Hey world! I am college student at a reputable university who is interested North Carolina legislative’s repeal of the “Racial Justice Act”. The “Racial Justice Act” allowed convicted prisoners to appeal their sentences if they could somehow prove that their sentence was biased due to their race. The act was recently repealed because almost every prisoner sentenced to death appealed their case and received lesser sentences. North Carolina governor, Pat McCrory, sums up “Nearly every person on death row, regardless of race, has appealed their death sentence under the Racial Justice Act…the Racial Justice Act created a judicial loophole to avoid the death penalty.” Over the next four weeks, I will be exploring the correlations between race and capital punishment in hopes of understanding the subjectiveness of sentencing prisoners. Under the true nature of the law, it should be a fair and equal system, but there are clearly discrepancies in the number of white vs. non-white death row prisoners. The death penalty is an especially heavy topic to talk about with many opinions, so feel free to comment and express your ideas and opinions.
Deuces,
Estoniansugar
For further reading: http://www.cnn.com/2013/06/20/justice/north-carolina-death-penalty/index.html
Race and Capital Punishment 
The death penalty is a very debatable topic. I’m interested in seeing more information on this. I personally do believe in the death penalty and hope to get a better understanding on the law that would affect it. Do you know what a “lesser” sentence is if a person got their death penalty taken back? How do you feel about someone getting their death penalty reduced to a life sentence? Excited to see what is to come in your blog!
Xoxo- Unusualpurplewool
Hey thanks for commenting! In our judicial system, death is considered the highest penalty for a crime. A lesser sentence is any sentence for a prisoner on death row that is not the death penalty. Usually the sentence for an inmate who has their death sentence repealed is life in prison. Personally, I have extremely mixed-feelings about an inmate getting taken off of death row. I do agree with capital punishment. I believe that when a person commits horrendous crime, such as murder to the first degree, that the death penalty is the best punishment. But the way that the prisoners are executed is, in my opinion, not very humane. But if a person gets off death row and is given life in prison, then they become an obligation to the state or federal government. That obligation includes clothes, food, housing, and medical expenses. The only way the state or federal prisons can pay for inmate expenses is through taxes and federal funding. Over the summer, I worked two jobs over the summer and lost a good amount of money to taxes. Every penny counts for me, but part of my tax money is going towards taking care of prisoners who are stuck in prison for life. I can’t really give you a straight answer about how I feel but I know I wouldn’t be jumping for joy if I heard that a prisoner got taken off death row. Good questions Unusualpurplewool!
This topic is very controversial. Do you agree with the death penalty and Governor Pat McCrory’s statement? I would love to know some statistics concerning race and the death penalty. I can’t wait to read more!