I have returned, and mostly recovered, from my whirlwind tour of the Illinois Department of Corrections, but I do continue to struggle and reacclimatize to the much less aggressively inclined environment here in Iowa. I am desperately trying to get my head back onto the cloud that it was once upon, but I know that those eight months of super-max changed me, irreparably so. The good news though is that I am again enrolled in graduate courses and am at the moment wrapping up the analysis of data that I have gathered for a paper I intend to submit to the Midwest Sociological Society for peer review. The research concerns the positive correlation between government sponsored/endorsed violence and criminal violence.
I will give you a small peak into one of the truths that I uncovered during my recent research: the death penalty is a good predictor of violence. The United States, collectively, have a mean of 362.6 violent crimes per 100,000 citizens, per state (with an SD—standard deviation—of 138.2). However, the violent crime average of those states that have the death penalty is 373.4 (SD 125.8). Yes, you are correct; the states with capital punishment are actually more violent on average, not less violent as one would conclude. The logical takeaway from these data is that the death penalty is not a deterrent for violent crime. The thing that one has to love about statistical analysis is that it is a science. It is not partisan politics; it is not religion, nor ideology. It is fact. Moreover, the fact is that the government killing people does not stop others from killing people.
It does not daunt murder, and the reason for this lack of effectiveness is that most people who are found guilty of this offense are not violent under normal circumstances. Some “un-normal” circumstance most often leads up to this event; an act of passion or an unfortunate escalation of a set of circumstances. If Mrs. W had not come home to find Mr. W in bed with Ms. X, she would never have shot either of them. Meth Addict Y was simply trying to rob shopkeeper Z, and only shot him accidently during the tussle that ensued. Mrs. W and Meth Addict Y did not ever consider the fact that they would be put to death, because they never considered killing another human being, nor were they thinking rationally when they found themselves thrust into that “un-normal” circumstance. The death penalty is not a deterrent.
Even in the face of these truths, state lawmakers in New Mexico have launched efforts to restore the state’s death penalty. Economically these are rather lean times for state governments. Thus it is peculiar indeed that a state that is among the lowest of total revenue generators, 43rd in per capita income, and has more than 49% of its citizens living in poverty would choose one of the most expensive punishments available—it cost more to kill a convicted murderer than it does to incarcerate him for 40 years.
This writer concedes that there is definitely something wrong in New Mexico as its violent crime per 100,000 crept up to near double of the national average in 2015 to a whopping 656.1. However, the above facts demonstrate that becoming a death penalty state is not the answer. Heck, lawmakers in New Mexico only need to consult with any of their clear-minded neighbors to their west and east, Arizona and Texas respectively. These two states carry out government sponsored murder on the regular basis, yet they have violent crime rates that are habitually above the mean.
Speaking of Texas, this state is so partial to its death penalty that some of its proxies ventured on to the foreign black-market to find a supplier for sodium thiopental. Sodium thiopental is one the drugs used in the lethal injection cocktail, and whose European maker has refused to make available for the purpose of killing. The feds confiscated Texas’ underground purchased shipment, and they are at present suing the federal government in an attempt to get it back.
If the citizenry of a society decide that the conduct of a fellow citizen is so dangerous that he should no longer be allowed to dwell among the rest of the people, then one would extract a far fairer pound of flesh by compelling him to live in prison for 40 years rather than to die in prison after 4 years. This logic serves another purpose as well; at least one can let him out if the system, which is in need of retooling, gets it wrong. It seems as if there is not a week that goes by without a news segment concerning someone who has been exonerated and released after being incarcerated for something that they did not do. This very scenario played out with enough consistency in the state of Illinois that it chose to abolish its death penalty. The truth is often billed as convoluted and complicated, but most times it is clear eyed and simple: dead men can’t be freed.