Do No Evil – Perspectives of the death penalty and wrongful convictions remain a perplexing issue in America. Here are three videos that offer a closer look at the current policies. Included in the article is a poll; cast your vote.
"In our understandable desire to be fair and to protect the rights of offenders in our criminal justice system, let us never ignore or minimize the rights of their victims. The death penalty is a necessary tool that reaffirms the sanctity of human life while assuring that convicted killers will never again prey upon others."
Ventura County's former District Attorney, Michael D. Bradbury
I don't agree with Bradbury, but it his view is widely held.
I don't agree with it either. I could never understand how killing an additional person "reaffirms the sanctity of human life." If anything, it reaffirms that human life is not sacred.
There is no doubt that society must be protected but, in my view, it is sufficiently protected if the penalty is life in prison.
I wonder how many prisoners were sent to their death, knowing they were innocent over the last 50 years and beyond ... it would have to be 100's ... can't even imagine the frustration and fear.
rinty
A haunting reality, to say the least. Our nation is still in the dark ages, when it comes to capitol punishment.
Maybe DNA testing will prevent most unfortunates from facing the spectre of wrongful imprisonment and execution.
In those cases where there is DNA evidence.
I would certainly like to see some concrete statistics to back up that assertion of yours. DNA evidence is, at present, not infallible, but it is far better than anything we had previously with far fewer mistakes being made with each passing year.
Short of some form of actual mind verification - unlikely anytime soon - we have to work with the tools we currently have.
What did you think about those videos?
I thought they were poweful.
I just stared at my screen for a minute after the third video. Very powerful indeed... At the very least there should be a moratorium on executions. Something's not working.
That's exactly what moved me to post this story.
(Btw: don't forget to take the poll on the same webpage...)
I wonder how many proponents of the death penalty would still hold their position if they personally performed the execution.
I am sure most if not all proponents for the death penalty would hold their position if they got to personally execute the punishment for the murderers that impacted their lives. I for one even have suggestions on how I should be given that opportunity. Instead the scum lawyers have massaged the system which continue to let this individual breathe for the decade and half so far.
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"There are no millionaires on death row nor will there ever be. Almost everyone on death row is poor. And do you really think that no millionaire ever committed a capital crime? I'm saying that there are certain people that we are willing to offer up, and not others, and they're the people who have no power."
Thomas Cahill
Only the poor and disadvantaged are convicted of crimes that they are innocent of; only the poor and disadvanted receive the death penalty. And who ever appeals the death of a convicted murderer wrongfully charged?
Well Spade a sad and true fact of our sys of justice is that the more money you have the more justice you get in your favor.
Grrrr my last comment on this wasn't posted, sorry if you end up with a double post here. Anyway what I said in the one I'm not seeing here is a sort of philosophical question, of sorts. Are we more right now to have it possible, if not likely, for a wealthy person to be convicted? Or were we more right when we were honest and just had the rich person pay a restitution to the poor person, which I believe was allowed in Hammurabi's Code? Just something to sort of think on.
I think we would be most right if we applied the justice system equally to rich and poor alike.
What is the proper restitution for the murder of a child?
Yes, your correct. There is no restitution for that, but at least then we were honest that if you were rich you'd get off scot-free really. Now its possible, just not likely while the justice system still promises equal justice. At least then it was honest, if wrong in the law. Now its right in the law but dishonest in how its applied.
It depends on which state it is in and also depends on if there were heinous acts or not
SC - I have to admit to mixed emotions when it comes to the death penalty. As purportedly a civilized human being I am against the taking of life yet from personal experience there are times and situations when I am completely in favor of it.
More than a score of years ago the sister of my best friend was brutally attacked and raped leaving her severely brain damaged and totally unable to to do the most basic of acts for herself. Now I had watched this beautiful young girl(she was 22 when attacked) grow up from birth and thought of her as another sister. I watched this wonderful girl, so bright and full of life slowly erode away until she died and the promise of her life go with her. The thug that committed the act was caught and sent to prison for 15 years and ended up getting paroled after 6 for "good behavior" even though my friend and I and a clinical psychiatrist testified against his being released. He was back on the street less than 2 months when he...
