 The laws also set out crimes and their associated punishment . There were several crimes that carried the death penalty : treason , murder , witchcraft , arson , sodomy , rape , bestiality , adultery , and cursing or smiting one 's parents . The actual exercise of the death penalty was fairly rare ; only one sex @-@ related crime resulted in execution , a 1642 incidence of bestiality by Thomas Granger . Edward Bumpus was sentenced to death for " striking and abusing his parents " in 1679 , but his sentence was commuted to a severe whipping by reason of insanity . Perhaps the most notable use of the death penalty was in the execution of the Native Americans convicted of the murder of John Sassamon ; this helped lead to King Philip 's War . Though nominally a capital crime , adultery was usually dealt with by public humiliation only . Convicted adulterers were often forced to wear the letters " A.D. " sewn into their garments , much in the manner of Hester Prynne in Nathaniel Hawthorne 's novel The Scarlet Letter . 
