The "death penalty", and indeed "the guillotine", should have been equally acceptable as answers to this question.
The guillotine was used for judicial executions in France right up to the abolition of capital punishment. It was last used on 10 September 1977; the victim was Hamida Djandoubi, a 27–year–old Tunisian agricultural worker who had moved to Marseille in 1968. He was convicted of kidnapping, raping, torturing and murdering his former girlfriend, 22–year–old Élisabeth Bousquet. He based his defence on the supposed effects of the amputation of his leg six years earlier, following a workplace accident. His lawyer claimed that this had driven him to a paroxysm of alcohol abuse and violence, turning him into a different man.
Djandoubi was the last person to be executed in Western Europe.
In an ideal world, not only would people like Hamida Djandoubi not exist, but the setters of quiz questions would consider what alternative answers people might give to their questions; and question askers would be prepared to accept answers other than the exact one on the card, when appropriate.
© Macclesfield Quiz League 2018