irk Bloodsworth of Maryland, both were later exonerated by DNA tests, but not before spending 5 years in prison (Armstrong). Capital punishment is prone to killing innocent people. A court error can be corrected with a pardon but a pardon after death is not valued to anyone. Race is an important factor in determining who is sentenced to die. When dealing with race, statistics are important because they provide facts that are unbiased and indisputable. Martin Luther King said, sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust on its application (King 159). Meaning intentions are good but its outcome is unjust. With capital punishment, the statistics present the big picture by revealing that biased judgments were made along racial lines and therefore must be examined first. Then, each court case is examined to enumerate the evidence that supports our conclusion drawn from the statistics. For example, statistics shows that, during 1997?1998 the population of our country was 252.7 million. 72.9 percent of this amount was white, yet whites accounted for only 49.1 percent of prison inmates, while blacks who accounted for only 15.3 percent of the entire population, accounted for 47.3 percent of prison inmates. The statistics are similar for the population on death row and executions (Cabana 1). These statistics suggest a racial problem does exist but is not enough to make a claim. Each case is now examined; the evidence that supports the claim is enumerated; the result is a well thought out explanation of the problem. For example, after carefully studying the statistics the General Accounting Office released a report in 1990 that insists the race of the victim in capital murder cases influenced whether prosecutors would pursue the death penalty or not. In particular, it insists that, a black man who kills a white person is 11 times more likely to receive the death penalty than a white man who kills a black person (Fernando 1). In simpler terms, ...
