@raditz8526 Said 
That's assuming the only purpose of punishment is to deter crime.
In 2007 the United States executed 41 people. Assuming they were all innocent, which I seriously doubt, I don't think it's hard to imagine that the death penalty saves more innocent lives than it takes.
It does! Note the following data No executions between 1967-1977
DATE 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 (1967) 1968 1969
EXECUTION 56 42 47 21 15 7 1 2 0 0
ON DFEATH ROW NO DATA ? ? ? ? ? 517 575
MURDERS (7990) (9552) (12503)
MURDERS (8773) (11114) (13675)
DATE 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1(977) 1978 1979
EXECUTION 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 2
DEATH ROW 631 642 334 234 244 488 420 420 482 593
MURDERS 13649 15832 18632 (16605) (18714)
MURDERS 16183 17123 (18642) (18033) (20591)
DATE 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1089 1990
EXECU 0 1 2 5 23 18 18 20 11 18 23
D-ROW 691 856 1050 1209 1405 1591 1781 1984 2124 2250 2356
MURDE 21860 19485 16689 19257 18269 20045
MURDE 20063 18673 17545 17859 18954
May 31, 2010 @ 02:55:04
