At the end of each chapter in your textbook, there is an item called “The Case.” This discussion requires you to read “The Case” and answer the questions posed at the end of Chapter 12 – page 216. Your response to each of the questions should be at least one paragraph long and should include support from the textbook, a journal article, book, or newspaper. Be sure to include a reference page that shows, in APA style, all the sources you used. ( This book this comes from is Corrections (Justice Series) 3rd Edition )
The idea of having public executions raises several interesting questions:
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A presumed benefit of public executions is to maximize the deterrent effect of capital punishment. When it is obvious to everyone that the death penalty will be used—and, humiliatingly, with thousands of others watching—it will discourage others from committing a capital offense. Is the potential for general deterrence sufficient to reintroduce public executions?
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An argument against public executions is that it could desensitize people to violence. Do you agree or disagree with that argument? What other reasons can you think of for why executions should not be public?
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In agreeing to a closed-circuit television broadcast of his execution, McVeigh wondered why it should not be truly public via public broadcast. Would you have watched a televised execution of Timothy McVeigh? Why or why not?