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Tuesday, March 24, 2015

Death Penalty in the USA

 
Capital Punishment or Death Penalty in the USA is a leagal sentence in 32 States  and the federal civilian and military legal systems
Death penalty in the US: map

The methods of execution and the crimes subject to the death penalty vary by state and have changed over time

Capital punishment was suspended in the United States from 1972 through 1976 primarily as a result of the Supreme Court's decision in Furman Vs Georgia
In this case, the court found that the death penalty was being imposed in an unconstitutional manner, on the grounds of cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution 

The Supreme Court has never ruled the death penalty to be per se unconstitutional.
In Furman Vs Georgia, the SC considered a group of consolidated cases. The lead case involved an individual convicted under Georgia's death penalty statute, which featured a "unitary trial" procedure in which the jury was asked to return a verdict of guilt or innocence and, simultaneously, determine whether the defendant would be punished by death or life imprisonment.
In a five-to-four decision, the Supreme Court struck down the impositions of the death penalty in each of the consolidated cases as unconstitutional. The five justices in the majority did not produce a common opinion or rationale for their decision, however, and agreed only on a short statement announcing the result.


Since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976, 34 States have performed executions.

The most common method since 1976 has been Lethal Injection
 
Usage of lethal injection for executions in the United States
Color key:
  State uses only this method
  State uses this method primarily but has secondary methods
  State has never used this method
  State once used this method, but no longer does

The use of lethal injection has become standard. The last executions by other methods are as follows:
Method Date State Convict
Electrocution Jan 16, 2013 Virginia Robert Gleason
Firing squad Jun 18, 2010 Utah Ronnie Lee Gardner
Lethal gas Mar 3, 1999 Arizona Walter LaGrand
Hanging Jan 25, 1996 Delaware William Bailey


 The District of Columbia and the following 18 states currently do not have an enforceable death penalty statute
State Abolition Date
 Alaska 1957
 Connecticut 2012 
 Hawaii 1957
 Illinois 2011
 Iowa 1965
 Maine 1887
 Maryland 2013 
 Massachusetts 1984 
 Michigan 1846
 Minnesota 1911
 New Jersey 2007
 New Mexico 2009 
 New York 2007 
  North Dakota 1973
 Rhode Island 1984
 Vermont 1964 
 West Virginia 1965
 Wisconsin 1853

The United States territory of Puerto Rico has no death penalty. Puerto Rico instituted a four-year moratorium on the death penalty in 1917. The last execution took place in 1927, and the Puerto Rican Legislature abolished the death penalty in 1929

The SC has placed two major restrictions on the use of the death penalty

First, the case of Atkins Vs Virginia, decided on June 20, 2002,held that the execution of mentally retarded inmates is '' cruel and unusual punishment" prohibited by the Eightth Amendment Generally, a person with an IQ below 70 is considered to be mentally retarded. Prior to this decision, between 1984 and 2002, forty-four mentally retarded inmates had been executed in the USA


Second, in 2005, the SC's decision in Roper Vs Simmons abolished executions for persons under the age of 18 at the time of the crime

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