Ateneo de Davao University

Jacinto St., Davao City

DEATH PENALTY IN THE PHILIPPINES

In partial fulfillment of the

Requirements in English 23

Writing Across the Discipline

Submitted to

Dr. Josyl M. Hey - Aquilam

Submitted by

Quennie Jean Iroy

Edwina Louise Jumuad

Michael Jay Lachica

February 23, 2017

 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

Following the change of administration under newly elected Pres. Rodrigo

Duterte, the government undergoes a major make over including its laws and

regulations. One of its preeminent legislative agenda is the restoration of death

penalty for heinous crimes. The House committee approved the bill which seeks

to reinstate capital punishment with 12-6-1 vote, last December 7, 2016. Last

February 7, the Senate committee on justice began on its deliberations on the

proposed imposition of the death penalty in the Philippines (Ager, 2017).

Death penalty was first established earlier 18 Century B.C. in the Code of King
th

Hammurabi of Babylon, which codified death penalty for 25 different crimes such

as murder, kidnapping, and sexual crimes. In the contemporary era, despite more

countries are abolishing such law, its practice remains a commonplace. China,

Iran, North Korea, Yemen and the US carried out most executions from 2007-2012.

In 2015, around 1,634 people were executed, 54% more on 2014 excluding

China’s executions.

From pre-Spanish Filipinos era to Marcos’ deposition, death penalty has

been practiced in the Philippines. After gaining its full sovereignty in July 1946, the

capital crimes were murder, rape and treason. Two of the notable cases are Julio

Gullien who was the first one to be executed for attempting to assassinate

President Manuel Roxas and Marcial “Baby” Ama, electrocuted minor, for murders

committed while in prison for lesser charges. Death penalty was abolished and

reduced those who are previously sentenced to death to reclusion perpetua or life
imprisonment in the newly drafted 1987 Constitution but was later restored in

Ramos’ term. The first execution after its reinstatement was the case of Leo

Echegaray who was put to death by lethal injection for repeatedly raping his 10-

year old stepdaughter. Death penalty was suspended for the second time via

Republic Act No. 9346 which was signed by President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo

on June 24, 2006.

The Davao Death Squad is a vigilante group that operates in Davao City.

Some reports show that they were responsible for the summary executions that

happened in Davao City during the reign of Mayor Rody Duterte. They have

executed different kinds of criminals, from drug traffickers to other criminal

offenders. Due to the drastic rise of killings, many speculated that this was due to

Davao Death Squad. Their existence sparks the issue on local extrajudicial killings.

The researchers choose to write about the death penalty to educate the

people, including the future criminals and candidate for executions about what this

capital punishment may bring upon its passage to law. The country, led by

President Duterte, an advocate of death penalty, is on the brink of deciding

whether the citizens should look at death penalty as an appropriate solution for

punishing hardened criminals or not. The researchers argue that death penalty

should be reintroduced because it is an equitable punishment, an effective crime

deterrent, and is cheaper.

 CHAPTER II

CLAIMS

It is an equitable punishment (an eye for an eye).

Everyone agrees that there should be some punishment for murder. After a

murderer has killed a certain number of victims, he reaches a point where the only

meaningful retribution is the death penalty. There are murders for which alternative

sentences of imprisonment are demonstrably meaningless (Devine, 2009).

Moreover, the common good requires that the punishment fit the crime, whether

that crime be a theft of a bicycle or an ax murder. As an exercise in retribution,

punishment serves to right the balance of justice that is disturbed by the crime,

provided that the punishment is appropriate (Rice, 1987). Justice demands that

each individual be treated by others and by society as he deserves. The person

who does good act ought to be rewarded with good, and the person who does evil

ought to suffer evil-each in proportion to the good or evil done. Applied to

punishment, this means that the punishment should fit the crime that the evil

inflicted upon the condemned criminal should be in proportion to the degree of

harm he has done (“Death Penalty: Moral and”, 2012).

