The Death Penalty

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The Death Penalty

• Student M
• Lib 105

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What is the death penalty?

• The death penalty is a punishment that is put
  forth on people that commit heinous crimes
• There is much controversy on the morality and
  ethicality of it
• There are different forms of completing this
  punishment such as the electric chair, the gas
  chamber, and lethal injection
• Bedan, Hugo Adams, Capitol Punishment Morality,
• Politics, and Policy. Encyclopedia
  of Crime and Justice. 2nd Edition. 2002

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Is the death penalty a justified way of punishing
convicted felons?Some things to think about

• Many people have been put to death only to find
  out afterwards that they were innocent
• The Death Penalty goes against many religions and
  the morals of many people in the United States
  today
• (opinion) Isnt the government committing the
  same crime as the felon when sentencing someone
  to death? If what that felon did was commit murder

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Information retrieved from Feinberg Library

• Academic discipline Social Science
• LC classification Criminal Justice HV
• LC subject heading Capital Punishment United
  States
• Databases used Subject database Criminal
  Justice Abstracts, Sociological Abstracts
• Keywords Capitol Punishment, Morals, Ethics,
  Religion, Death Penalty
• Boolean Searches (Capital Punishment or Death
  Penalty) AND (Morals OR Ethics)
• Capital Punishment AND Morals AND Religion
• (Capital Punishment OR Death Penalty) AND
  Justice

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Information retrieved from
Feinberg continued

• I found that the most effective way to find
  information on the death penalty was using the
  keywords Capital punishment, morals, and religion
  in Boolean searches. In the subject database
  under Criminal Justice Abstracts I was able to
  find more useful sources then I was using the
  Feinberg Library Catalog. Many of the sites that
  were retrieved on this topic referred to the
  morality of the death penalty. This was very
  helpful because I am searching for information
  that pertains to whether or not the death penalty
  is a justified way of punishing convicted felons.
  Using different keywords and changing the order
  of words was helpful in narrowing down the amount
  of results that were retrieved. Also, subject
  searches were more effective than keyword
  searches in the library catalog. For instance,
  the death penalty is listed under the subject
  heading Capital Punishment. The catalog used
  different terminology!

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Best Books

• Bohm, Robert M. Deathquest II An introduction to
  the theory and practice of capital punishment in
  the United States, 2nd ed. Cincinnati, OH
  Anderson Publishing Co., 2003.
• Annotation In this book, Bohm explains the facts
  of the death penalty. This was especially helpful
  for me in understanding more in depth what the
  death penalty actually consists of.
• Gray, Mike. The death game Capital punishment
  and the luck of the draw. Monroe, ME Common
  Courage Press, 2003.
• Annotation Different cases of felons being put
  to death in the United States are examined in
  this book, reviewing the contradictions and
  controversies of the death penalty. This showed
  me how the criminal justice system is looked down
  upon by many people for administering capital
  punishment
• Hodgkinson, P. and Schabas, W. Capital
  Punishment Strategies for Abolition.Cambridge,
  UK Cambridge University Press, 2004.
• AnnotationThis book examines the reasons why
  some places continue to use the death penalty and
  why others dont. This book was useful to me
  because it goes over the moral and ethical
  reasoning's of why the death penalty is either
  used or not.
• The Death Penalty on Trial Crisis in American
  Justice
• Cambridge, MA Perseus Books Group, 2004.
• Annotation This book is about abolishing the
  death penalty due to innocent people being put to
  death. I found this helpful because it gave
  examples for why the death penalty is so
  controversial.

