20 Page Paper For Senior Seminar On The Death Penalty

Griffin 1

Griffin 2

Nyome Griffin

Professor Nanuzeyi

Senior Seminar

18 January 2020

Paper Proposal

I will be conducting my research for my paper on incarceration in the United States related to the death penalty and wrongful accusations of innocent inmates. My title will be, “Wrongful Convictions in the US; Should the death penalty be abolished?” With the release of the new movie ‘Just Mercy’ starring two big name actors, Jamie Foxx and Michael B. Jordan a lot of light has been shed upon this topic. The movie is based around wrongfully accused inmates and even though it is set in the late 1900s, the issues in the movie are still relevant and prominent until this day. Studies have shown that as much as four percent of inmates are on death row and innocent, to sum it up almost one hundred and twenty out of three thousand inmates are potentially not guilty of the crime they are in prison for. The ultimate question is after six states getting rid of the death penalty, should the rest follow? Therefore, my research question is, “Should the United States get rid of the death penalty in all 50 states?”. New studies have emerged in order to break down and calculate the wrongful convictions, one by the name of “Survival analysis” for the inmates currently incarnated that may suffer from injuries of harnessing diseases. Also, the chances of a prisoner who is wrongfully convicted getting exonerated depends highly on if the government is trying to currently execute him and how quick his date is set and approaches. Some of these innocent prisoners sit on death row an wait on trials, dates to be set and to potentially face their death, all the while they may not even make it to see any of those days due to some prisoners dying while sitting on death row when the whole time they could’ve been free. I feel as though this topic is very important and many should be educated on this unfair tactic by the government.