since 1976, 121 death row inmates (Facts, 2) have been let off of death row due to innocence. However, it was not because the courts randomly dragged someone off the streets to a trial. The inmate did commit a crime, or two, they did not, however, commit a crime to the degree that deserved death.
In 1846, Michigan was the English-speaking jurisdiction in the world to abolish capital punishment. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights specifically recognizes the right of countries to impose the death penalty for the most serious crimes (Hoekema, 1-5). Capital punishment is still used in 87 countries and territories which use electrocution, lethal gas, hanging, shooting, lethal injection, garroting and decapitation as execution methods. In the United States lethal injection and electrocution are the dominant means of execution while some states still allow the use of a gas chamber, the firing squad and hanging (Authorized, 1-7)
Lethal Injection was first developed in 1977 and Oklahoma became the first state to adopt it. The execution of Charles Brooks on 2 December 1982 in Texas was the first actual use of lethal injection and it is now used as the main method of execution in 37 of the 38 states. Inmates are injected with sodium thiopental and anesthetic, followed by pavulon or pancuronium bromide and then potassium chloride which eventually stops the heart (Authorized, 1-7).
Electrocution is the main method in Nebraska and was first developed in 1888 in New York. The first execution by it was of William Kemmler in 1890. The electric chair sends a jolt between 500 and 2,000 volts, which lasts about 30 seconds, a second is given when the body cools down until the inmate is dead. The eyeballs often pop out of their sockets and rest on the inmates cheeks and occasionally the body will burst into flames. Generally the brain appears to be cooked (Authorized, 1-7)
The gas chamber was first introduced in 1924 in Nevada, Gee Jon was the first executed by gas. Five states, Arizona, California, Maryland, Missouri and Wyoming, still authorize the use of the gas chamber, but all use lethal injection as the main method. Most prisoners try to hold their breath which slows down the process; most people are in a lot of pain. Being executed by the gas chamber is like having a heart attack when the heart is deprived of oxygen, the inmate eventually dies from hypoxia (Authorized, 1-7)
The firing squad remains a method of execution in Utah and Idaho, Utah is the only state which allows the inmate to choose. The most recent execution was John Albert Taylor on 26 January 1996. Five shooters are armed with .30 caliber rifles and stand twenty feet away and shoot at the inmate. The loss of blood or tearing of the lungs is often the cause of death (Authorized, 1-7).
Hanging was the first execution method, and was used as the primary method until the 1890’s, it is still used in New Hampshire and Washington, the latter allows the inmate to choose. In theory the inmate should drop and his weight should cause a rapid fracture-dislocation of the neck. It rarely happens. Usually, the condemned hangs for about 45 minutes as the face becomes engorged, the tongue protrudes, the eyes pop, the body defecates and violent movements of the limbs occur before the heart finally stops due to loss of oxygen. (Authorized, 1-7)
No one will ever really know if the execution methods are “humane” or painless, (Graham, 1-2) but the execution methods used in the United States and in most other countries only end the lives of the condemned, but does nothing to cause the pain and suffering that their victims were subjected to. “In August 1990, two boys […] were charged with sexual assault and murder of two […]children (one 8, one 7). The victims were strangled with their own shoe laces.” (Monk, 320) Recently, Scott Peterson was convicted of murdering his pregnant wife, Laci, and their unborn son Connor and then dumping the bodies in the ocean. Anne Schwartz describes one of the many gruesome acts committed by serial killer Jeffery Dahmer; "...he kept the head and boiled it to remove the skin, later painting it gray, so that in case of discovery, the skull would look like a plastic model used by medical students” (Bardsley, 8)
Ted Bundy was one of the most horrible serial killers in the United States. In August of 1974, two of his victims were found. “It was remarkable that police were able to identify two of the bodies considering what was left -- strands of various colors of hair, five thigh bones, a couple of skulls and a jaw bone.” (Bell, 1) Many women were murdered at the hands of the “Green River Strangler”. Carol Ann Christen was one of them; “Christensen was found with her head covered by a brown paper bag. When it was removed, it was found that she had a fish carefully placed on top of her neck. Smith and Guillen state that the killer also placed another fish on her left breast and a bottle between her legs. Her hands were placed crossed over her stomach and freshly ground beef was placed on top of her left hand. Further examination revealed that she was strangled with a cord.” (Bell, 2)
People like that, who can come up with such a horrible way to kill, and torture, their victim have no place in our society. They do not abide by society’s expectations and they do not deserve to live. They do not deserve to be fed, clothed and educated. Convicted murderers, rapists, hijackers etc. deserve to die. They have affected many peoples lives in extremely negative ways, no amount of therapy, praying, wishing or hoping will ever bring the dead back. The convicted inmates deserve to have their presence on Earth terminated for they ended someone’s life, someone who was meant to live for much longer, who had people who cared about them. “An Eye for an Eye, a Tooth for a Tooth” can be applied in capital punishment cases without argument.
More than 20,000 homicides are committed each year in the United States (Lee, 162). Enforcing the death penalty is the only way to make sure that peoples lives are spared. Although death row inmates are usually the poorest of the poor (Lee, 163) the fact remains that the possibility of dying, for killing another, does hit people. The stories surrounding capital punishment cases are horrible, reading them is enough to make any person cry. The emotional state the families are in is unreal, the hurt that someone has caused is unbelievable; capital punishment must remain legal to save innocent people, help healing families and protect society.
anywhoo. economics was wicked boring.
morality we watched this like crazy woman scream at us about sex. not gonna lie it kinda scared the shit out of me.
homeroom mentor meeting.
chemistry test
algebra at lunch
algebra quiz
spanish boring-ness
had a lovely chit chat with jp after school. jajaja. that boy's fun.
went to compusa. bought a wireless system thing.
xo, ash