Death penalty and Crime deterrence-A review of Quantitative evidences

 

Shivani Bisht¹, Rakshit S. Patil², Dr. Satyanarayana Labani³*

¹Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, SBSPGI Dehradun, Uttarakhannd & Trainee at ICPO (ICMR).

²Department of Clinical Pharmacy Practice, BLDEA’s College of Pharmacy, Bijapur, Karnataka & Trainee at ICPO (ICMR).

³Scientist G, Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics^, Institute of Cytology and Preventive Oncology, Indian Council of Medical Research, I-7, Sector-39, Noida - 201301

Uttar Pradesh, India

 

ABSTRACT:

The issue of death penalty and crime deterrence has been a debate. A review was undertaken on the Quantitative evidences that found the mixed results both deterring effect as well non-deterring effect. Several studies have documented deterring effects of capital punishment. However, the published studies on capital punishment and deterrence effects include a number of statistical models and conclusions are contradictory. Hence, these types of studies needed a lot of care for the confirmation of hypothesis of statistical models.

 

KEY WORDS:

 

Debate over the justice and effectiveness of capital punishment may be as old as the death penalty itself. The contemporary debate over capital punishment involves a number of important arguments based on either moral principles or social welfare considerations. As it happen in recent death penalty, the country was feverishly debating the death penalty. Is this justified, does it deter crime or it bring on end? There are many questions, but the answer often depends on what our ethical, philosophical and ideological values are central to the continuing controversy over capital punishment.

 

The evidence for capital punishment as a uniquely effective in deterring crimes is of special interest, since deterrence is the only major sensible argument on the pro-death penalty. It is often felt as executions that convicted murderers can at least save money. Others are in opinions that executions are far more expensive than life imprisonment.^1. On the other hand there are evidences based on arguments how effective the death penalty is in deterring crimes. This was attempted to demonstrate with relevant evidences and mathematical models or any other form of data, so that this might help influence policy makers to frame-out the laws favoring deterrence of crimes. A review of deterrence effects and their previous evidences were obtained from the available literature that have been drawn on various mathematical models and data which are based on deterrence effects with respect to capital punishments.

 

 

 

In one of the first studies, Issac Ehrlich, Professor of economics at State University, New York at Buffalo, examined the previous US murders and executions statistics for the period 1933-1970, where he analysed the effect of deterrence in murder rates due to executions. Ehrlich also established a mathematical model relating to murder rates to other social factors including unemployment, age distribution and per-capita income. He concluded that executions had the significant deterrence effect on murder rates and there are about seven to eight homicides were deterred by each execution. Furthermore, this was the most supportive studies for the deterrence hypothesis, which generated widespread of scientific interest.²

 

A study found a deterrent effect of capital punishment on Ehrlich’s data by different provisions and functional forms.³ While, other studies on the same data found no deterrence effect with alternative provisions.^{4, 5.} On the other hand a team experimented with their own regression models using cross-sectional studies found mixed results.⁶

 

Some researchers used Ehrlich’s data as time-series type or cross-section type and as a produced different results with similar data with different provisions. A study uses Ehrlich’s time-series data in which they found a significant deterrent effect and another study found no deterrent effect by altering time-series data into non-stationary data ⁷. These time series data and cross-sectional data were also used by others who found deterrent effect of executions.^8. Some of the recent studies examine the post moratorium evidences by using panel data instead of time-series or cross-section data. One of these studies found a deterrence effect of executions using state-level panel data as well as country-level data, whereas, the other found no deterrent effect.^{9, 10}

 

Recent study in 2005 opposes the results of other researcher’s estimations regarding capital punishment and argued that previous researcher’s findings influence their data to attain their desired conclusions.¹¹

 

The existing issue provides common opinion for rational and scientific arguments about the death penalty with outstanding load of confirmation. As this comparative research evaluation already clear that there is no overpowering evidences for deterrence and also provides the contradictory conclusions that such evidences for deterrence will not be supportive. Although there were some substantial pre- and post-moratorium evidences that boldly clear that execution deter murders. The existing evidence indicates that capital punishment is not convincing policy for deterrence effect.

 

However, the nature of data considered in these types of studies was ecological and sufficient care is needed in confirming of assumptions of statistical models used as evident from studies that tested to avoid any controversial conclusions.

