Whereas the state never has to use the death penalty. Mistakes in police shootings happen in moments of life or death urgency. It is accepted that human error will occur, but that the authority to use deadly force is still necessary to protect the public.
There is never any urgency with the death penalty. It’s never needed to protect anybody.
By the way, I don’t agree that the public accepts unnecessary shootings by law enforcement. The public is willing to give them a wide benefit of the doubt in making those determinations (arguably too wide), but they don’t accept deadly force that they know is gratuitous.
Wow, looking at Nationmaster shows that the USA with 42 executions per year and Japan with 9 are two ‘modern’ countries that still have the death penalty.
I am surprised that these two countries still use capital punishment. They are in such esteemed company as China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, The Congo, Egypt and Iraq. I suppose it’s not easy to turn around an ocean liner.
Or, they could choose to not use their weapons. We all have choices, right? How does a police officer know in a split second that he’s made the right choice? He doesn’t. Maybe it’s best to simply choose ahead of time to not use the weapon.
As usual, so simplistic as to be childish and therefore devoid of credibility.
You don’t think that suggesting that police should decide ahead of time not to use their weapons is simplistic too? “Don’t want to risk shooting the innocent, don’t ever fire your gun” strikes me as a remarkably simplistic approach…
I’m amused when people argue in the abstract about “there are innocent people on death row! Oh, the horror! The inhumanity!”
Horror and inhumanity? Have any of you anti-death penalty people even actually read what some of these human stains have done?
Right now, my state has executions scheduled for:[ul]
[li]the guy who for months stalked a woman who’d rejected him, then raped and killed her and her 2-year-old son, dumping them both in the bathtub;[/li][li]a guy who murdered a man with an ice pick and pipe while others acted as lookouts, so that he could earn a “tear drop” tattoo;[/li][li]and a guy who confessed to raping, beating, and strangling a 93 year old woman to death in her home.[/ul][/li]
In the past year, Texas performed ten executions, including:[ul]
[li]a man who broke into a woman’s house, strangled her with a belt, raped her corpse, and set fire to the house to cover his crime;[/li][li]and a man who bummed a ride from two kids, ages 16 and 17, and shot and killed them both, chasing one for 350 feet before catching and killing him.[/ul][/li]
The 10 murderers executed in the past year had a total of 17 murder victims among them.
On top of that, not yet scheduled for executions, we have:[ul]
[li]the guy who strangled a woman to death, leaving her body on the side of the road as he took her 2 year old daughter from Salt Lake City to Houston, where he murdered her on Christmas Day by smothering, then left her body in a suitcase beside the road;[/li][li]a woman who led accomplices in beating a 59 year old retarded man to death with such ferocity that his body was unrecognizable, in order to collect an insurance policy;[/li][li]a guy who crawled through a window into a woman’s home and attempted to sexually assault her as she slept in her bed with her 2 year old daughter and 4 month old baby, then stabbed her to death, also stabbing her 10 year old son in the chest when he came in because of the screaming;[/li][li]a two-time convicted rapist who was finally sentenced to death for raping and murdering a 2 year old child left in his care;[/li][li]and the guy who killed his own two daughters, ages 6 and 9, shooting them three and four times, including shots in the back as they attempted to flee, while their mother listened on the phone, concluding the phone call with, “Merry fucking Christmas.”[/ul][/li]
This ain’t TV, people. These victims had families and people who loved them and who still miss them. Their lives are forever destroyed by these monsters, who have demonstrated that they have no regard for human life. They had a trial, and twelve people decided, beyond a reasonable doubt mind you, that they are guilty and should receive a sentence of death. That burden, by the way, is greater than the evidentiary burden required to take a child away from his parents, and it’s damn tough to meet. The appeals process is there to make sure that the first stage worked properly, and that’s where the few people who sneak through the first level are weeded out (note, by the way, that there’s a big difference between legally innocent and factually innocent). Those who remain, earned the needle.
The people on death row are the worst of the worst. By their actions, they have forfeited their right to live. Fuck 'em.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to answer the habeas petition of a man convicted of murdering his wife with a grubbing hoe handle, to let him know he can’t get out of jail just yet. Seriously.
Wow, no kidding? Most people on Death Row really REALLY guilty, you say? Well then! That changes everything. What can all these other countries that have abolished the death penalty be thinking? They must not have any really REALLY guilty criminals, I guess.
Lordy. Texans…
Illinois Gov. Ryan put a moratorium on executions when they found out 14 death row prisoners were innocent. When then Gov, Bush of Texas was told of that ,he said Texas has never executed an innocent man. That was all I had to know about Bush.
We execute innocent men. Thats a fact. That must be stopped. If they get life it is possible to partly fix your mistakes.
This whole line of argument is a strawman since opposition to the death penalty has nothing to do with sympathy for the guilty. The problem is that you can’t prove they are all guilty, and we know for a fact that many of them are not. You mock and ridicule those who care about innocent people sitting on death row. Are you willing to BE one of those innocent people?
http://www.commondreams.org/views/061700-102.htm Story on Texas executions. They show incompetent,coked up lawyers and every other mistake possible.
