# 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:** 14\ **Page:** 6
**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 11, 2006, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/101 "2006-01-11T15:54:19Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Oh, and, while I’m at it since I’ve “decided” that this is a debate? > > Did you wander into the wrong message board by mistake? This may be the Pit, but even here it’s laughable to make the entire substance of your rebuttal ‘Well… your idea is stupid!’ > > Just, ya know, in case you were curious. You win. ---
**Author:** ![cowgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8c91f0/32.png) [@cowgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cowgirl)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/102 "2006-01-11T16:01:28Z")
> [@Starving Artist](#): > > To go back to the traffic ticket analogy, traffic tickets don’t eliminate infractions of traffic laws but they do serve as a very effective deterrent. Imagine what the roads would be like if not for the threat of traffic fines. That is pretty much what has happened in this country as a result of the abolition of the death penalty He’s right. That’s why Canada’s [murder rate](http://canadaonline.about.com/od/crime/a/abolitioncappun.htm) shot up when we abolished the death penalty. Surely by now it must be much higher than in those states which have the DP? ---
**Author:** ![Nancarrow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c37758/32.png) [@Nancarrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nancarrow)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/103 "2006-01-11T18:59:21Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > What should we do when someone dies of old age while serving a life sentence for a crime they didn’t commit? Er, a life sentence carries the possibility of the punishment being stopped on appeal. The death penalty cannot be undone. Sure, if we replace the DP with life imprisonment, _some_ innocents may still die of old age in prison. But they would have been executed anyway under the DP! By contrast, for those wrongful convictions that are overturned while the defendant is still alive, the error is (partially) undone in a way that execution obviously cannot be. I understand that you are pro-DP. When someone who is anti-DP uses the fact of wrongful conviction as an argument, do you _honestly believe_ that “but wrongful conviction can happen for life imprisonment too” is a rebuttal of that argument? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Nancarrow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c37758/32.png) [@Nancarrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nancarrow)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/104 "2006-01-11T19:30:21Z")
Oh and **Starving Artist** : > [@Starving Artist](#): > > In short, people in this country don’t grow up with the respect for life that a properly enforced DP engenders So people who live in countries without the DP must have even less respect for life? ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/105 "2006-01-11T19:45:24Z")
> [@Nancarrow](#): > > Oh and **Starving Artist** : > > So people who live in countries without the DP must have even less respect for life? I think I can speak for **Starving Artist** when I say: guns don’t kill people, the State not killing people kills people. It’s perfectly logical. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/106 "2006-01-11T22:17:29Z")
> [@Nancarrow](#): > > Oh and **Starving Artist** : > > So people who live in countries without the DP must have even less respect for life? And countries with the DP have more. Like China. And Iran. And North Korea. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/107 "2006-01-11T23:10:15Z")
OK, the death penalty doesn’t deter crime–no one here has offered a single statistic that it does. While failing to fulfill its primary purpose, the DP costs taxpayers more than life in prison. It also just isn’t a very pleasant thing to hear about on the news, so it has a slight but perceptibly negative effect on our everyday lives. Frankly, what’s to like about it? The only thing I can think of is being hellbent on punishing the wicked with death. If that’s your thing, fine, but don’t pretend that it does our country as a whole any fucking good. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Odds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/d_odds/32/2882_2.png) [@D\_Odds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Odds)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/108 "2006-01-11T23:27:21Z")
> [@Nancarrow](#): > > I understand that you are pro-DP. When someone who is anti-DP uses the fact of wrongful conviction as an argument, do you _honestly believe_ that “but wrongful conviction can happen for life imprisonment too” is a rebuttal of that argument? 😕 A better argument is that, as it currently stands, a DP convict has his/her trial and evidence scrutinized. There are automatic appeals all funded by the court. A life sentence convict is locked up and forgotten by the system, for the most part. Back in October (I think), the New York Times wrote about this. For the young and especially for the innocent, the death penalty might be the better option. Your case will be (re)heard. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/109 "2006-01-11T23:37:50Z")
> [@Aeschines](#): > > It also just isn’t a very pleasant thing to hear about on the news, so it has a slight but perceptibly negative effect on our everyday lives. I know it gives a slight boost just to turn on the TV and see someone I never heard of got put down for doing something horrible and stupid. It’s kind of like really high stakes reality TV. Of course the contestants have to volunteer to play the game at all. I don’t think the entertainment value alone can be completely discounted especially in this media driven age. ---
