ARTICLES: The Tensions Between Protecting the Innocent and the Objectives of Capital Punishment

A recent article in the Justice Quarterly by Professor James Acker (pictured) and Rose Bellandi of the University at Albany, New York, examined whether there is an irreconcilable conflict between recent reforms to prevent the execution of the innocent and the traditional goals of capital punishment. The authors studied recent changes to Maryland’s death penalty statute that were designed to reduce the risk of wrongful executions while trying to maintain the death penalty for the most heinous crimes. Maryland’s law requires either biological evidence of guilt, a videotaped confession, or a video conclusively linking the defendant to a murder as a prerequisite to seeking a death sentence. The authors concluded that such a statute will not impose the death penalty on the worst offenders, but only on those whose cases contain certain evidence of guilt: “No one supports executing the innocent. Yet, many support executing those who are guilty of heinous crimes. How to guard against the former risk while advancing the latter objective evokes special challenges, if not paradoxes of sufficient magnitude that suggest that the twin goals defy reconciliation.” Acker and Bellandi further add that even these protections will not be infallible, and that the Maryland Commission on Capital Punishment recommended abolition of the death penalty.

(J. Acker and R. Bellandi, “Firmament or Folly? Protecting the Innocent, Promoting Capital Punishment, and the Paradoxes of Reconciliation,” 29 Justice Quarterly 287 (April 2012); DPIC posted June 4, 2012). See Innocence. Read more Articles on the death penalty. Listen to DPIC’s podcast on Arbitrariness.