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attacked and brutally beat up another young girl. Unfortunately for her she died of her injuries. There was never any doubt of this individuals guilt as the evidence, including bite impressions, made it very clear that he was the one responsible. He was sentenced to death and after 14 years of legal maneuvering his final appeal was rejected. 5 years ago I sat with my best friend and watched as this individual was executed and I can honestly tell you that to this day I feel absolutely no remorse over it!
Yes there are some currently on death row that are likely innocent and I can only hope that eventually justice will prevail, but there are ten times more that deserve nothing more than a bullet between the eyes for there is absolutely no doubt of their guilt!
For those that say the death penalty is wrong I say that you are the one that is wrong for the only way to deal with a rabid animal is to kill it - there is no "cure!"
You raise a few interesting questions. You say: There is no cure. True, but recidivism is very low among murderers. I don't claim that they should be let loose, but keeping them in prison is probably sufficient. However, as far as I know, recidivism is very high among sexual predators, and they are more likely to kill eventually. Still, they cannot be executed for their crimes because society doesn't find them as serious and they are often released quickly.
Another thing that has always puzzled me is that the punishment is so closely linked to the actual outcome, even when it's accidental. If the victim dies as a result of the attack, then it's murder and may result in capital punishment. However, if the doctors save the victim through some miracle, then the crime is likely to be downgraded to assault resulting in a less severe sentence, even though the intent and the actions of the attacker might have been the same.
The serial killer has no right to life.
Odd that the comments here are along the line that the convicted has no right to life or deserves to die. This same rationalization was used by murderer when he committed his crime. Murderers in their own mind are not doing anything wrong, just giving the victim what he deserves. So how are you any different?
Furthermore, the death penalty is not a deterrent. The states with a death penalty have higher murder rates than those without it and countries without a death penalty have lower murder rates than those with it.
Your posted rationalization is ridiculous in a multiple of ways. The obvious one being that the individual that committed the murder does it based on what he/she has determined as a valid reason, the death penalty handed down by a jury of peers follows societies observation that this individual has perpetrated a crime against humanity and therefore has forfeited the right to live. Serial murderers who target individual and commit repeated murders are a whole other subject.
Removing the Death Penalty is total BS. The discussion should be how to fix the criminal system so that innocent people are not made to face the harshest penalties that the guilty should in fact face because of their heinous act. Abolishing the death penalty because innocents may die is the unethical (and lazy) persons response to try and make themselves feel better. How ethical is it to lock up an innocent person for the rest of their lives?
The 12 people on the jury (they could hardly be called peers) are all in favor of the death penalty. All perspective jurors opposed to the death penalty are always dismissed. The fact this biased jury feels the defendant has forfeited his right to life is still little better than the murderer deciding his victim has forfeited his right to life.
Our own Declaration of Independence calls the right to life "inalienable" meaning it can't be taken away.
Why if the death penalty is not a deterrent, why if states who have the death penalty have higher murder rates than those who don't, why do you still support it?
Our own Declaration of Independence calls the right to life "inalienable" meaning it can't be taken away.
A murderer has just taken that "inalienable" right to life ay from someone in an act of aggression and has therefore forfeited his Declraration of Independence. In other words the Death Penalty is in accordance with the Declaration of Independence.
The Declaration of Independence is not a body of law, it's a political treatise.
still looking for those stats to back that up.
Any statistics measuring the effectiveness of the Death Penalty are false. Since in the US, the death penalty is practiced in such rare cases that those on death penalty will continue to live well into their old age and die of that before the die as an affect of their punishment. Th penalty system is screwed in the US, that is worthy of discussion on how to fix it so it is applied evenly across all socio economic statuses and with standards for evidence that keep the innocent incarcerated from facing unfair punishments. Abolishing the death penalty though is amongst the dumbest, inhumane, unkind, thoughtless things that have ever been expressed.
thats why I asked for stats. gun control advocates always try to say that taking away our guns will reduce crime too. They claim to have proof but never actually produce it.
There are lots of sites with statistics. But NotVulgarName must already know that because he's already starting the spin. Even if what he says is true, it doesn't explain why non-death penalty states still have a lower murder rate.