**Author:** ![Cerri](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3bc359/32.png) [@Cerri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cerri)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/110 "2006-01-11T23:58:35Z")
> [@D\_Odds](#): > > A better argument is that, as it currently stands, a DP convict has his/her trial and evidence scrutinized. There are automatic appeals all funded by the court. > > A life sentence convict is locked up and forgotten by the system, for the most part. > > Back in October (I think), the New York Times wrote about this. **For the young and especially for the innocent, the death penalty might be the better option. Your case will be (re)heard.** (bolding mine) Or perhaps not… [http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=45&did=489](http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=45&did=489) > [@](#): > > Access to the appeals process is critical to sparing the lives of those who are mistakenly sentenced to death. Former Texas death row inmates like Randall Dale Adams, Clarence Brandley, Federico Macias, and Muneer Deeb were extremely fortunate that others became interested in their cases and helped them attain freedom. But Texas has severely limited that access by not providing attorneys during critical appeal stages. And most recently, the state has even pushed for executions prior to the completion of a defendant’s appeals. > > Death row inmates are entitled to representation for only one direct state appeal of their conviction or sentence. After that appeal, Texas generally provides no attorney for subsequent appeals. Unless some court grants a stay, execution warrants can be signed and carried out despite the fact that an inmate might have significant issues requiring state and federal review. > > With respect to this period of post-conviction representation, the Spangenberg Report found that: > > [T]he situation in Texas can only be described as desperate. The volume of cases is overwhelming. Presently no funds are allocated for payment of counsel or litigation expenses at the state habeas level.[64] Whereas most other states have a system for appointing and compensating attorneys after the direct appeal is over, [65] Texas leaves this important step to the discretion of the local judge. In almost every case, no attorney is appointed for state post-conviction relief, and those who do the legal work do it without pay. Similarly, funds for expert witnesses and expenses are almost never approved. [66] With the defendant unrepresented, local prosecutors have recently begun to push for executions, and some local judges are no longer granting stays until an attorney can be found. [http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizations/ncadp/news.jsp?key=1824&t=](http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizations/ncadp/news.jsp?key=1824&t=) > [@](#): > > 3 months ago, the Supreme Court granted a last-minute stay of execution to a Virginia inmate who argued that the state’s loss of crucial evidence had deprived him of the right to prove, by DNA testing, his innocence of the murder for which he was sentenced to death in 1999. > > The purpose of the stay, granted less than 5 hours before the scheduled execution, was to permit lawyers for the condemned man, Robin Lovitt, to file a full-scale Supreme Court appeal. > > On Monday, the 1st day of its new term, the court rejected that appeal without comment. > > The stay of execution will now automatically dissolve, leaving a grant of clemency by Virginia’s governor, Mark Warner, the only way for Mr. Lovitt, 41, to avoid execution. [http://www.socialistaction.org/news/200006/graham.html](http://www.socialistaction.org/news/200006/graham.html) > [@](#): > > They discovered, for the first time, powerful evidence of Graham’s innocence: > > A police weapons expert had concluded that the gun Graham allegedly used to kill Bobby Lambert could not possibly have fired the fatal bullet. > The same expert concluded that it was possible another gun, owned by another suspect who was never arrested, could have. > Seven of the eight witnesses who saw the murder did not identify Gary Graham as the killer and gave descriptions of a different person to the police. > The one witness who did identify him only did so after the police suggested it to her through a variety of techniques, including the use of altered photographs. > None of these facts were ever presented at trial or in the first round of appeals. In an exclusive interview with Socialist Action, Burr said: “This evidence-discovered years after Gary’s trial-demands to be heard. It proves that he is innocent, and it proves that he deserves a new trial. Executing him in the light of these facts would be an abomination.” > > The travesty > > Yet that is precisely what the court system, and George W. Bush, intend to do. > > When the new evidence was presented in 1993, the Texas state courts refused to hear it. The technicality they relied upon was the “30 day” rule mentioned earlier-the evidence, according to the courts, should have been presented within 30 days after the trial period. > > Despite the fact that it proves Graham’s innocence, and despite the fact that he was never properly represented, this “rule of law” was held to be absolute. [http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizations/ncadp/news.jsp?key=1660&t=](http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizations/ncadp/news.jsp?key=1660&t=) > [@](#): > > With more than 40 death row inmates in the last 6 years having been found innocent and released from prison, you would think Congress would focus any new legislation on strengthening access to the courts so prisoners are not