# I didn't know them but I'm still shaken **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 9, 2006, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228 "2006-01-09T22:50:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Cerri](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3bc359/32.png) [@Cerri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cerri)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/41 "2006-01-10T13:32:49Z")
> [@Starving Artist](#): > > Mmmm…revenge! > > But seriously, I understand your point but I don’t happen to believe that a very large percentage of murders is committed by people who can’t help themselves. Certainly, the DP isn’t a one hundred percent deterrant, but neither are traffic tickets and think what the roads would be like without them. The cites I’ve listed, that show _actual crime statistics_ versus you know, personal anecdotes based on a handful of murders you heard about as a young man, show that it’s nothing like a 100% deterrent. The stats in general show either a negligible difference or _just the opposite_, depending on whose study you’re looking at. Did you even bother _looking_ at the information I posted? Have you bothered to look at correlations between FBI and Vital Statistic Departments’ compiled murder statistics in DP vs. non-DP states? The data I’ve seen doesn’t support your theory of deterrence at _all_. Here, I’ll even give you another cite so you don’t have to scroll up. [http://www.msccsp.org/publications/death.html](http://www.msccsp.org/publications/death.html) > [@](#): > > Much of the current recent research suggests that the death penalty does not have a significant deterrent effect. One study by Sorenson and Wrinkle (1999) in Texas speculated that, if a deterrent effect did exist, it would be found in Texas because of the extreme numbers of death sentences and executions within the state. They not only found that there was no deterrent effect but that number of executions was unrelated to murder rates and felony rates as well. Another study by William Bailey (1998) in Oklahoma also found no deterrent effect; however, he did find that there was a significant increase in stranger killings and non-felony killings after Oklahoma resumed executions. > Moreover, Bailey conducted studies of several states, including Ohio, Oregon, North Carolina, and California and found no deterrent effect (Bailey, 1978, 1979, 1979, 1979). A study by Decker and Kohfeld (1990) used a 50-year time series from 1930–1980 to assess the effect of executions on murder rates in North Carolina, California, Texas, New York, and Georgia. Essentially, they found no deterrent effect in their analysis. > > -snip- > > In California, instead of finding support evidence of a deterrent effect, Robert Harris found support for the brutalization effect (Harris, 1999). The brutalization effect suggests that executions increase crime rather than act as a deterrent. Harris found slight increases in homicides during the eight months following the execution. Another study, entitled The Capital Punishment Quagmire in America, examined differences in homicides and violent crime in 293 pairs of counties. They found no deterrent effect and higher violent crime rates in death penalty counties (Harries & Cheatwood, 1997). > > A study by Radelet and Akers (1996) surveyed America’s criminologists and discovered that most (87.5%) believe that the death penalty does, and can do, very little to reduce rates of criminal violence. In addition, they cited a survey by Peter D. Hart Associates, which found little support (26%) for the deterrence argument out of a random sample of police chiefs and county sheriffs throughout the Unites States. Even Erlich’s studies, which are often used by pro-DP people to cite a deterrent effect doesn’t really show a strong correlation. From the same cite I just listed: > [@](#): > > An earlier study by Issac Ehrlich (1975) has played an important role in the public debate on the death penalty. Before this, most of the work on death penalty and deterrence was conducted by Thomas Sellin. In one particular study, Sellin examined groups of contiguous states, each group containing one state with capital punsishment (“retentionist”) and one state without (“abolitionist”). His conclusion was that executions have no discernible effect on homicide death rates (McGahey, 1996). However, using an econometric technique to examine murder and execution rates in the U.S. from 1933-1969, Ehrlich found that capital punishment did in fact have a deterrent effect. He concluded that for each execution there was a deterrence of 7 to 8 murders (McGahey, 1996). This study received immediately criticisms from other criminologists. Passell and Taylor replicated the study and found when the period from 1963-1969 was excluded, the deterrent effect was statistically insignificant (McGahey, 1996). Bowers and Pierce found similar results and also questioned Erhlich’s use of FBI rather than Vital Statistics data (McGahey, 1996). In 1985, Layson repeated Erhlich’s study, making several improvements, including the use of Vital Statistics data, and confirmed findings of a deterrent effect (Layson, 1985). Finally, work by Brian Forst (1983) suggests that on balance the death penalty does not have a perceptible influence on the homicide rate. > [@](#): > > Most of the murders I’m aware of have been committed in order to acheive some specific goal. Often this goal is nothing more than wanting to leave no witnesses to some otherwise relatively minor crime. **I recall the rash of senseless murders (mostly of convenience store clerks and filling station attendants) that occurred following the outlawing of the death penalty in the early seventies.