By: Lester Williams
Is a life locked away worse than being sentenced to death? It is heavily debated about what is the best outcome, a life sentence or a death sentence.
The two can be thought of as the same, anyone who is convicted and gets a life sentence will most likely never have their freedom again, which can be looked at metaphorically as being dead.
Even sites such as deathpenalty.org acknowledge “A sentence of life in prison without parole is, in fact, a sentence of death in prison.”
Many people believe having a life sentence is a greater punishment than a death sentence; this is due to a death sentence being viewed as letting a convict get away. However, some can argue if a prisoner is most likely going to die in prison they should just be given a death sentence.
Throughout history, convicts have avoided the death penalty by being given one or multiple life sentences that exceed their life expectancy.
While punishing criminals that have committed acts like terrorism or murder with a death sentence appear to be common sense to many people, there are various examples of prisoners escaping the death penalty.
A famous example is Terry Nichols, an American terrorist that took part in The Oklahoma City bombing in 1955 and now is serving 161 life sentences because of this event. An article from the New York Times states “He was spared the death penalty in both trials when jurors could not agree on a sentence.”
Life sentences don’t always solve problems. Letting dangerous criminals spend the rest of their lives in prison creates issues such as the possibility that they might escape and commit more crimes, they’ll cause chaos in prison and they’ll be wasting precious prison resources by staying alive.
The most noticeable problem is inmates with life sentences are causing prisons to become overcrowded. With increases in prison populations, it requires more time, money and effort needed to maintain a stable environment.
According to www.penalreform.org “Prison overcrowding is one of the key contributing factors to poor prison conditions around the world. It is also arguably the biggest single problem facing prison systems.”
Public opinions between these two methods of punishments have been mixed for many years. According to an article, from deathpenaltyinfo.org, written by Richard C. Dieter, Esq. the Executive Director of the Death Penalty Information Center it shows that when it comes to public opinions, 41 percent prefer if convicts get a death sentence, 44 percent prefer a life sentence and 15 percent couldn’t decide.
No matter which side a person stands on both punishments can end a person’s life. However, with a life sentence, they can sometimes present people with the hope that the convicted has been framed and someday will be proven innocent, while a death sentence is less likely to have that outcome.
Often in a criminal case, the court system doesn’t find the culprit, rather they just find someone they can convict.
It is not that rare that people are wrongly convicted of a crime. NBC news even acknowledges in the past few years, “A record-breaking number of people were exonerated in 2015…In all, 149 people spent an average of 15 years in prison before being cleared last year.” Some of those people released might have gotten a life sentence in the death penalty which as a result saved their lives.
Completely getting rid of life sentences wouldn’t be the best solution, as people can easily be framed for crimes and be released years later.
There are other reasons for having life sentences as an alternative, such as a death sentence is a lot more expensive than a life sentence. deathpenalty.org even suggest from studying the death penalty system in California that “a death sentence costs at least 18 times as much as a sentence of life without parole.”
Both punishments, while not perfect, are needed to balance out the justice system.
