Death Penalty

James Felner, author of "Mentally Retarded Don't Belong on Death Row," states that, "A person is considered mentally retarded if he or she has a significantly sub-average general intellectual functioning, which generally means recording an IQ score of lower than 70, and exhibiting deficits in adaptive behavior before the age of 18." According to the American Association on Mental Retardation, it has three components:

1. significantly sub-average intellectual function

2. accompanying impairments in the adaptive skills of the person

3. manifestation of the disability before the age of 18

How can Americans put someone on death row that is not fully responsible for his actions? Many argue that these people have committed horrible murders and are absolutely guilty of a capital crime; therefore they deserve the death penalty as the consequence of their crime. The people behind these arguments are wrong; it is a dreadful way to deal with people who do not understand the extent of their actions.

Several cases have proven that convicted felons of below average mental capacity are not competent enough to argue their case effectively. According to Felner, in the united states alone, there have been at least 33 mentally ill men executed since the United States reinstated the death penalty in 1976. Some experts estimate that as many as 10-15 percent of the 3,000 men and women on the nation's death rows are mentally ill. This barbaric action performed on and sentenced to these mentally ill prisoners is morally wrong. As Americans we should take pride in our country and our citizens, by punishing these special people not killing them. They did not choose their own mental impairments; therefore, they should not have these horrible acts of injustice inflected on them.

In many cases, there have been