The Death penalty and mentally ill people it is a problem

The death penalty has been around ever since a king/queen would order
his/her guards to kill someone that either they didnt like or just did something that
they didnt like. Of course the death penalty has evolved from just ordering guards
to kill someone. It is now only using lethal injection, hanging, gas chamber,
waterboarding, and electrocution. Ever since 1976, 1,407 people have been
executed in the US and some of those people were mentally ill. Since 1998, 283,000
mentally ill individuals have been incarcerated in the US. Honestly the mentally ill
people being incarcerated isnt the problem the problem is mentally challenged
people are actually being executed even though there have been court rulings that
are supposed to prevent this from happening. One of these court cases is Ford v.
Mainwright (1986) and the ruling for that court case says that the execution of
someone who doesnt understand why they are being executed violates the US
constitution. This court case was one of the first court cases that was actually about
executing the mentally ill. However one of the most important court cases was
Atkins v. Virginia (2002). The ruling for this court case overturned the ruling of the
court case Penry v. Lynaugh (1989). The Penry v. Lynaugh case ruled that it was not
a violation of the eight amendment to execute a mentally challenged individual.
Then the Atkins v. Virginia court case simply overturned that ruling and ruled that it
is indeed a violation of the eighth amendment to execute a mentally challenged
individual. Over the years as more and more mentally challenged individuals have
been executed in the US more people have started to question is it right to execute
people who are mentally challenged. It has created the idea that maybe people who
are mentally challenged shouldnt be executed but an alternative sentence should
be used, or the individual should be sent to a mental institution. This is the reason

that I chose this line of inquiry. I personally am all for the death penalty, I feel that if
a person were to murder another person then that person should be executed or
serve life in prison. However I do feel that there should be certain exceptions to that
and one of those exceptions I feel should be mentally challenged individuals that
dont know what they are doing or are suffering from a mental disorder that causes
them to not be able to control themselves. That is just my way of thinking and those
are the reasons that I chose the death penalty and the insanity defense as my line
of inquiry.