RACHEL VAN CLEAVE
September 27, 2016
Semon Frank Thompson’s essay, “What I Learned From Executing Two Men”
(Sunday Review, Sept. 18), revealed a further reason to put an end to
the ultimate punishment. The death penalty is a broken system carried
out by human beings that no amount of reform can repair.
Study
after study demonstrates that it is imposed in a racially
discriminatory manner and that it does not have any additional deterrent
value than the punishment of life without the possibility of parole.
The death penalty has been imposed erroneously in at least 150 cases.
Mr.
Thompson’s essay compels us to consider the collateral harm suffered by
those who must carry out executions. Indeed, we are all harmed by
state-ordered killings when no reliable study has demonstrated that
there is any benefit to society.
This
November, California voters have an opportunity to put an end to a
failed and irrational system by supporting Prop 62. California would
then join 20 other states and the District of Columbia in moving us to
be, in Mr. Thompson’s words, “a healthier society.”
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