Cruz Off Death Row example essay topic

Before 1981 there had only been three executions in the United States since the confusing 5-4 Supreme Court decision in 1976 which invalidated all existing state death penalty laws. Gary Mark Gilmore was executed by a firing squad in Utah in 1977, and Jesse Bishop went to the gas chamber in Nevada in 1979 then there was John Spenkelink who in 1979 was electrocuted in Florida. Then in 1981 Steven Timothy Judy was electrocuted for the capital punishment of raping and strangling Terry Lee Chas teen who was on the side of the road with her three children when their car stalled. He then drowned each of the children one by one in a nearby creek. This would be the beginning of a flood of executions mainly in the state of Texas. The night that Judy was to be executed, a rally of about 200 liberal activist stood outside in the wind and rain shouting, "Burn, Judy burn!" On that March night the United States started off on a new journey.

Executions would no longer make international news, in a hand full of states they even became routine. In Texas where the crime rate was through the roof, crowds would stand outside the Huntsville prison on execution night to celebrate. Americans were chanting, "An eye for an eye", the same quote the people in bible times chanted at an execution. Who would argue with such ancient wisdom?

But what if its not an eye for an eye, what if it's an eye for a finger? Or removing the eye of someone you thought put out your eye but actually just resembles the bad guy and happens to not have an alibi for the night in question. Many times inmates have been released from death row because new evidence has come forth to prove their innocence. But how many times has that evidence come too late or not at all. How many innocent lives have we taken we will never know. Now thanks to several high profile cases in which DNA tests were used some innocent men were exonerated and their lives were spared.

The governor of Illinois, George Ryan was tired of reading about inmates in his state that had been freed from death row because new evidence proved their innocence. In the 23 years since capital punishment was reinstated 13 men in Illinois have been cleared. Two of the Illinois exoneration's were brought on by a Northwestern University Professor, Lawrence Marshall. He took on cases without a fee. In one case, Rolando Cruz had been on death row for twelve years for the murder and rape of a ten-year-old girl. Marshall not only got Cruz off death row but his work resulted in criminal charges against the authorities who prosecuted Cruz and he found the identity of the actual killer.

Before reading this article I wasn't fully convinced that capital punishment was a good thing, I was leaning more towards it than away from it. But now after hearing about all these men who were in fact innocent and either were put to death or came very close to it, I am definitely against capital punishment. Anyone who believes that a man can devise and execute a system that is only going to catch the guilty is kidding themself. It is not humanly possible to design a system that is that perfect. And if people are not prepared for the possibility that human institutions are going to make mistakes, then they shouldn't support the death penalty or vote for legislators who are for it. As Benjamin Franklin once said, "They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.".