U.S.: Majority of Voters Claim Presidential Candidate Opinion on the Death Penalty is ‘Very Important’

According to a new IFC poll, there is overwhelming support for the death penalty across political parties, with the majority of voters claiming that Presidential candidate opinion on the death penalty is "very important." Additionally, only 12% of Americans felt the death penalty would be abolished in the US in the near future. Here is a link to the poll results.

Also, IFC will premiere the original documentary At the Death House Door tomorrow, which will provide viewers with an intimate look at the death penalty in Texas. We also have the trailer/clips from At The Death House Door available for posting. The New York Times did a story on At the Death House Door.

New York, NY – May 27, 2008 – On the heels of the Supreme Court’s ruling upholding the constitutionality of lethal injection (Baze v. Rees), IFC and E-Poll Market Research announced today the results of a new independent poll examining American voters’ attitudes towards the death penalty, and the significance of the death penalty as a key issue in the upcoming election. The national poll was conducted for IFC by the network’s political polling partner, E-Poll Market Research, as part of IFC’s year-long “Election Coverage for the Rest of Us” campaign. Among other results, the poll revealed overwhelming support for the death penalty across political parties, with the majority of voters claiming that Presidential candidate opinion on the death penalty is “very important.” In addition, only 12% of Americans felt the death penalty would be abolished in the United States in the near future.

The network will also premiere the original documentary At the Death House Door, which will provide viewers with an intimate look at the death penalty in Texas, May 29.

IFC’s recently launched “Election Coverage for the Rest of Us” is a comprehensive multiplatform initiative that is part of the network’s expanding News division and overall focus on being the voice of independent culture and thought. Leading up to the ’08 Presidential Election, IFC News will help viewers deconstruct American politics and the electoral process; showcase key stories, issues and events from popular and political culture and highlight the role of independent thought within the political landscape through a series of political polls fielded by its partner, E-Poll Market Research, and exclusive specials.

“Our poll shows that the death penalty is an important, but thorny issue. Popular support for the death penalty remains remarkably strong, and the clear majority of voters say it is a ‘very important’ issue in the coming Presidential campaign," said Evan Shapiro, General Manager of IFC. "However, it seems there may be a connection between so called 'sanctity of life' issues, and that they contain some potentially unforeseen land mines for Presidential and Congressional candidates.”

“58% of voters say they ‘totally/somewhat agree’ that the death penalty is very important for Presidential candidates, and 75% say they ‘totally/somewhat’ agree that abortion is very important. However, 45% ‘totally/somewhat’ disagree that it makes sense for a candidate to be both pro-life and pro death penalty, and 58% see an inherent contradiction between being both pro-abortion and anti death penalty. This contradiction is especially apparent among Democrats and Independents, giving Democrats and Republicans something to think about as they move into more moderate states and the general election.”

The following poll questions were among those asked of registered voters to gauge their views on the death penalty, and its potential role as a key issue in the upcoming Presidential election:

1.) Are you in favor of the death penalty for a person convicted for murder?

IN FAVOR:

Total Respondents: 73%
Republicans: 85%
Democrats: 65%
Independent/not-affiliated: 73%

2.) Presidential Candidate opinion about the death penalty is very important to me.

AGREE (Totally/Somewhat agree):

Total Respondents: 58%
Republicans: 63%
Democrats: 58%
Independent/not-affiliated: 52%

3.) Presidential Candidate opinion about abortion is very important to me.

AGREE (Totally/Somewhat agree):

Total Respondents: 75%
Republicans: 78%
Democrats: 77%
Independent/not-affiliated: 69%

4.) It makes sense for a Presidential Candidate to be both for the death penalty and against abortion.

AGREE (Totally/Somewhat agree):

Total Respondents: 55%
Republicans: 68%
Democrats: 45%
Independent/not-affiliated: 53%

5.) It makes sense for a Presidential Candidate to be both for abortion and against the death penalty.

AGREE (Totally/Somewhat agree):

Total Respondents: 42%
Republicans: 30%
Democrats: 49%
Independent/not-affiliated: 44%

6.) Abortion and the Death Penalty are two separate issues and cannot be connected (Agree or Disagree)

AGREE (Totally/Somewhat agree):

Total Respondents: 82%
Republicans: 82%
Democrats: 82%
Independent/not-affiliated: 80%

7.) 91% of all known executions in the world take place in Iran, Iraq, China, Sudan, Pakistan, and the USA. Does that lessen your support for the Death Penalty? (asked among those who are in favor of the Death Penalty ONLY)

YES:

Total Respondents: 8%
Republicans: 5%
Democrats: 13%
Independent/not-affiliated: 7%

8.) Based on the below statements, do you think that the death penalty is going to be abolished in the U.S. in the near future?

