Across the United States of America, police officers are unfortunately, due to lack of funding, being fired, prisoners are being released, court systems are being bombarded with cases and the overall crime rate in this country continues to climb higher and higher despite our efforts to reduce it. Since the 2008 economic crisis that led to our nation's recession, the criminal justice system has been forced to cut to the foundation. Many U.S. states have been forced to release large numbers of their prisoners prematurely due to a lack of funding. For example, the state of Florida released more than 2,500 of its inmates due to budget crises caused by the recession. The state of Texas allows convicted felons to serve less than fifty percent of their sentence because it simply cannot afford to keep them behind bars any longer. These same states invest millions of dollars each year in the death penalty. It has been shown in many cases that the cost of a death penalty case is much higher than that of a life without parole case. One such case came from a study in Colorado that concluded that a capital case requires on average one hundred and twenty-three days more than a life without parole case. (Marceau, 2013) This case also showed that it takes about two days to select a jury for a life without parole case, while it takes about 30 days to select a jury for a capital case. In total, the procedure for a life without parole case takes about days, while the procedure for a capital case takes almost 4 years. Since 1978, the State of California alone has spent nearly four billion dollars to pursue paper cases......and thus support the justice system of the United States of America. In conclusion, the death penalty is too costly and time consuming to effectively prevent the general public from committing murder and other associated acts of violence. Works Cited Capital Punishment. (nd). Collins English Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 10th Edition. Retrieved October 29, 2013, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/capital punishmentJ. Marceau and H. Whitson, “The Cost of the Death Penalty in Colorado,” 3 Univ. of Denver Criminal Law Review 145 (2013)).Murder. (nd). Online etymology dictionary. Retrieved October 29, 2013, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/murderState of California. California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Death penalty. CA.gov. October 28. 2013