2015年12月第2套 短文 第3题

Questions 23 to 25 are based on the passage you have just heard.
23.A ) It is practiced in most of the states.
B ) It will be abolished sooner or later.
C ) It has drawn a lot of criticism from overseas.
D ) It has to be approved by the Supreme Court.
24.A ) Whether the practice should be allowed to continue in future.
B ) Whether there should be a minimum age limit for execution.
C ) What type of criminals should receive it.
D ) What effect it might have on youngsters.
25.A ) The court sentenced him to life in prison for killing two friends.
B ) The governor changed his death sentence to life in prison.
C ) He was the minor to be executed in South Carolina.
D ) He was sentenced to death for a crime he committed as a minor.

听力文本：

In the United States, 36 states currently allow capital punishment （死刑）for serious crimes such as murder. Americans have always argued about the death penalty. Today, there is a serious question about this issue: Should there be a minimum age limit for executing criminals? In other words, is it right for convicted murderers who kill when they are minors—that is, under the age of 18—to receive the death penalty?
In most other countries of the world, there is no capital punishment for minors. In the United States though, each state makes its own decision. Of the 36 states that allow the death penalty, 30 permit the execution of minors.
In the state of South Carolina, a convicted murderer was given the death penalty for a crime he committed while he was a minor. In 1977, when he was 17 years old, James Terry Roach and two friends cruelly murdered three people. Roach's lawyer fought the decision to execute him. The young murderer remained on Death Row for ten years while his lawyer appealed to the governor. The lawyer argued that it is wrong to execute a person for a crime he committed while he was a minor. In the United States, the governor of a state has the power to change a sentence from the death penalty to life in prison. Nonetheless, the governor of South Carolina refused to stop the execution. Roach was finally executed in 1986.

参考答案：
23-25 A B D