The Death Penalty

The 4th edition edition of this classic study has been thoroughly revised to provide up-to-date information on the scope and practice of capital punishment and the movement, backed by international organizations and human rights treaties, to abolish the death penalty worldwide. As in previouseditions, it draws on Roger Hood's experience as consultant to the United Nations for the Secretary General's five-yearly surveys of capital punishment as well as the latest information from non-governmental organizations and the academic literature.Not only have more countries - such as the Phillipines - abolished capital punishment, but amongst those that retain the death penalty, fewer have been carrying out executions. Legal challenges to the mandatory imposition of capital punishment have been successful, as has the movement to abolish thedeath penalty for those who commit a capital crime when under the age of 18. Of particular interest is the situation in China, where all death sentences are to be reviewed by the People's Supreme Court. Support for capital punishment is waning in the USA, where concern is mounting as evidence ofconviction of the innocent grows, and where there have been renewed challenges to the constitutionality of the death penalty.Despite the many advances towards world-wide abolition, this book reveals many human rights abuses where the death penalty still exists. These include the wide range of crimes still subject to capital punishment in some countries, the lack of protection from police abuse, unfair trials, lack ofaccess to qualified defence counsel, terrible conditions and excessive periods of time spent on 'death row', and public and painful forms of execution. Roger Hood and Carolyn Hoyle engage with the latest debates on the realities of capital punishment, especially the claim that the death penalty is a uniquely effective deterrent to murder and other serious crimes. This edition brings up-to-date the discussion of whether capital punishment can everbe administered equitably, without discrimination or error, and, for the first time, considers the alternatives to capital punishment, especially the problems associated with a mandatory sentence to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. This edition also considers the role andinfluence of victims' families and victim interest movements.