Wrongful Convictions Research Paper

Words: 3079
Pages: 13

Introduction To the Criminal Justice System In the complex world of criminal justice, the death penalty is one of the most controversial issues in the world. Particularly, the unsettling reality of wrongful convictions has cast a shadow over the system. This paper aims toward the current Doherty students perception of these issues and their impact on trusting our justice system vs. facts taken from court cases and victims themselves. In this paper I will identify wrongful convictions; what they are, how they happen, the impacts and how they try to reverse them. Read the article False Confessions: causes, consequences, and implications. The American Academy of Psychiatry has published a report revealing police-induced false confessions as the …show more content…
Up until the 19th century when there was a debate about public executions. Although the death row has been abolished in most states and countries, the death penalty is still used to execute defendants in hopes of deterring others from committing crimes. I believe the death penalty is ultimately cruel, inhumane and a degrading punishment. Especially when a defendant is put on death row because of wrongful conviction or a mild crime. The death penalty is used differently in each state/ country. In some cases, defendants are put on death row even if they're under 18, others use it on defendants with mental or intellectual disabilities and others use it for unfair trials. So in 2020, Governor Polis abolished the death penalty in Colorado to reflect the Colorado law; with that said, nearly half the states and 2/3rds of the countries have followed along and abolished the death penalty as well. However, in 2022 there were 2,016 death sentences and 883 executions in the other countries. It's a political tool, discriminatory and irreversible; and even though it's abolished in the majority of each country, so much more needs to be done. Opinions on punishment methods With the limited data collected the participants can all agree between two main themes; that the death penalty is crucial and should only be used for extreme cases such as (murder, abuse, rape, etc.) or its inhumane no matter what the inmate did, and they either dont deserve the peace of death or its immoral and inhumane. They believe that it's unfair to incarcerate individuals who are in jail/ prison for minor cases especially if it's just to clear up jail cells and agreed there needs to be careful consideration before being executed to death row. All participants agree that wrongfully convicted victims on death row will have negative impacts