Death penalty for specifically identified egregious crimes Essay

Death penalty for specifically identified egregious crimes - Essay Example Retreat From the Death Penalty†, it was revealed that more criminal justice practitioners and scholars have expressed increasing opposing arguments in terms of the effectiveness of capital punishment in servicing the paramount purpose for its imposition: deterrence and retribution. As emphasized, â€Å"a distinguished committee of scholars convened by the National Research Council found that there is no useful evidence to determine if the death penalty deters serious crimes† (America’s Retreat From the Death Penalty par. 2). The result was an apparent decline in the number of executions, from a high of 98 executions in 1999 up to only 43 executions in 2012 (Facts About Death Penalty). There are still a reported number of 33 states which were noted to concur on capital punishment; and only 17 were identified as non-death penalty states (Facts About Death Penalty). At the rate that the number of executions have apparently been manifested to be on a declining trend, only confirms that the national consensus against its continued implementation has been openly relayed. One strongly believes that capital punishment is not the most effective means for crime deterrence; since it only perpetuates a system of revenge through taking the life of the perpetuator. The preservation of life has been regarded as paramount to human values and beliefs and thus, killing and taking another person’s life, to replace one that was unjustly lost, does not justify the wrong that has been done.