Death Penalty

Thursday, March 15, 2012

Dear Mr. President,

                My name is Mariel. I am a student at Parkway West Middle School, and I am writing you today to share my thoughts on the death penalty.

                                To begin, I first became interested in the death penalty when it was introduced as a class project. However, when I found that it costs around three million dollars to fund one execution, I became interested on a whole new level.

                Executions are wasting our country's money. It only costs about 1.5 million dollars to put a criminal in jail for life; that's half of what it costs for an execution. There's so much good we could be doing with that money such as funding jumpstart programs for kids with disabilities and supporting the public school system. Why are we wasting it on criminals?

                Another big reason why the death penalty is an issue is the fact that killing is wrong, and there is a chance that an innocent person could be convicted. For starters, killing a person who has killed just sinks us to their level. Didn't Ghandi once say, "An eye for an eye makes the world go blind"? Also, through research, I found a case where a man named Kirk Bloodsworth had been on death row in Maryland for two years before he was cleared by DNA evidence. What if he had been executed before that evidence was found? Would we have told his family "Your son/brother/husband/friend was executed by law for something he didn't do, but we're really sorry"? I just can't see how we can continue with this type of punishment knowing that we can so easily make mistakes like we have in the past.

                It is because of these reasons, Mr. President, that I think the death penalty should be abolished throughout the entire USA. It would save our country tons of money and much worry.

                Thank you, Mr. President, for your time and hard work. I hope this letter has helped convince you to put an end to the death penalty, once and for all.

Sincerely,

Mariel
Parkway West Middle School
Chesterfield, Missouri

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