** One after another of these murders was committed with no more motive than to leave no witnesses to a $50 robbery. In fact, an entire family I knew was wiped out in just such a robbery forty-five minutes after I had stopped at the convenience store where the husband worked. Three lowlife motherfuckers took them into a back room, lined them up and shot them in the head. Forty-five minutes earlier the sweet and slightly overweight wife of the clerk (a quiet, soft-spoken guy who wouldn’t harnm a fly) had been cheerfully showing me the new diet book she’d just bought, while her beautiful, dark-eyed six-year-old son tugged at my pants leg wanting to show me a new toy he’d just gotten. > > These assholes got exactly $50 and were caught within a few days. They were sentenced to life in prison and guess what?..the triggerman escaped after ten or twelve years and has never been recaptured. > > Shortly afterward I was transferred to another town a hundred miles away and I know of at least three other cases where convenience store clerks were killed for the same reason during the first year I was there. > > Of course many murders don’t involve convenience store clerks, but to me this emphasizes the fact that not only does doing away with the death penalty remove a deterrant, it actually encourages murders that wouldn’t have happened > otherwise. Ah. I see. So, in other words, no, you blithely ignored the _actual fucking facts_ I posted, in favor of a handful of personal anecdotes and an appeal to emotion. Boy, you should be in politics. :rolleyes: > [@](#): > > With regard to the assholes referred to in the OP, I’d wager just about any amount that the murders they committed were to cover up some other crime and not because they were in the grip of some homicidal urge they either couldn’t or didn’t have the time to control. > > As I said above, I beleive most murders are committed in relative cold blood by people who have specific, deliberate goals in mind, and IMO it is this type of murder that the death penalty primarily serves as a deterrant to. You _do_ know that a majority of stranger-murders (that is, murders where the victim and perp did not previously know each other) are _not_ prosecuted as pre-meditated murders, correct? That is, quite a large number of them are considered “impulse crimes”…robberies gone wrong, the criminal panicking, etc. Ah, what the fuck, you haven’t bothered with facts yet, why start now? Appeal to emotion and vengeance! Woohoo! I’m executioning like a motherfuck! You _honestly_ think any of these perpetrators are thinking about the consequences of their actions when they commit their crimes? I think you’re livin in a fantasyland, bud. > [@](#): > > I also believe it causes people to recognize and accept (as I did in the fifties and sixties) that murder is the worst crime you can commit, and if you kill someone you will die as a consequence. I’ve never accepted this notion that the death penalty cheapens life. To me, abolition of the death penalty cheapens life as it makes the penalty for killing soneone less severe. How is that realistically supposed to convince would-be killers of the sanctity of life? Do you beat your child to teach him not to hit other children? I ask again, how do you teach people not to kill by killing them? I ask again, have you ever found “do as I say, not as I do” to be an effective teaching tool? Have you ever been in prison? How about a maximum-security prison? You think life in prison is _easy_?! DYING is easy, life in prison is a fuckin’ bitch. I’m all for Truth in Sentencing. Life without parole should mean just that. The only way you leave those bars and walls is in a coffin. But, imo, the Death Penalty is obscene, and has no place in civilized society. I saw the bullshit in “do as I say, not as I do” when I was 5, and I haven’t gotten dumber since then. Of course, these are just anti-DP arguments based on refuting that there is a deterrence rate. You want to try some of the other debates/arguments, we can go that way too. Pick one. The staggering number of overturned capital punishment convictions on appeal? The theory that it’s virtually certain we’ve executed people who did not commit the crimes they were executed for? The inequality of the DP’s application, the racial disparity in capital punishment applications? The sheer scale of incompetence by both lawyers and the courts in a not-insignificant number of DP cases (the defense lawyer who slept through his client’s trial, and the federal judge who decided on appeal that defendent _did not actually have a right to a lawyer who stayed awake through his trial_ being one of the most obscene in my offhand-memory)? The sheer economic cost of execution versus life imprisonment? You want revenge, it’s your right to go ahead and ask for it, I suppose, but don’t dress it up in terms of deterrence, it’s probably cheaper to kill em than keep em locked up, we don’t get these cases wrong, etc. Because the facts aren’t on your side. ---