By the way, Max, since we agree that many, maybe even most people on death row are horrible people who committed unimaginably horrific crimes, then why don’t you want to punish them? Why let them off the hook so easily with a little shot in the arm that ends their suffering and eliminates any chance for satisfactory retribution?
Also, for all those innocent people you’re mocking, there’s a guilty person getting away with it. have you ever thought about that?
The needle may be “letting them off easy”, but the fact is that imprisoned murderers, even those on death row, have the opportunity to commit additional crimes. Taking Texas as an example again, two condemned capital murderers have committed additional murders while in prison. Of eight prison murders in 1999, three were committed by capital murderers sentenced to “life” rather than death. Capital murderers have killed and injured prison guards and personnel; recently one officer was so badly brain damaged that he may never leave the hospital. (PDF cite for all this stuff). And that’s not even considering those who escape (yes, it does happen, see previous cite).
So, keeping them around longer means more people will get hurt or killed. As someone who actually cares about people being murdered by subhuman garbage, I’d rather keep that number to a minimum.
We do? Show me a few. By the way, we can and have proven that they are guilty according to the legal standard for guilt. “Beyond a reasonable doubt.” That’s something of a prerequisite before being sent to prison.
When I play imagination, I pretend I have a pony.
Honestly, how seriously am I supposed to take that? Somehow the life I’ve lived becomes so screwed up that I end up on death row? Please.
By the way, gonzomax, you may not realize this, but it used to be a common tactic for defense attorneys to “throw themselves on their own sword” so to speak, by alleging ineffective assistance of counsel against themselves to ensure a retrial for clients who were sentenced to death. It was their “get out of electric chair free” card, the ace up the sleeve. Now, defense attorneys cannot be appointed to represent defendants on capital cases if they’ve ever been held ineffective in a capital case, so that behavior has at least been somewhat curbed.
It seems those who are unequivocally in favour of the DP, are of the opinion as long as there is someone prepared to pull the switch, or start the injection process, and can sleep happily at night, we should leave them to do their job.
Despite the fact that there is no proof anywhere that the DP actually lowers the rate of violent crime.
Am I missing anything?
By the way poor people do not get a very good lawyer nor do they have the money to fight off the prosecutors. OJ showed what money can buy. Death row shows what poor people can buy. It is not just a tactic. It is a fact that poor people get a much worse defense.
Seeing as how I am sure you have a cite for that, could you please also provide I cite for how many defense attorneys successfully achieved a retrial for their clients by alleging ineffective assistance against themselves and what sanctions, if any, were imposed.
I have never heard this allegation before, except from hang 'em and flog 'em prosecutors.
Of course, that’s the point – if Der Trihs insists that all military personnel the world over deserve to die (the same as Rev. Fred Phelps, only for a slightly different, if no less asinine, reason) because they all participate, even if remotely and indirectly, in the murder of innocent people and the destruction of a nation, and because they refuse to desert en masse, refuse to disobey orders and refuse to wreck their own lives in protest, then I can just as childishly insist that police officers never draw their weapons but, instead, allow themselves to be killed, rather than accidentally kill another innocent civilian.
Yes, villa, it’s simplistic and silly. That’s the point.
Sorry - that element wasn’t clear to me. I thought you were making a serious suggestion.
That’s a problem with the prison system. It’s not caused by the lack of a death penalty, as evidenced by the fact that you cited Texas, which is one of the most enthusiastic practicioners of execution.
Happy to. Here’s 129 of them.
What kind of a hayseed do I look like? Do you really think you just made some kind of valid point? The Innocence Project has freed 16 people from death row because DNA evidence indisputedly proved they didn’t do it. All of those people were found guilty by juries. Guess what. Juries make mistakes. You know that very well. Are you honsetly going to sit there and argue that a jury conviction is equivalent to real proof? Is it your position that no innocent person has ever been sentenced to death? Are you kidding me?
This is extremely evasive. The point is that you don’t have to do anything wrong to end up on death row. Do you affirm or deny that innocent people have been sentenced to death? If you agree that it happens, then do you believe the sacrifice of innocent people is worth it to keep the death penalty? If you think it’s worth it, then it’s only fair to ask you if you would be willing to be one of those people. Do you have the intellectual courage to answer that question or don’t you?
Ah, an evasion of the issues and an insult rather than an attempt to answer my points. How unsurprising.
But then, you could hardly admit that most Americans WOULD want to see an army that invaded us be annihilated without undercutting the claim that I’m “nutty” for wanting the same to OUR invading army.
First, Phelps is condemning people who are born a particular way and who are not part of an organized attempt to harm others. Not people who choose to join an organization an participate in an organized campaign to inflict ( massive ) harm upon others. So, in fact my position is pretty much the opposite of his. Second, there’s no comparison between police doing a necessary job and a bunch on conquistadors involved in conquest. Third, I never said anything about wanting “all military personnel the world over” to die, just those in Iraq. In other words, the army of conquest, who condemn themselves by being there just as any army of conquest would.