Deconstructing decapitation

Factory farming is certainly a more topical subject of conversation on campus than the death penalty. As modern, conscientious students, we lament the fact that the animals we eat spend their lives confined in tiny cages, deprived of all animal luxuries. The fact that we subject our prisoners to the same inhumanities seems to be of little concern. Faced with keeping stray animals caged for the rest of their lives, we choose euthanasia as the more humane solution. Rather than subject criminals to a lifetime of captivity, we ought to afford them the same opportunity. 

Of course, this analogy between animals and humans is not perfect—human factors such as free will may complicate the situation. Still, while the best sentence may vary from case to case, we at least must leave the option of the death penalty open to principled jurors and judges, as well as to allow convicts faced with life imprisonment the right to a quick death. 

The main barrier to the widespread implementation of the death penalty is the huge financial cost involved. It can cost many times more to carry out the death penalty than a life sentence in prison. Now, our nation simply cannot afford to spend these millions of dollars. Faced with these enormous costs, we must either abolish the death penalty or somehow reduce the costs associated with it.
 
The latter option should by no means be neglected. There is a huge potential for reining in the costs of the death penalty. The appeals process often takes much longer for capital cases, but this is a comparatively inexpensive process (so long as states maintain enough appellate judges to prevent long wait times before an appeal is heard). The extra costs are incurred largely pre-conviction, rather than at the appeals stage. A capital trial is a very different proceeding than one in which a life sentence is sought. Prosecutors spend more money on investigations. More lawyers are assigned to the case. The trial lasts much longer, from jury selection to sentencing, due in large part to the procedural hurdles prosecutors must go through when seeking capital punishment. 

This is ostensibly to prevent a wrongful conviction. I find this lack of confidence in our regular criminal trials troubling. True, people are occasionally wrongfully convicted. This is an unfortunate but unavoidable consequence of the trial by jury—or any trial system, for that matter. If we lack confidence in the verdict of a non-capital trial, then we should increase the prosecutorial burden in all trials to the level of a capital trial. If we have confidence in the non-capital trial, we should trust that same process when sentencing someone to death. 

The possibility of new evidence coming to light certainly exists. However, there is plenty of time for this evidence to surface in the decades of pre-execution appeals. The advent of DNA analysis has provided evidence that has freed many prisoners on death row as well as those serving life sentences, but this is problem of the past. DNA evidence is now analyzed and presented at trial. The chance of exonerating evidence surfacing post-execution is now acceptably miniscule. 

It seems then that we should do away with the excess trial requirements of capital cases. This will greatly reduce the costs of the death penalty, with few if any sacrifices in terms of justice being served. The death penalty will remain more expensive, however, due in part to the increased cost of housing death-row inmates. 

If we are to maintain the death penalty, we should ensure we are getting the most for our money. One of the arguments often cited in favor of capital punishment is its deterrent effect on crime. This is clearly nonsense. People are not considering the possible punishments when committing brutal murders. Nor is the distant prospect of a painless lethal injection at all terrifying.

There is, however, still potential to exploit the deterrent effect of capital punishment. First, we should replace lethal injections with beheadings. This is a much more humane method of execution—botched lethal injections in many cases cause excruciating and extended agony prior to death, while beheadings cause instant and painless death. Saudi Arabia executes convicted criminals by beheading, with virtually no mishaps. 

Beheadings have the advantage of being, while much more humane than lethal injections, also much more terrifying. If we are to scare people away from committing crimes, they must be intimately aware of the prospect of their punishment. Thus, these beheadings should be made public. 

Still, it is not likely that many violent crimes will be deterred by these public beheadings. White-collar crime, on the other hand, could be deterred. A corporate executive willing to risk life in a minimum-security prison may not be willing to risk having his head chopped off. Corporate fraud, in its most egregious cases, can be as destructive as violent crime, and its perpetrators should face similar punishment—namely beheading. 

I realize advocating expanding the scope of executions, implementing public beheadings, and reducing the rigorous standards of capital trials may be seem barbaric at first glance. However, both in terms providing humane treatment to convicted criminals and advancing the interests of society as a whole, these are ideal options.   

The author is a Columbia College junior majoring in political science-economics. He is a member of the Columbia University College Republicans.