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Best Periodical Articles

• Dutta, Sunil Humans playing GodCapital
  Punishment and its Follies. Tikkun. 17
  (2002)4. ProQuest Research Library Database.
  Plattsburgh State University Library. 24 October
  2005 lthttp//www.proquest.umi.comgt.
• Annotation In this periodical the author
  explains how they believe that humans are acting
  as if they are a God by punishing other people.
  They also feel that it would be less expensive to
  keep the felons in prison rather than putting
  them to death. I found this article interesting
  because it agrees with how I feel and I felt it
  dealt with my topic well.
• Clark, Thomas W. Crime and Causality Do
  Killers Deserve to Die? Free Inquiry 25 (2005)
  4. ProQuest Research Library Database.
  Plattsburgh State University Library. 24 October
  2005 lthttp//www.proquest.umi.comgt.
• AnnotationThis periodical expresses Clarks
  feelings on the death penalty. Whether felons are
  guilty or innocent the majority of them face
  execution. This was helpful in that it went on to
  speak about the justifications of the death
  penalty.

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Periodical Articles Continued

• Hamm, Theodore. The Death Penalty. California
  Journal 23.4 (2002) 6. ProQuest Research
  Library Database. Plattsburgh State University
  Library. 24 October 2005 lthttp//www.proquest.umi
  .comgt.
• Annotation This article is about capital
  punishment in California and the laws they have
  with it. I found this article interesting because
  it shows that although the United States is under
  one government, each state follows their own ways
  on topics as great as the death penalty.
• Jefferies, Kimberly. The Great Debate. Texas
  Monthly 21.3 (2004) 1. ProQuest Research
  Library Database. Plattsburgh State University
  Library. 24 October 2005 lthttp//www.proquest.umi
  .comgt.
• Annotation This article expresses the authors
  views on the death penalty and speaks about a man
  that should not have been executed. This was
  useful for me because part of my topic is based
  on how innocent people have been executed.

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Best Internet Sources

• Bureau of Justice Statistics. Capital Punishment
  Statistics 13 January 2005. 24 Oct. 2005
  http//www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/cp.htm
• Annotation This website was very informative
  with facts and statistics about capital
  punishment. I used this because it allowed me to
  learn more about the death penalty.
• Capital Punishment 2001. 24 Oct. 2005
  http//www.utm.edu/research/iep/c/capitalp.htm
• Annotation This site gave different arguments
  from all different types of groups on how they
  felt about the death penalty. I found this
  helpful because it gave me more insight into
  other people and groups thoughts.
• P, Michael. The Morality of Capital Punishment.
  27 April 2005. 24 Oct. 2005 http//www.mirrorofju
  stice.com/mirrorofjustice/2005/04/the_morality_of.
  html
• AnnotationThis website goes on to question the
  morality of capital punishment and whether the
  government is contradicting themselves. This was
  very useful for me because that is the basis of
  my topic.

I found that the internet sources were not as
helpful as the database searches. Many sites that
I found using Google contained information that
was irrelevant to my topic.
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Best Non- Print Sources

• The Life of David Gale. Auth. Parker, Alan. Perf
  Cage, Nicholas Universal Pictures, 2002.
• Annotation This movie shows how innocent people
  can be found guilty and how many times not enough
  work is put into finding out the truth. With this
  movie it occurred to me how often this happens in
  our country and how more thought should be put
  into declaring someone innocent or guilty.
• Dead Man Walking. Perf. Sarandon, Susan  Auth.
  Prejean, Helen. Polygram Video, 1996.
• Annotation This film examines a convicted killer
  and his journey to finding the out the truth. I
  found this very heartfelt and interesting.

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Self- Evaluation

• While researching this topic I tried many
  different types of resources. I found that there
  were more relevant information in books and in
  periodical articles than there was in internet
  sources. I used many subject databases,
  especially Illumina because I found that it had
  the largest amount of useful information. For
  other sources I used databases such as World
  Cat and Proquest which were also helpful. The
  internet gave me too large of a variety, ranging
  from fake websites, to someones personal site,
  which was not what I was looking for. Finding
  useful information on the internet took much more
  time then the databases did. Through doing
  research on the death penalty I learned more
  about the controversies that are going on still,
  and more about the amount of felons that are on
  death row, just waiting to be put to death. From
  this project I have learned much more about
  researching and using databases and libraries.
  Before this I only really used search engines
  such as Google and Yahoo. I believe this
  will be very beneficial for me in the future,
  especially when it comes to my next research
  paper.

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