Life and Death in California :: essays research papers

Life & Death in the State of California   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In the United States, the first known execution was of Daniel Frank and it took place in the Colony of Virginia. Frank was executed in 1622 for the crime of theft (University of Alaska). Since the time of Daniel Frank, the death penalty has almost always been a part of our criminal justice system, starting in the colonies and continuing in the United States after we won our independence. As far as the United States goes, I am going to start off in 1930 because this was when the Bureau of Justice Statistics, United States Department of Justice, first started to compile data on a fairly regular basis. From 1930 through 1967, 3859 people were executed under civil circumstances in the United States. Others were executed but they were completed under the jurisdiction of the United States military. During this period of nearly forty years over half of those executed (54%) were black, forty five percent were white, and the remaining one percent were from other racial groups – America n Indians (a total of 19 executed from 1930-1967), Filipino (13), Chinese (8), Japanese (2). By far the majority of those being executed were men; only 32 women were executed between 1930 and 1967. During this same period of time the United States Army (and the Air Force) executed 160 people, including 106 executions for murder (21 involved rape), 53 for rape, and one for desertion. The U.S. Navy has not executed anyone since 1849 (University of Alaska). Strong pressure from parties opposed to the use of the death penalty resulted in an unofficial moratorium on executions for several years, with the last one taking place in 1967. Legal challenges to the death penalty led up to a 5-4 United States Supreme Court decision in Furman v. Georgia. Furman v. Georgia struck down the federal and state capital punishment laws that permitted wide discretion of the application of the death penalty. The majority of the justices ruled these laws as cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the eighth amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the due process guarantees of the fourteenth amendment. Only Justices Brennan and Marshall declared capital punishment to be unconstitutional in all instances (Furman v. Georgia). Furman v. Georgia led to many new death sentencing laws. The first execution under the new laws took place in Utah when Gary Gilmore was executed by firing squad for murder.