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Post by DAS (formerly BushAdmirer) on Jan 26, 2010 17:20:33 GMT
Well RV, what about the Muslim US Army officer who shot up an Army base in Texas and killed a number of people? OK with you if we execute him next week?
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Post by DAS (formerly BushAdmirer) on Jan 26, 2010 17:25:53 GMT
There is always the risk of executing an innocent person. However, our legal system is so heavily tilted in favor of the criminal that such an error is highly unlikely. We have reasonable doubt, presumption of innocence, requirement for a unanimous jury verdict by twelve jurors, strict rules of evidence, and appeals.
Legal screw-ups are a two way street. I think the greater risk is that we will release a monster on technicalities. Another worry is that a flim-flam lawyer and a high paid jury consultant will be able to stack the jury using our jury selection procedures (think Johnny Cochran and OJ Simpson). I'm a lot more worried about a heinous murderer like Simpson standing in line with my family at the supermarket rather than being executed as should happen.
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Post by randomvioce on Jan 26, 2010 18:29:30 GMT
There is always the risk of executing an innocent person. However, our legal system is so heavily tilted in favor of the criminal that such an error is highly unlikely. We have reasonable doubt, presumption of innocence, requirement for a unanimous jury verdict by twelve jurors, strict rules of evidence, and appeals. No, the system is not tilted in favour of the criminal, it is tilted in favour of the defendent. Not the same thing. Legal screw-ups are a two way street. I think the greater risk is that we will release a monster on technicalities. The risk is not the same, however, is it? The State may take the life of an innocent person, without justification. If that is you or your son then that is the worse case senerio for most of us. I'm a lot more worried about a heinous murderer like Simpson standing in line with my family at the supermarket rather than being executed as should happen. How do you feel about a member of your family being killed by the State on false evidence?
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Post by Big Lin on Jan 26, 2010 19:00:37 GMT
I'd like to point out to the antis that when you sentence someone to LWOP what you are ACTUALLY doing IS imposing a DEATH SENTENCE.
Not enough antis seem to realise that.
If you impose LWOP then you ARE sentencing someone to DEATH. It just takes longer than executing them.
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Post by DAS (formerly BushAdmirer) on Jan 27, 2010 1:53:21 GMT
@ RV - Theoretically I suppose you have a point. The key word there is 'theoretically.' In reality, the 'defendant' has so many legal protections that it is highly unlikely. I'd hazard a guess that chances executing an innocent person are considerably less than the chances of the average commercial airplane pilot being killed in a crash. Do you want to ban air travel because it could result in the death of innocent people? Why would you want to ban the death penalty and not ban air travel if your main focus is risk to an innocent person??
@ Lin - You make an excellent point. Do a google search for Charles Manson if you're unfamiliar with his case. He had himself a harem of young impressionable women when he was quite young. He got them to kill people including a young Hollywood actress who was pregnant at the time. They wrote "Helter Skelter" on the wall of the home they invaded and left those people dead. Manson has been cooped up in San Quentin (California's high security prison) for many many years. Is that a benefit to him? Is that a benefit to society (read: taxpayer)? Are we worried that we might be executing an innocent man (grin)? Why would anyone want Charles Manson to be alive for even one more day? What's the point?
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Post by Deleted on Jan 27, 2010 7:24:21 GMT
I'd like to point out to the antis that when you sentence someone to LWOP what you are ACTUALLY doing IS imposing a DEATH SENTENCE. Not enough antis seem to realise that. If you impose LWOP then you ARE sentencing someone to DEATH. It just takes longer than executing them. I'm racking my memory for thename of the judge who allegedly said "I don't sentence anyone to death, I only fix the day." People can and do make lives for themselves in prison. They can even do some good if they have a mind to. Anna tells us that when people are given a choice (gruesome thought) they choose Life instead of execution.