**Author:** ![Cerri](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3bc359/32.png) [@Cerri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cerri)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/42 "2006-01-10T13:35:47Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Come on, not all lifers are serving without chance of parole. And even a lifer without parole can escape. Convicts on Death Row can escape too. Should we deny them their lawful right to an appeal so we can kill em faster, so there’s no chance they can escape? ---
**Author:** ![light\_strand](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a6a055/32.png) [@light\_strand](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/light_strand)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/43 "2006-01-10T14:26:06Z")
Here’s my suggestion with respect to the death penalty: I think that we (the State) should be able to put to death anyone we determine guilty, however, if it turns out that the person put to death was indeed not guilty, then the prosecutors, the judge, the cops, and the jury should all be convicted murder, and the prosecutor should be given the death penalty. Strictly for deterrent reasons, mind you. I hate all of this “soft on crime’, “soft on criminals” crap that the pro-death lobby throws at the anti-death crowd. I’m not soft on crime; I just don’t think the State should be in the business of vengeance. Let’s just throw some Christians to the lions while we’re at it. We are supposed to be above this barbarism. ---
**Author:** ![SoulFrost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f07891/32.png) [@SoulFrost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SoulFrost)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/44 "2006-01-10T16:11:41Z")
Personally, I am against the Death Penalty. You know why-- all the things listed above. However, in certain rare cases, I think that society needs to kill in revenge. To purge. To balance the books. Monsters who savage little children to death for short-term personal gain should be destroyed. Yes, they are entitled to a fair trial with competant representation. Further, these special cases should be doubly- and even tripley-scrutinized. If their guilt is determined and they are found to have been sane at the time, they should be wiped off the skin of the world. ---
**Author:** ![SoulFrost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f07891/32.png) [@SoulFrost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SoulFrost)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/45 "2006-01-10T16:13:14Z")
Crap. Thought that was the Preview button. Ah well, there it is warts and all. ---
**Author:** ![Duke\_of\_Rat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Duke\_of\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke_of_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/46 "2006-01-10T16:37:48Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > My opposition to the death penalty is based on two factors. One, that we have no way to ensure that we don’t kill innocent people and two, that on a personal level, I think it’s too fucking EASY for them. Why should slime like the guys in the OP be allowed to just get a nice quiet shot in the arm and go to sleep instead of- you know- actually having to SUFFER for a while? > A system which cannot help but kill innocent people cannot be defended as just. That’s the bottom line, motherfuckers. What about people who are wrongly convicted and sent to life in prison without parole? If spending the rest of your life in prison is worse than dying (in your opinion), is this somehow "better’? A system which cannot help but send innocent people to life in prison cannot be defended as just, right? ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/47 "2006-01-10T16:42:15Z")
> [@Duke of Rat](#): > > What about people who are wrongly convicted and sent to life in prison without parole? If spending the rest of your life in prison is worse than dying (in your opinion), is this somehow "better’? > > A system which cannot help but send innocent people to life in prison cannot be defended as just, right? not to speak for **Dio**. but, he failed to put (IMHO) the ‘obvious’ line “w/o ability to correct the action”. a sentence can be corrected (obviously one does not regain the time spent incarcerated, but the person can be freed), but once executed, there is no possability of ‘correcting’ that wrong. (yes, some one can die in prison immediately after being sentenced and not have that available remedy, however, the DP precludes any potential remedy for “oops”) ---
**Author:** ![Duke\_of\_Rat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Duke\_of\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke_of_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/48 "2006-01-10T16:50:23Z")
That’s right, a person can also spend the rest of his life pursuing appeals that do not gain him freedom. ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/49 "2006-01-10T17:00:51Z")