When a society fails to punish criminals in a way thought to be proportionate

to the gravity of the crime, the danger arises that the public would take the law into

its own hands, resulting in vigilante justice, lynch mobs, and private acts of

retribution (Bedau & Cassell, 2005, p. 57). Society is justly ordered when each

person receives what is due to him. Crime disturbs this just order, for the criminal

takes from people their lives, peace, liberties, and worldly goods in order to give
himself undeserved benefits. Deserved punishment protects society morally by

restoring this just order, making the wrongdoer pay a price equivalent to the harm

he has done. (Budziszewski, 2004). In part, capital punishment is an expression

of society's moral outrage at particularly offensive conduct. This function may be

unappealing to many, but it is essential in an ordered society that asks its citizens

to rely on legal processes, rather than self-help, to vindicate their wrongs (Stewart,

1976).

Opponents [of the death penalty] wrongly equate retribution and revenge,

because they both would inflict pain and suffering on those who have inflicted pain

and suffering on us. Whereas revenge knows no bounds, retribution must be

limited, proportional and appropriately directed: The retributive punishment fits the

crime (Blecker, 2014). Such a view of punishment [revenge] as an engine for

victim-directed vengeance is not utilitarian, but neither is it retributive. A retributivist

believes that justice is served by punishing the guilty and thus, the desert of an

offender not only gives the state the right to punish him but also the duty to do so.

Retributive justice is achieved by punishing the guilty even if the victims of such

guilty offenders all wish forgiveness and mercy upon their offenders (Moore, n.d).

Vengeance signifies inflicting harm on the offender out of anger because of what

he has done. Retribution is the rationally supported theory that the criminal

deserves a punishment fitting the gravity of his crime. Retributivism is not based

on hatred for the criminal (though a feeling of vengeance may accompany the

punishment). Retributivism is the theory that the criminal deserves to be punished

and deserves to be punished in proportion to the gravity of his or her crime,

whether or not the victim or anyone else desires it. We may all deeply regret having

to carry out the punishment, but consider it warranted (Pojman, 2004).

It is a crime deterrent.

The deterrence approach looks to punishment techniques to restrain the

wrong-doer from repeatedly indulging in crime and to discourage them from

committing crimes or violating laws. In certain cases, imprisonment may not be

sufficient for the protection of the society. It is reasonably considered necessary to

terminate criminal’s life, even that is done for the purposes of deterrence.

Studies and statistics have shown that death penalty in as affective crime

deterrent. A 2003 study by Emory University researchers of data from more than

3,000 countries from 1977 through 1996 found that each execution, on average,

resulted in 18 fewer murders per country. A 2008 comprehensive review of capital

punishment research since 1975 by Drexel University economist Bijou Yang and

psychologist David Lester of Richard Stockton College of New Jersey concluded

that the majority of studies that track effects over many years and across states or

countries find a deterrent effect (Muhlhausen, 2014).

The death penalty discourages future crimes. Deterrence approach is

based upon the thinking that individuals are rational actors who look out for their

self-interests by ensuring that the benefits will outweigh its costs in indulging

oneself to commit unlawful conducts. They will therefore see whether it will be

beneficial for them to break the law and gain some extra profits. If individuals are

detected and punished with sufficient severity, it would discourage them and also

future offenders from violating laws. If murderers are sentenced to death and be
executed, potential murderers will think twice before violating laws for fear of losing

their own life. In 1973, Isaac Ehrlich employed a new kind of analysis which

produced results showing that for every inmate who was executed, 7 lives were

spared because others were deterred from committing murder and similar results

were produced by Ehrlich’s disciples’ follow-up studies.

Moreover, even if some studies regarding deterrence are inconclusive, that

is only because the death penalty is rarely used and takes years before an

execution is actually carried out (Death Penalty Curricula for High School, 2001).

According to John McAdams of Marquette University’s Department of Political

Science, quotes on deterrence saying, “If we execute murderers and there is in

fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute

murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murderers, we have

allowed the killing of a bunch of innocent victims. I would much risk the former.

This, to me, is not a tough call.”

It is cheap.

