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Since 1976, when capital punishment was reinstated, eighty-seven men and women have been taken off death row and freed because they were proven innocent. Since the turn of the century, 343 people have been wrongly convicted. Of these, 137 were sentenced to death, twenty-five were actually executed, sixty-one served more than ten years in jail, and seven died while in prison (Rein et al. 77). These figures raise the question: how many innocent people are on death row right …

…this protection against the execution of innocent people. Currently, guilt must be proven beyond a reasonable double to warrant the death sentence in capital cases. When the matter is life or death, a change must be made so that a defendant must be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt in order to justify a death sentence above life imprisonment and to avoid the murder of the innocent at the hands of the capital system.