The death penalty should be reinstated and used because fear of punishment deters crime - not rehabilitation. At least in the country of which I reside (UK), when we had the death penalty, the homicide rate was less than half of what it is now. Of course, the obvious rebuttal is that correlation is not causation and factors like population increase. Principally, I'm for the temporary reinstation of the death penalty to see its efficiency and effect on society.

There are posts in this thread regarding the risk of innocent life being taken through the death penalty. Of course, the idea that any innocent life could be taken away through false convictions is concerning (as rare as it is), but as a society we have gone into numerous events where we knew that the deaths of innocents were a possibility, yet pursued them through noble goals. For example, I doubt many of us here would have opposed the UK, or the US's involvement in the Second World War, despite the risk of innocent lives being taken.

The death penalty focuses on first-degree murder charges and rapists. These are criminals who have made society unsafe, who threw away their rights and privileges when they decided that it was worth taking the rights of another. There should be a high concentration on testimonies, witness statements and video footage to determine the verdict. The death penalty shouldn't be something used lightly or carelessly, but as a necessary and appropriate tool to dispose of vermin who have little regard for innocent human life. The death penalty rightly has no regard for guilty life.