Is the death penalty ever the appropriate punishment?
What should dictate someone receiving the death penalty?
To this day Troy Davis is still one of the many faces of contested convictions, fallacies of the criminal justice system, and the use of the death penalty. His death sparked much disapproval of the death penalty as a whole and the fight still continues. His living family still fights to prove his innocence and have true justice served for Troy Anthony Davis. A posthumous pardon can grant the Davis family the peace they may want after the death of their innocent brother, uncle, and son. Although it does not bring their loved one back, it does allow them to have his name cleared, and the government take responsibility for their error. The issue with Posthumous Pardons is that clemency is generally granted by Presidential powers and the processing of Pardons takes an extreme amount of time.
The Constitution Project, a human rights group, emphasizes that “¾ of prisoners who have been exonerated and declared innocent in the US were convicted at least in part on the basis of faulty eyewitness testimony” (The Guardian). It now becomes our responsibility to project a voice and influence toward a more just justice system and question their decisions, to ensure instances like this are less likely to happen. The Troy Davis case and others like it allow us to empathize with the victims of these wrongful convictions and their families. It could be any one of us, and that’s why we still chant, “I Am Troy Davis.”
