The United States grants certain criminals with a death sentence everyday. President Donald Trump mentioned in his 2016 election that he would sign a executive order forcing those convicted of killing police officers to be put to death. He recently restated this order in December and has yet to sign an executive action. He believes that imparting the death penalty upon these murderous criminals will help protect police officers. Although the purpose for this executive order is ideal, giving the death penalty to criminals who kill cops will not overall benefit our community.

Trump’s logic behind this idea was, “We need to protect those who protect us.” The general idea behind protecting our protectors is genuine, but capital murder is far from justified.

The amount of police officers being killed could be over-exaggerated. In 2017, there were 46 officers fatally shot by criminals, while in 2018, there were 47. There is a substantial amount of police brutality and vice versa, but since there has been a huge increase in media use and 24/7 news coverage, issues can get become magnified beyond the limits of truth.

For example, if there are a couple shark attacks on the coast, the media covers it and everyone creates this new irrational fear of swimming in the ocean. When in reality, 40 years ago, there could have been just as many shark attacks.

“I think that this act is speaking to the ever increasing danger that policemen are under as we have guns in our society and we have drugs… in our media crazy society, where one police shooting will get national exposure, national attention, we’re led to believe that this is happening everywhere,” history teacher Roger Stippel said.

The government should be putting a better effort towards keeping our police officers safe. Our police officers keep civil order and maintain peace throughout our community. Does our government have to right to decide who’s life is worth keeping in our country? Modern resources and technology have made finding the guilty suspect much more efficient and effective. But even with the certainty of a conviction, our government should not have to right to decide who’s life is worth taking.

“The person who was the victim had no choice in the matter. Someone decided to take their life,” history teacher Chris Engler explained.

The main idea for the notion of the constitutional order for cop murders to receive capital punishment is that it will deter others from harming officers. The murder rate in states that do not have the death penalty is actually lower than the states that do. The south has the highest murder rate in our nation, which carries out 80 percent our executions. Since there is no correlation between capital punishment and murder rates dropping, the death penalty would not protect police.

“If the death penalty is effective with the safety of our cops, then we should use that to our advantage,” senior Shamus Boe said.

A majority of Americans believed that it was cheaper to execute people than keep them feed and alive in prison for the rest of their life. Citizens on death row are given options on how they want to be executed including hanging, electrocution, lethal gas, firing squad and lethal injection. In the past it was cheaper to execute criminals, but since the invention of lethal injection, capital punishment has become more expensive than ordering a life sentence. Most people on death row choose lethal injection, which is the most expensive option, as their method of execution which has increased the cost of capital punishment. Therefore, it is no longer cheaper to exterminate criminals than hold them in prison.

Protecting our officers is a need in our ever increasing society. Enforcing the death penalty will not overall help our community or protect our police force. To better the country we live in, a general, more accepting and positive view on police officers could help the issue of police enforcement being harmed. Instead of executing citizens for murdering our cops, as a community we could promote that our officers are working to protect our society.

“We don’t like people who kill other people, so to show everyone how much we don’t like people who kill people, we are going to kill people who kill other people. It seems like capital punishment pretty much goes against everything it claims to be for,” Brad J. Bushman said.