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?sci...
http://www.religioustolerance.org/execut4.htm
http://davecoop.net/rate.htm
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/...
http://canadaonline.about.com/od/crime/a/abolit...
http://www.uvm.edu/~vlrs/doc/deathpenalty.htm
http://www.amnestyusa.org/Fact_Sheets/The_Death...
You assume it is spin on my part. It has nothing to do with spin. I believe in justice for the victims and the victims families far more than empathy for the criminals. I don't believe any of the spun statistics that you would/could present. One statistic I can share with you is: A prisoner executed for murder will never get out and murder another person again - 100% guaranteed and end of story.
You can go on with your lack of respect for the life of the victim and the unending pain of the victim's family. It is obvious where your sympathies lie.
I'd love you to show statistics for those claims.
Exactly how many people did not commit murder last year because they feared the death penalty?
Can't really answer that question since they actually did not commit murder and they are unlikely to tell you that they were thinking of it but stopped because they feared the death penalty.
So to say it is not a deterrant is not actually stating anything that can be proven.
Murder rate/1000 inhabitant of states that have death penalty. Do you see a pattern?
#3 Louisiana: 0.099
#4 Maryland: 0.099
#5 Nevada: 0.085
#6 Alabama: 0.082
#7 Arizona: 0.075
#8 South Carolina: 0.074
#9 New Mexico: 0.074
#10 Mississippi: 0.073
#11 Tennessee: 0.072
#12 California: 0.069
#13 Missouri: 0.069
#14 Arkansas: 0.067
#15 North Carolina: 0.067
#16 Texas: 0.062
#17 Georgia: 0.062
#19 Pennsylvania: 0.061
#20 Virginia: 0.061
#21 Illinois: 0.06
#22 Indiana: 0.057
#23 Oklahoma: 0.053
#24 Ohio: 0.051
#25 Florida: 0.05
#26 New Jersey: 0.048
#28 Kentucky: 0.046
#29 New York: 0.045
#31 Delaware: 0.044
#32 Colorado: 0.037
#33 Kansas: 0.037
#35 Washington: 0.033
#37 Connecticut: 0.029
#38 Wyoming: 0.027
#40 Nebraska: 0.025
#41 Idaho: 0.024
#42 Utah: 0.023
#44 Oregon: 0.022
#47 Montana: 0.019
#48 New Hampshire: 0.014
#52 North Dakota: 0.011
Murder rate/1000 inhabitants in states that do not have death penalty.
#1 DC: 0.354
#2 Puerto Rico: 0.196
#18 Michigan: 0.061
#27 Alaska: 0.048
#30 West Virginia: 0.044
#34 Wisconsin: 0.035
#36 Rhode Island: 0.032
#39 Massachusetts: 0.027
#43 South Dakota: 0.023
#45 Minnesota: 0.022
#46 Hawaii: 0.019
#49 Maine: 0.014
#50 Iowa: 0.013
#51 Vermont: 0.013
DEFINITION: Murder and nonnegligent manslaughter total cases (2005) Per capita figures expressed per 1,000 population.
SOURCE: FBI: Crime in the United States, 2005 http://www.statemaster.com/graph/cri_mur_and_no...
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If the death penalty served as a strong deterrent, then the states that allow it should have low murder rates. This is not the case. With the exception of DC and Puerto Rico, the states that do not have death penalty tend to be in the lower end of list. Based on this, it seems that the death penalty is not a deterrent.
How can the death penalty be a strong deterrent when those that commit crimes that warrant it know that it will be years, if not decades, to live before any death sentence is carried out?
Sure there are stories about how those who have been wrongly accused are later found to be innocent, but how many of those executed have actually been shown to have been innocent after the fact?
What are the actual figures when compared to those who are, in fact, actually guilty and do we, as a society continue to simply warehouse those that are guilty.
The US ranks as #1 in the world with nearly 1 in every 138 or 714 per 100,000 Americans are behind bars and that number continues to increase.
http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/rel/icps/world-pris...
namecritic: still looking for those stats to back that up.
NotVulgarName: Any statistics measuring the effectiveness of the Death Penalty are false.