- New Jersey abolished the death penalty.

- Over 100 people released from death row after they were exonerated.

- 91% of all known executions in the world take place in Iran, Iraq, China, Sudan, Pakistan and the

USA.

- The Supreme Court reviewed the issue of lethal injection

- 60% of all American executions in 2007 were in Texas in 2007.

- 36 States still have the Death penalty.

YES:

Total Respondents: 12%
Republicans: 11%
Democrats: 15%
Independent/not-affiliated: 10%

E-Poll randomly selected qualified respondents from their nationwide proprietary panel to participate in an online survey. IFC designed the questionnaire, with input from E-Poll Market Research. E-Poll conducted the survey which was fielded from May 15-18. There were a total of N=1,211 completed surveys meeting all demographic and screening criteria. A total of N=1,211 completes yields a margin of error of + 3%.

About IFC

IFC (The Independent Film Channel) is the first and only network dedicated to independent film and related programming, 24 hours a day, uncut and uncensored. Operating under the mantra 'always, uncut,' IFC presents feature-length films, "cult classics," thought-provoking original documentaries such as At the Death House Door and This Film Is Not Yet Rated, shorts, animated series, exclusive web series, and television's most comprehensive independent film library. The network also offers some of the most innovative and edgy original series on television, including the sketch comedy "The Whitest Kids U' Know." Providing a voice for independent thought not found anywhere else on television, IFC broadens the audience for independent film and supports the independent film community through its exclusive live coverage of notable film events like the Independent Spirit Awards. The network's On Demand offering, IFC Free, gives audiences the opportunity to watch premieres of all of IFC's original series in HD before they air on the linear network. IFC is a subsidiary of Rainbow Media Holdings LLC.

Click here to watch video.

Source: IFC

Comments

USA | What happens in the final weeks before an execution? These reporters were inside the room.

The journalists behind ‘The Last 12 Weeks’ earned extraordinary access to a death penalty defense team—and faced difficult ethical choices Many defense lawyers are naturally cagey. They work in a pressure cooker, protecting their clients’ rights while fighting for the best possible outcome. And arguably, the stakes can’t get any higher than trying to save a client’s life. So no, defense lawyers don’t usually invite journalists into strategy meetings. But that’s what happened when Marshall Project reporter Maurice Chammah and Serial Productions senior producer Alvin Melathe spent the final few months before a Texas execution embedded with a capital defense team.

North Korea | 'I was only 9': North Korean defector recalls childhood memory of public execution

Kim Eun-joo was 9 years old when her teacher stopped their lesson and told the class to follow her outside. The children were marched to a public execution ground in North Korea. “I would cry even when our family dog died,” Kim said in a recent interview with The Korea Times. “But the first time I watched humans killing a human, I had no words for what I was feeling. It was the most brutal scene I have ever seen, in any movie or in real life.” The memory has stayed with her ever since. Now a human rights advocate after defecting from North Korea, Kim recently brought that childhood scene to the 9th World Congress Against the Death Penalty in Paris, where North Korea’s use of public executions and capital punishment was officially placed on the agenda for the first time.

19 July 1943 | Auschwitz's Largest Public Hanging: 12 Polish Prisoners Executed in Escape Reprisal

OSWIECIM, Poland — The SS carried out the largest public hanging in Auschwitz history on July 19, 1943, executing 12 Polish prisoners before other inmates as collective punishment for escapes and civilian contacts. The victims, all from the camp’s surveyors’ labor unit, were hanged on gallows built in front of the camp kitchen during an Auschwitz I roll call. The SS orchestrated this reprisal following prisoner escapes from the surveyors’ detail and unauthorized communication between inmates and civilians. Camp authorities used the recent escapes as a pretext to impose collective punishment.

