Is the death penalty discriminatory?In the US the race of the...

Is the death penalty discriminatory?

In the US the race of the person to be executed can also affect the likelihood that they receive a death sentence. Death-penalty proponents counter this by pointing out that most murders where the killer and victim are of the same race tend to be "crimes of passion" while inter-racial murders are usually "felony murders"; that is, murders which were perpetrated during the commission of some other felony (most commonly either armed robbery or forcible rape), the point being that juries are more likely to impose the death penalty in cases where the offender has killed a total stranger than in those where some deep-seated, personal revenge motive may be present. A recent study showed that just 44% of Black Americans support the death penalty.