Overview

had committed. But the jury disagreed, ruling that Spisak had willfully
committed murder and deserved the death penalty. Even though he filed
appeals that spanned nearly three decades, the death sentence continued
to be upheld, and Spisak’s time eventually ran out. After his execution,
Warford’s mother said in a statement: “I can finally say justice has been
served. If one can say this brings closure, I can say it is peace of mind for
me and my family.”2

Centuries of Controversy
The death penalty, also known as capital punishment, has been used
for thousands of years as the ultimate punishment for crimes. Although
historians have no way of knowing how long the death penalty has been
an issue of controversy, they do know that it has been debated for cen-
turies. In writings from the 1700s, several influential Europeans were
clear about their contempt for capital punishment. One was the Ital-
ian criminologist and philosopher Cesare Beccaria, who published an
essay in 1767 entitled Of Crimes and Punishments. Beccaria condemned
the death penalty as a barbarous practice, saying that intentionally put-

“
ting someone to death, even if the
person had committed crimes, was
unjustified. He wrote: “What right,
Although histori-
I ask, have men to cut the throats
ans have no way of
of their fellow-creatures? Certainly
knowing how long
not that on which the sovereignty
the death penalty
and laws are founded.”3
has been an issue
The death penalty is as contro-
of controversy,
versial today as it was during Bec-
they do know that
caria’s time, and perhaps even more
it has been debated
so. Organizations such as Amnesty
for centuries.

”
International and the National
Coalition to Abolish the Death
Penalty denounce capital punish-
ment as an inhumane practice that must end. But many disagree, argu-
ing that people who intentionally commit murder deserve to be put to
death for their crimes. According to an October 2010 Gallup poll, this
is the perspective of the majority of people in the United States. When
asked if they were in favor of the death penalty for a person convicted of

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