More than 3,700 men and women were serving death sentences in American prisons on January 1, 2001, according to the U.S. Dept of Justice. Many of these people have been on death row for decades, waiting as their cases work their way through the appeals process. Some will die before ever having to face the execution chamber. Between 1977 and 1982, the years immediately following the reinstatement of the death penalty, there were a total of two executions. In 1999, …showed first 75 words of 1860 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1860 total…crimes. In the 18th Century BC, the Code of King Hammurabi of Babylon codified the death penalty for 25 different crimes, although murder was not one of them. The first death sentence recorded occurred in 16th Century BC Egypt where, a member of nobility, was accused of magic, and ordered to take his own life. Non-nobility was usually killed with an ax. In America lethal injection is becoming the most commonly used form of capital punishment