In a statement, Aurora Rep. Juan Edgardo Angara said government spends

almost ₱64,000 a year feeding, guarding and housing one prisoner (Abs-Cbn

News, 2011). However, in an interview with Ralph Recto last 2016, he said that

the yearly budget per prisoner is ₱74,000. In addition, to house, feed, and guard

the prisoners, the government will spend almost ₱10.1B for the year. This will go

up to ₱13.4B on 2017 as government braces for a prison population boom resulting

from its anti-drug campaign (Senate of the Philippines, 2016). Thus, the cost of

imprisonment or parole for every prisoner increased by 15.6% within five years.
This increase, however, is not conclusive. On 2020, the Philippines will have a

3.8% inflation rate as forecasted (Trading Economics, 2017). Therefore, from

₱74,000, the cost will rise to ₱76,812 by 2020.

Executions do not have to cost that much. The state could hang convicts

and re-use the rope or use firing squads and ask for volunteer firing squad

members who would provide their own guns and ammunition (Clem,

2002). Nearing the possible reinstitution of capital punishment, senators are

debating on what method to use for the punishment. In a Congressional meeting,

Sotto said “Meron nagsasabi na death by hanging, meron nagsasabi firing squad,

meron nagsasabi lethal injection, naintindihan ko po ginagawa nila. Hanging nga

pinakamatipid sa kanila e, firing squad ang matipid ng onti, ang mahal lethal

injection at electric chair," (Elemia, 2016). While officials are now giving their

opinion on the preferred method, Alvarez said that lawmakers should not make a

big deal of how a death convict should be killed, whether through hanging or firing

squad or lethal injection. Alvarez’s preference was for low cost method to save on

government resources (Cabacugan, 2016).

In the Philippines, inmates pay for their crimes in many ways. Cash-rich

convicts buy deluxe cells with fans, televisions, and stereos. Editha Matignas, 56,

president of the Families of Death Row Inmates, has gone into debt to pay for her

son Jemriech’s trial and to keep him comfortable inside. His cell costs ₱3400, plus

₱16250 for the remodeling. So far she has spent over ₱150,000 legal fees

(Nowanko, 2011). Instead of paying this amount to house murderers, money could

be directed to charitable purposes. Life sentences, the frequently advocated

alternative to the death penalty, impose an unreasonable burden on society to

feed, house, clothes, and care for murdered. Money might be better be spent on

schools, health care, and improving the environment. It might provide some

genuine benefits to society. It might be used for crime prevention, rather than for

prolonging the life of a murderer who, given the opportunity, might well kill again.

(Gottfried, 2002).) Also, the ₱74,000 yearly budget per prisoner may be used to

finance scholars (Senate, 2016).

 CHAPTER III

OPPOSING VIEWS AND REFUTATIONS

Innocent people may be executed.

Opponents of capital punishment pose that it is better that ten guilty persons

escape than one innocent suffer. They believe that innocent people are too often

executed. They believe that the justice system which condemns human beings to

death is so flawed that the execution is inevitable. However, they are wrong.

According to Antonin Scalia, JD, Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court,

capital cases are given especially close scrutiny at every level, which is why in

most cases many years elapse before the sentence is executed. Also, capital

cases receive special attention in the application of executive clemency.

It is immoral.

It [capital punishment] is immoral in principle, and unfair and discriminatory

in practice. No one deserves to die. When the government metes out vengeance

disguised as justice, it becomes complicit with killers in devaluing human life and

human dignity (ACLU, 2007). However, Alex Kozinski, JD, a judge of the United

States Court of Appeals, said in an interview with Hoover Institution that,

"Immanuel Kant said it best. He said a society that is not willing to demand a life

of somebody who has taken somebody else's life is simply immoral. So the

question really... when the system works and when you manage to identify

somebody who has done such heinous evil, do we as a society have a right to take

his life? I think the answer's plainly yes. And I would go with Kant and I would say

it is immoral for us not to (Kozinski, 2002).

 CHAPTER IV

CONCLUSION

Death penalty can be a useful tool in the economy in view of the crime rates.

If closely examined, death penalty is an asset to the society; it serves retribution,

deters crimes, and is cheaper. It is imperative that death penalty should be

reintroduced in the Philippines.

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