Japan: Capital punishment for a minor

Death chamber at Tokyo Detention Center The Supreme Court's recent decision to uphold the death sentence given in a lay judge trial to a 24-year-old man for murders he committed when he was a minor raises questions about the lay judge trial system and capital punishment. These include whether the lay judges correctly understood the spirit of the Juvenile Law in sentencing the defendant to death. It was the 1st death sentence handed down on a minor in a lay judge trial. The murders took place in Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture, in 2010 when Yutaro Chiba was 18 - meaning he fell under the purview of the Juvenile Law. Chiba was convicted of entering his ex-girlfriend's house and stabbing to death the girl's sister and a female friend of the girl with a butcher knife, seriously injuring a male friend of the sister and abducting the girl. Prosecutors said Chiba killed the victims because they were trying to separate him and his former girlfriend. Since Chiba pleaded n...

Texas: The inmates who refused to die quietly and had to be gassed out of their cells before execution

Former crime reporter Michelle Lyons, who witnessed nearly 300 executions in Texas, US, reveals the desperate acts of death row prisoners who refused to accept their fate After spending years or often decades locked up in a tiny cell for 23 hours a day, most Death Row inmates go willingly to their executions. However, some refuse to die quietly - with officers forced to gas them out of cells, strap up their heads and even give chase across prison grounds. Michelle Lyons, who has witnessed nearly 300 executions in Texas, US, exclusively tells Sun Online how certain inmates "fight like hell" in their last moments. On most occasions, Michelle watched from the witness area, with the killers already on the gurney - the stretcher where they'd be given a lethal injection. Seven prisoners once tried to escape from the Row in Huntsville - with one shoving magazines and newspapers under his clothes to help him roll over razor-wire fences. Others have had to b...

Former Florida cop to be executed on same day as 80-year-old Pasco man

In an unprecedented move in the modern history of capital punishment, Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday cleared the way for 2 executions to occur on the same day. DeSantis reset the execution of James Duckett, whose execution earlier this year was stayed amid efforts to secure DNA testing and analysis of evidence in his case. Duckett’s execution was reset for July 28. That is the same day previously set for the execution of Dominick Occhicone. Court records indicate that Duckett’s execution is scheduled for noon. Occhicone’s is set to follow at 6 p.m.

Idaho | Death row prisoners sue over state's new firing squad

BOISE (Idaho Statesman) – Days after Idaho made the switch to a firing squad for executions, two Idaho death row prisoners next in line to be put to death sued the state prison system, saying its director withheld information about how she settled on the specifics for carrying out the method. Attorneys for prisoners Thomas Creech and Gerald Pizzuto filed suit this week in state district court against Idaho Department of Correction Director Bree Derrick. In the filing, they called her approval of an updated standard operating procedure for the firing squad and lethal injection as a backup method “arbitrary, capricious, or an abuse of discretion and in excess of the statutory authority of the agency.”

Florida executes Dennis Sochor

Man, 74, becomes oldest inmate executed in Florida in state’s 10th lethal injection this year Florida put to death one of its oldest prisoners in its history on Tuesday, a 74-year-old convicted murderer who was 1 of 3 older inmates scheduled for execution within the span of a month in the nation’s busiest death penalty state. Dennis Sochor was pronounced dead at 6:16 p.m. following a 3-drug injection at Florida State Prison near Starke, the office of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis said. He was convicted of killing a woman on Jan. 1, 1982, just hours after meeting her at a New Year’s Eve party.

Oldest inmate set to be executed in Florida will face strict spending limit for final meal

An entire category of food is also off-limits for final meal requests in Florida Florida is currently preparing to execute its oldest inmate later today (July 14), a 74-year-old convicted murderer who has been on death row since the 1980s—but his final meal will be limited by a strict budget. Dennis Sochor is scheduled to be put to death later today, making history as the oldest inmate to ever be executed in the state. The criminal, who has been on death row for nearly 40 years, will be administered the lethal three-drug injection, with the process due to begin at around 6pm.

Florida | Former warden recalls botched electrocution that left him battling PTSD for 13 years and turned him into an abolitionist

Ron McAndrew anticipated it would be just another standard execution. He had been assigned to carry out the death of Cuban refugee Pedro Medina via electric chair within the confines of Florida State Prison. Fifteen years had passed since Medina's conviction for the murder of 52-year-old Dorothy James, and McAndrew's responsibility was to oversee the administration of lethal electrical currents to his brain. Having already supervised two previous executions using the identical procedure and raised in a community that strongly supported capital punishment, he expected a swift conclusion with justice delivered.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog