Sentenced to Die: Capital Punishment and the Eighth Amendment, 2nd Ed.

Throughout much of American history, the death penalty has been a subject of debate, with critics complaining that it's most often administered to the poor and minorities, while also pointing out that the U.S. Constitution prohibits "cruel and unusual punishment" (the document declines to define those punishments--though firing squads and hanging, once common, are now rejected as barbaric). In the early '70s, the U.S. Supreme Court imposed a moratorium on executions, declaring that the death penalty had been "wantonly and freakishly imposed" from state to state, and carried out in an "arbitrary and capricious" manner, penalizing those who could least afford quality legal defense. After some state reforms, the court lifted the moratorium and executions resumed, but the controversy still rages. Sentenced to Die presents the death penalty from the perspective of criminal and victim, prosecutors and defenders, helpfully defining points such as aggravating or mitigating circumstances along the way. Unfortunately, the video loses focus when it shifts to two very different "death row" case studies, involving a serial rapist/murderer named Steven Oken, and a framed and convicted black janitor named Clarence Brandley (who was freed after almost a decade in prison). What the point or connection between these two cases might be is never explained. Ultimately failing to provide insight into one of today's most complex, emotional issues, Sentenced to Die is not a necessary purchase. [Note: this is a "second edition" of a program originally reviewed in VL-5/96, in which the first reviewer came to the same conclusion and recommendation.] Aud: H, C, P. (S. Rees)