> [@Duke of Rat](#): > > That’s right, a person can also spend the rest of his life pursuing appeals that do not gain him freedom. do you not see a substantive qualitative difference between: “availability of potential correction for errors” and “no availability of possible correction for errors”? no one guarentees the success of any particular avenue, but when there ain’t even an avenue, do you not see that as a significant difference? ---
**Author:** ![light\_strand](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a6a055/32.png) [@light\_strand](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/light_strand)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/50 "2006-01-10T17:02:46Z")
> [@Duke of Rat](#): > > What about people who are wrongly convicted and sent to life in prison without parole? If spending the rest of your life in prison is worse than dying (in your opinion), is this somehow "better’? > > A system which cannot help but send innocent people to life in prison cannot be defended as just, right? Surely you’re kidding. Of course it’s better to be alive then dead. This ranks right up there with perhaps the dumbest thing I have ever heard regarding the Death Penalty. By your estimations, why don’t we just kill everyone instead of imprisoning them? I can’t decide if you’re foolish, or facetious, but either way this is stunningly stupid. ---
**Author:** ![SoulFrost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f07891/32.png) [@SoulFrost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SoulFrost)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/51 "2006-01-10T17:06:37Z")
Not so stupid, really, when you look at it in context. That remark from **Duke** was a response to **Dio’s** comment: > [@](#): > > I think it’s too fucking EASY for them. Why should slime like the guys in the OP be allowed to just get a nice quiet shot in the arm and go to sleep instead of- you know- actually having to SUFFER for a while? ---
**Author:** ![Duke\_of\_Rat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Duke\_of\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke_of_Rat)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/52 "2006-01-10T17:16:22Z")
> [@light strand](#): > > Surely you’re kidding. Of course it’s better to be alive then dead. > > This ranks right up there with perhaps the dumbest thing I have ever heard regarding the Death Penalty. By your estimations, why don’t we just kill everyone instead of imprisoning them? > > I can’t decide if you’re foolish, or facetious, but either way this is stunningly stupid. I see **SoulFrost** has caught my drift. Of course it’s better to be alive, but **Dio** said the advantage of prison over the death penalty was to make people suffer for a long time. So you’re innocent, and have spent 50 years suffering, knowing every day that you could have had a family, travelled the world, fallen in love. You’ve _suffered_. Yet the death penalty is “too fucking easy”. Sure, no way to know you’re never getting out, just like there’s no way to know that a innocent person might be executed. I was just disagreeing with the crystal clear absolutes some here see. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/53 "2006-01-10T17:54:37Z")
> [@AFAIKnow](#): > > Perhaps the burden of proof should be much more than usual when it comes to the DP. Maybe a willingly offered confession, or video tape, or irreproachable witness(es) should be required. Perhaps there could be an independent group that studies all DP cases and must find all requirements met. I’m against the DP for a great many reasons, but if this were instituted I’d be much less shrill about it. However, we’d have to be sure that the independant group is well-insulated from politics, emotions, and public outcry. I’m not sure that’s possible. > [@](#): > > I am of the belief that the DP has at least some deterrent factor. Well and good, but you’d need to have more than just a belief. I am of the opinion that if we are going to put people to death for purposes of deterrence, then we had better make sure that deter it does. Not ambiguously, in a horoscope, Magic 8-Ball, could-be-interpreted sort of way. We would need to have clear, unambiguous, black-and-white, beyond a shadow of a doubt, real-world proof that it deters. Watertight real numbers that a child could understand. So far such a thing has been as far from forthcoming. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/54 "2006-01-10T17:57:11Z")
