Эксперт по сдаче вступительных испытаний в ВУЗах
UNIT 2 CAPITAL PUNISHMENT
Vocabulary
Exercise 1. Translate the following word combinations into English.
Смертный приговор/смертная казнь/высшая мера наказания
Вынести смертный приговор
Отменить смертную казнь
Находится в камере смертников
Привести смертный приговор в исполнение
Exercise 2. Answer the following questions.
1. What do you know about the practice of capital punishment in ancient times?
Was it widespread?
2. What crimes, in your opinion, were punished with death penalty in Middle
Ages?
3. When did the idea of the abolition of capital punishment appear? Why?
4. What are the ways of carrying out executions in modern societies?
5. Is capital punishment used nowadays?
Exercise 3. Read and translate the text.
Capital punishment is a legal killing of the criminal who is sentenced to
death. It is a punishment for grave offences, such as murder, rape, treason and
others. Criminals are put to death through shooting, hanging, poisoning and other
means of execution. Some people support capital punishment, others are against it.
Those who are against capital punishment say that it is not more effective than life
imprisonment. They also say that suspension of capital punishment does not affect
the crime rate. One more argument of the opponents of capital punishment is that
sometimes people are sentenced and killed wrongly. For example, innocent people
are tried and sentenced to death for the crimes committed by serial murderers.
People who are accused wrongly are often executed before the real murderers are
found. Yet, the number of the defendants of capital punishment is growing. They
believe that capital punishment can prevent a murderer from committing a crime.
Crime is on the rise in large cities, and people are in need of effective means of
crime prevention. So, debates about capital punishment are still going on.
In England, capital punishment was abolished in the XX century. In Russia,
it was suspended in 1993. There is no capital punishment in Europe, but it is
practiced in most states of America. The death penalty was suspended in the USA
in 1972, but it was resumed in 1976. Less than a half of the countries in the world
practice capital punishment. Yet, only 30% of the population lives in countries free
of capital punishment. The death penalty is used mainly in Asian and Eastern
countries. The leaders are China, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, but the USA is also
among the first 5 countries of the world as to the annual number of executions.
Two thirds of all American death sentences are executed in the state of Texas.
Exercise 4. Write a composition on either supporting or opposing to the death
penalty.
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