wrongly put to death. But you would be wrong. When Congress returns from its summer recess, it is expected to consider a bill designed to close the federal courthouse doors to prisoner appeals and speed death row inmates to their final end. > > The misnamed Streamlined Procedures Act is about gutting procedures, not streamlining them. 2 versions of the measure would go a long way toward eliminating federal habeas corpus review of state convictions. Prisoners use habeas corpus to claim that their trial or sentence was constitutionally faulty or that there is new evidence of actual innocence. > > Those pushing the changes say the federal courts unduly inject themselves into death penalty cases where the state procedures have been fully and fairly followed. In fact, the federal courts have been a vital check on state trials. When state appeals courts disregard trial errors, such as incompetent defense lawyers, prosecutors who have engaged in misconduct or juries that have been racially rigged, the federal courts have been there to redress the wrong. Allowing an unfair process to stand can have life and death consequences for someone wrongly accused. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2006, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/111 "2006-01-11T23:59:29Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > I know it gives a slight boost just to turn on the TV and see someone I never heard of got put down for doing something horrible and stupid. I’m assuming you’re joking. Yeah, a downer is right. Guy is getting a hotshot, and they go over the grisly details of his crime to boot. Whereas with life imprisonment you only hear about it once. Depends on what you’re into, I guess. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2006, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/112 "2006-01-12T00:10:54Z")
> [@Nancarrow](#): > > Er, a life sentence carries the possibility of the punishment being stopped on appeal. The death penalty cannot be undone. Sure, if we replace the DP with life imprisonment, _some_ innocents may still die of old age in prison. But they would have been executed anyway under the DP! So? I thought that the outrage was over people who can’t get appeals? People who dieof old age during a life sentence can’t get appeals. The statement “They wouldn’t died under the DP anyways!” doesn’t address the issue. > [@Nancarrow](#): > > I understand that you are pro-DP. When someone who is anti-DP uses the fact of wrongful conviction as an argument, do you _honestly believe_ that “but wrongful conviction can happen for life imprisonment too” is a rebuttal of that argument? 😕 Do you _honestly believe_ that I was talking about wrongful conviction solely, or that I was pointing out that there are mistakes that are made that cannot be unmade even without the DP? ---
**Author:** ![Amazon\_Floozy\_Goddess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/779978/32.png) [@Amazon\_Floozy\_Goddess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amazon_Floozy_Goddess)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2006, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/113 "2006-01-12T04:58:40Z")
Okay, so we’ve got a no-win situation: 1. The death penalty is unacceptable b/c we’re telling people not to kill by killing them; 2. Life in prison is unacceptable b/c the victims’ lives are gone while the perpetrator is allowed to keep living. So where are we supposed to find common ground here? Some people can be rehabilitated, depending on the crime, and why they did it. But there is **no reason** for someone to kill a child other than outright coldbloodedness. A 4 year old cannot seek out vengeance on you if you let her live. A 9 year old isn’t going to hook up with the Mafia to have you rubbed out because you killed her parents. The only reason these fuckers killed the children is because they could. There is no rehabilitation for these kinds of creatures. But no, we can’t execute them! If we do that, we’ll be acting just like they did, right? So what, then, are we going to do with them? No-one can tell a rational person that they deserve to have any kind of comforts in their life. They gave up the right to that when they murdered these people. So, if they get life imprisonment instead of death, it should be ensured that they get NO kind of fun out of life whatsoever. Why do they deserve to have recreation time when these girls will never run or play again? Take away the TV, the music, the games, the books. Deprive them of anything colourful, including clothes. Paint the walls grey. Dim the lights. If they’re going to be allowed to live, then they should have to live in the misery that they’ve created for themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Mellivora\_capensis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@Mellivora\_capensis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mellivora_capensis)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2006, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228/114 "2006-01-12T13:21:31Z")
How about giving a person convicted of a capital\* crime a choice: life in prison without parole, or death. Let’s assume that after careful analysis, rehabilitation is clearly out of the question, and setting aside for a moment understandable calls for retribution, let’s work solely from the premise that those convicted of perpetrating capital\* crimes should be prevented from perpetrating these crimes again, and that society at large should be protected from the actions of these individuals, why not give them the choice? \*_I use the term “capital” loosely and to describe crimes that currently attract the death penalty in some US states._ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-didnt-know-them-but-im-still-shaken/339228.md?page=5)