I’m 100% opposed to the death penalty. I can certainly understand those in favor of it. After all, in the weeks after the murder of my father, I would carried out the death sentence myself. What I don’t get, is those that say, “I’m against the death penalty in most cases but guys like this deserve to die”. Basing the idea of the death penalty on the heinousness of the crime to me is not logical. Guess what? Every murder is heinous to someone. There is no nice way of killing someone. Weather I hold Angelina Jolie on top of you so you are smothered by her breasts or if I gut you alive and decorate my aluminum Christmas tree with your internal organs, you are still dead. Then there are people that get ‘special protection’. For instance, killing a Police Officer is an automatic death penalty in some areas. Why? Why isn’t the death of a school teacher as important. Or a clerk? Or a homeless guy? If we are all equal before the law, then why are some people more valued? If two men standing next to each other fired guns and one shot and killed a cop, and the other a homeless man, do you think they would both get the same punishment? What if they were on opposite sides of town? They wouldn’t. To me, a person should either for or against the DP. If you kill a homeless person or the President. If you kill someone drunk driving or if you empty a machine gun at a daycare. Whether you are a white person killing a black person or a black person killing a white person, it shouldn’t matter, but in the real world it does. Prison escapes are rare. Life without possibility of parole is the correct sentence. The death penalty is not a deterrent. It may actually cause violent crimes. Heinousness has nothing to do with it. Being willing to kill people in the name of justice is not strength nor is locking them away weakness. ---
**Author:** ![SoulFrost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f07891/32.png) [@SoulFrost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SoulFrost)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/55 "2006-01-10T18:17:17Z")
> [@](#): > > Being willing to kill people in the name of justice is not strength nor is locking them away weakness. No, it isn’t. And it isn’t. But (in my mind, at least), it isn’t about strength or weakness. It’s not about revenge or rehabilitation or even about preventing more crime. It’s simply about the fact that some people deserve to die, and sooner rather than later. We will have to differ on whether killing a child is worse than killing an adult. In retrospect, perhaps we simply define “evil” differently. Inflicting long-term harm on the innocent as a means for short-term gain or gratification is as close a definition as I have at the moment. And I feel that evil must be put down whenever it is encountered. The brutal killing of a young child is the ultimate long-term harm of the innocent for short-term gain. So, in my mind, those who do so are the most evil, and they must be erased from this life. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/56 "2006-01-10T18:25:03Z")
> [@SoulFrost](#): > > It’s simply about the fact that some people deserve to die, Fact? Or opinion? ---
**Author:** ![SoulFrost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f07891/32.png) [@SoulFrost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SoulFrost)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/57 "2006-01-10T18:26:53Z")
To be honest, a strongly held opinion. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/58 "2006-01-10T18:34:57Z")
> [@SoulFrost](#): > > To be honest, a strongly held opinion. Natch. And that’s the problem right there. Not everyone holds that opinion, and it’s hard to back up “he needed killin’” with irrefutable facts. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/59 "2006-01-10T18:36:54Z")
But it is the sorting them out that is the problem. It’s more evil to kill a child than an adult? So, if I kill a 100 year-old man, that’s practically not a crime? The thing is, you will protect what you hold most dear and precious. Death to those that destroy what you like, and life or maybe 20 years for killing people you don’t care for so much. That is callous. That is human nature. ---
**Author:** ![AFAIKnow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a6a055/32.png) [@AFAIKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AFAIKnow)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/60 "2006-01-10T19:00:17Z")
> [@tdn](#): > > Well and good, but you’d need to have more than just a belief. I am of the opinion that if we are going to put people to death for purposes of deterrence, then we had better make sure that deter it does. Not ambiguously, in a horoscope, Magic 8-Ball, could-be-interpreted sort of way. We would need to have clear, unambiguous, black-and-white, beyond a shadow of a doubt, real-world proof that it deters. Watertight real numbers that a child could understand. So far such a thing has been as far from forthcoming. Nothing ambiguous about it. It’s common sense. Just as common sense says that any form of punishment has a deterrnce factor to some degree. Whether that is enough to compensate for other factors that would increase the murder rate is not my concern. I don’t see anything wrong with ending the life of those who commit such crimes. As I said before, they deserve nothing less. - “If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murders, we have allowed the killing of a bunch of innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former. This, to me, is not a tough call.” John McAdams - Marquette University/Department of Political Science \* I couldn’t have said it better. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228.md?page=4)