So we provided the stats, not from just one source but from many. NotVulgarName has obviously buried his head in the sand and won't look at anything that doesn't support his beliefs. Both he and JohnQPublic claim that the reason the death penalty isn't effective is that not enough murderers are executed yet are unable to explain why non-death penalty states have lower murder rates. JohnQPublic seems to be more interested in revenge than justice as is NotVulgarName by saying that "Abolishing the death penalty because innocents may die is the unethical (and lazy) persons response to try and make themselves feel better."
namecritic in contrast, is willing to listen to reason and now that the statistics that he or she asked for have been presented, no doubt has changed his or her mind.
I really don't need stats to tell me what is wrong or right. I have been taught the sanctity of life, what respect it deserves. If a murderer takes it away, he/she deserves nothing more than to lose his life at a minimum. Fortunately for murderers I do not believe in an Eye for an Eye or I would be a proponent of putting the murderer to death in the same fashion as the act they performed. As much as my emotional/gut response would like to see that implemented, I know that is not reasonable as human behavior.
From my perspective, it is the likes of opponents of the death penalty that their heads buried in the sand for one of several reasons:
They are short sighted and unkind, and empathetic to the murderers because they have someone in their family/circle who is likely to become one and they do not want that person to end up being executed.
They themselves have some sociopath tendencies and would not want to see the death penalty to continue in case they get caught.
JohnQPublic: "Sure there are stories about how those who have been wrongly accused are later found to be innocent"
So how many innocents are you willing to execute to make sure that you get the guilty ones as well?
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"The US ranks as #1 in the world with nearly 1 in every 138 or 714 per 100,000 Americans are behind bars"
Have you ever checked how many of them are drug and poverty related? Perhaps there are better ways of dealing with crime than locking people up. There is a short movie on the Sicko DVD about Norway. They have a completely different approach; it's worth checking out.
There is not a one to one relationship just using these stats. There are other factors why some states have varying rates. You can't claim it disproves the deterrent factor. The rate could be higher if they didn't have it and there is no way to determine it. One thing is for sure the person executed will never commit another crime.
I agree with most of what you said John, but killing is wrong regardless of who does it and when the states kill and it says they are doing it for the people well then that drags all of us into it. I dont want no one killing in my name.
ps - I would not hesitate for a single second to pull out my pistol in defense of myself, my family, or my home and do whatever was necessary to protect us up to and including pulling the trigger and taking another life. I might feel some remorse for doing so, but again I would not hesitate!
I understand JQP your ambivalence about this perplexing issue. However this remark concerns me:
"Yes there are some currently on death row that are likely innocent and I can only hope that eventually justice will prevail, but there are ten times more that deserve nothing more than a bullet between the eyes for there is absolutely no doubt of their guilt!"
How many executions of innoncent victims warrants the "justifiable" execution of guilty ones? Those that may be found innocent of their crimes, were believed beyond a reaonable doubt to be guilty. So how many executions of the innocent should be allowed so that the execution of the guilty is not deterred?
It is fairly well established that even when the death sentence is handed down that an individual may live another 15 to 20 years before the actual execution takes place. Yes there was a time when some who were innocent were - for lack of a better term - railroaded, but with the advancements in criminal science today those occasions are becoming increasingly rare. Most, if not all, of the more recent cases where those that are truly innocent were wrongly sentenced are from years ago and those that prepare the cases today make damned sure that every "i" is dotted and "t" is crossed before they are even presented.
I have no sympathy for the serial killer or the mass murderer and believe that they forfeited any right to continued existence when they committed the crime.
in california more prisoners die of natural causes and old age on death row than those that get executed.
Hi spadecaller.
My opinion on the death penalty is simply if the people of that state vote to have the death penalty then they should have it.
If the voters say they do not want it, they should not have it.
But the voters of each state should make the decision.
That's democracy.
Our justice system favors the people who can hire the best lawyers. It should not be that way, but it is.
Maybe that should be a factor in whether or not a person votes for or against the death penalty.
If you would not personally go kill that person on death row, then you likely should be against the death penalty altogether. Having someone else do what you would not personally do is just hypocritical.