 

REFERENCES:

1.       Mark Costanzo and Lawrence White, “An overview of death penalty and capital trial: history, current status, legal procedures and cost.” Journal of Social issues 50, no.02, (summer 1994), page no.1-18.

2.       The deterrent effect of capital punishment: A question of life or death, American economic review, 1975, pp 397-417. 

3.       James A. Yunker, Is the Death Penalty a Deterrent to Homicide? Some Time Series Evidence, 5 Journal of Behavioral Economics 45 (1976); Dale O. Cloninger, Deterrence and the Death Penalty: A Cross-Sectional Analysis, 6 Journal of Behavioral Economics 87 (1977); Isaac Ehrlich and Joel Gibbons, On the Measurement of the Deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment and the Theory of Deterrence, 6 Journal of Legal Studies 35 (1977); Isaac Ehrlich and Zhiqiang Liu, Sensitivity Analysis of the Deterrence Hypothesis: Lets Keep the Econ in Econometrics, 42 Journal of Law and Economics 455 (1999); Zhiqiang Liu, Capital Punishment and the Deterrence Hypothesis: Some New Insights and Empirical Evidence, Eastern Economic J. (forthcoming)

4.       W. J. Bowers and J.L. Pierce, The Illusion of Deterrence in Isaac Ehrlich’s work on Capital Punishment, 85 Yale Law Journal 187 (1975); Peter Passell and John B. Taylor, The Deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment: Another View, 67 American Economic Review 445 (1977); Stephen A. Hoenack and William C. Weiler, A Structural Model of Murder Behavior and the Criminal Justice System, 70 American Economic Review 327 (1980).

5.       Michael McAleer and Michael R. Veall, How Fragile are Fragile Inferences? A Re-Evaluation of the Deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment, 71 Review of Economics and Statistics 99 (1989); Edward E. Leamer, Let’s Take the Con out of Econometrics, 73 American Economic Review 31 (1983); Walter S. McManus, Estimates of the Deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment: The Importance of the Researcher’s Prior Beliefs, 93 Journal of Political Economy 417 (1985).

6.       T. Black and T. Orsagh, New Evidence on the Efficacy of Sanctions as a Deterrent to Homicide, 58 Social Science Quarterly 616 (1978).

7.       Stephen A. Layson, Homicide and Deterrence: A Reexamination of the United States Time-Series Evidence, 52 Southern Economic Journal 68 (1985); James P. Cover and Paul D. Thistle, Time Series, Homicide, and the Deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment, 54 Southern Economic Journal 615 (1988).

8.       George A. Chressanthis, Capital Punishment and the Deterrent Effect Revisited: Recent Time-Series Econometric Evidence, 18 Journal of Behavioral Economics 81 (1989); Harold J. Brumm and Dale O. Cloninger, Perceived Risk of Punishment and the Commission of Homicides: A Covariance Structure Analysis, 31 Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 1 (1996).

9.       John R. Lott, Jr. and William M. Landes, Multiple Victim Public Shootings, Bombings, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handgun Laws: Contrasting Private and Public Law Enforcement, (John M. Olin Law and Economics Working paper No. 73, University of Chicago Law School, 2000); Dale O. Cloninger and Roberto Marchesini, Execution and Deterrence: A Quasi-Controlled Group Experiment, 35 Applied Economics 569 (2001); H. Naci Mocan and R. Kaj Gittings, Getting Off Death Row: Commuted Sentences and the Deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment, Journal of Law and Economics (forthcoming); Paul R. Zimmerman, Estimates of the Deterrent Effect of Alternative Execution Methods in the United States: 1978-2000, Federal Communications Commission Working Paper (2003); Paul R. Zimmerman, State Executions, Deterrence, and the Incidence of Murder, Federal Communications Commission Working Paper (2003), Joanna M. Shepherd, Murders of Passion, Execution Delays, and the Deterrence of Capital Punishment, Clemson University Working Paper (2003); Craig J. Albert, Challenging Deterrence: New Insights on Capital Punishment Derived from Panel Data, 60 University of Pittsburgh Law Review 321 (1999).

10.     Hashem Dezhbakhsh, Paul Rubin, and Joanna M. Shepherd, Does Capital Punishment Have a Deterrent Effect? New Evidence from Postmoratorium Panel Data, American Law and Economics Review (forthcoming).

11.     John J. Donohue and Steven D. Levitt, The Impact of Legalized Abortion on Crime, 116 Quarterly Journal of Economics 379 (2001).