Abstract:
This study is survey research on the attitude of officers in the course of justice
toward capital punishment: lethal injection. The samplings comprised of 200 people in
total, who are representatives of the police officers, the lawyers, the public
prosecutors, the judges and the officers of Department of Corrections. The researcher
collected data by using the questionnaires and test with the sampling groups from
December, 2005 to January, 2006. Then the questionnaires were analyzed by statistics
method of t-test and one-way analysis of variance.
In the study, the researcher found out that the means value of attitude of
officers in the course of justice toward lethal injection penalty equalled 3.1 and which
was fail in an agreement level. The factors related to the lethal injection penalty - age,
occupation, marital status, and number of children was at the statistical significance
level of 0.05. It was also found that the female officers, the married officers and the
officers with children would like the lethal injection penalty to be used. Regarding the
factor of occupation, more police officers and the officers of Department of
Corrections would like the lethal injection penalty to be used than the lawyers.
From this research, the suggestions are that the Department of Corrections
should receive safety and morality training on the capital punishment process and
should also publicize the academic and practical facts on this process. Also, there
should be virtual agreements for the supporters and the opponents of capital
punishment. Moreover, the officers in the course of justice should update the
information and ethically practice their duty.