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Unveiling Singapore’s Death Penalty Discourse: A Critical Analysis of Public Opinion and Deterrent Claims

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While Singapore’s Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) maintains a firm stance on the effectiveness of the death penalty in managing drug trafficking in Singapore, the article presents evidence suggesting that the methodologies and interpretations of these studies might not be as substantial as portrayed.

USA | Pandemic and Continuing Historic Decline Produce Record-Low Death Penalty Use

Dismantling California's gas chamber
New death sentences and executions were at historic lows in the first half of 2020, the Death Penalty Information Center reported in its 2020 Mid-Year Review. 

The report, released July 2, attributed the record-low numbers to the combined effects of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic and a continuing broad national decline in the use of capital punishment.

The report indicated that, even before the pandemic, the U.S. was poised for its 6th consecutive year with 50 or fewer new death sentences and 30 or fewer executions. 

At the midpoint of 2020, there have been only 12 new death sentences, imposed in 7 states, and 6 executions carried out by 5 historically high-execution states. Only Florida (with 4) and California (with 3) had imposed more than a single new death sentence, and only Texas (with 2) had carried out more than one execution.

Colorado became the 22nd U.S. state to abolish the death penalty, and Governor Jared Polis commuted the death-sentences of the 3 prisoners remaining on the state’s death row. 

Louisiana and Utah joined the list of 12 death-penalty states that have not carried out an execution for more than a decade. 

2 more death-row prisoners were exonerated, and courts issued orders setting the stage for another, bringing to 169 the number of people in the U.S. exonerated from wrongful convictions and death sentences since 1973.

As the U.S. Supreme Court refused to intercede in the federal government’s 2nd attempt to resume federal executions, public support for the death penalty continued to decline. 

A May 2020 national Gallup poll found a record-low percentage of U.S. adults now believe that the death penalty is a morally acceptable punishment.

State courts continued to have a major impact on the course of capital punishment. 

In a decision with ramifications for more than 140 death penalty cases, the North Carolina Supreme Court struck down a legislative attempt to retroactively repeal the state’s Racial Justice Act. 

At the same time, new appointees to the Florida Supreme Court overturned established procedural safeguards in 3 death penalty cases, including abandoning case precedent that required a unanimous jury recommendation for death before a trial judge could impose the death penalty. 

The court’s decision in State v. Poole could retroactively reimpose dozens of death sentences that previously had been overturned.

Source: Death Penalty Information Center, Staff, July 2, 2020


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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde

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