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 11:03:16 GMT
But what evidence is there that the death penalty works as a deterrent? I presented some (on t'other thread) which suggests that it doesn't. totally irrelevant. death deters the executed murderer from ever killing again, and that is the ONLY deterrence that matters in any way
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Post by mouse on Jan 27, 2010 11:12:40 GMT
[ totally irrelevant. death deters the executed murderer from ever killing again, and that is the ONLY deterrence that matters in any way exactly jumbo
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 11:20:29 GMT
the people that rely on the deterrence argument, aside from all other reasons, make the colossal mistake of forgetting the FACT that the thought of punishment does not even enter the mind of a murderer. NO murderer plans on being caught and having to face punishment
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 11:26:09 GMT
...99% of all homicides in the US are not DP eligible... I don't know what the criteria are for a murder to be DP eligible - are they so easy to understand that a person contemplating murder would be clear before committing it whether his particular murder would be eligible or not? Or are the criteria such that he could make a calculated decision to commit another sort of murder instead? this is the murder statute in california. it explains quite clearly, in plain english, exactly what constitutes first degree murder law.justia.com/california/codes/pen/187-199.html
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 11:33:33 GMT
I don't know what the criteria are for a murder to be DP eligible - are they so easy to understand that a person contemplating murder would be clear before committing it whether his particular murder would be eligible or not? Or are the criteria such that he could make a calculated decision to commit another sort of murder instead? Most homicides are committed when a dispute between friends or family escalates into lethal violence. These homicides are not really planned and generally regretted afterwards.
The DP eligible homicides in the US always have severe aggravating circumstances and are committing in the course of another crime e.g. robbery, kidnapping, rape, arson, etc.. These murders are planned and usually not regretted by the murderer, unless he/she is caught.no hon. spur of the moment murders such as that comprise less than a quarter of all murders. the overwhelming majority are those which are premeditated. of course, premeditation does NOT necessarily mean consciously thinking of murder. it means committing a crime in which there is a possibility, even if the possibility is remote, of someone dying. taking ANY kind of weapon to commit a crime IS premeditated murder if someone dies. a good example is, if you take a toy gun to rob a store, and the clerk has a heart attack, you are guilty of first degree murder, and can, and should, be executed
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 11:38:52 GMT
This 'DP eligible' is a red herring. As I said on the other thread, which crimes are 'DP eligible' varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and over time. Surely the key question is the basic ethical one of whether or not we should empower the state to kill its citizens who fail to obey the law? Only once that is resolved is it relevant which breaches of the law are going to result in death, be it drug smuggling, doubting the literal truth of the bible or hideously murdering and tortuing several people. To justify the DP per se on the basis of what is and isn't an 'eligible' crime seems to me to be complicating a clear-cut ethical issue. Do I think the state should be empowered to kill its citizens for breaches of the law? No. I don't think the state should have that power. And practically, as I've already posted, the possibility of the death penalty inevitably results in perverse decisions by some juries, with guilty people being allowed to walk free. non starter hon. there is NO ethical question in the death penalty. it is a simple question of whether or not you support human rights. if you do, you believe that EVERYONE has a sacrosanct right to life, which can only be voided by your CHOICE to violate another's right. if you think that you have the right to live after having made the wilful, conscious choice to forfeit that right by murdering another person, by definition, you strongly oppose human rights
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Post by mouse on Jan 27, 2010 11:44:46 GMT
taking ANY kind of weapon to commit a crime IS premeditated murder if someone dies.
very true..it shows intent...well said jumbo bit like the spouting about human rights by those who have disregarded the human rights of others..all very hyporcritical
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 11:54:52 GMT
So far, only Lin has come out in support of the death penalty as retribution. It is a perfectly honourable reason for punishment, and so far as I am concerned the only valid justification for the death penalty - though I don't agree with it largely because of the very real risk of wrongful conviction. Thank you, Skylark. I'm sure I can't be the only pro who supports the death penalty because it's the appropriate punishment for taking someone else's life. I think Jumbo supports it for that reason and possibly one or two other members who haven't spoken up on the subject yet. I think we have to remember that sometimes too much attention is placed on the US when the death penalty is discussed. Japan, Jamaica and various other democracies also use capital punishment and if we're talking numbers, unsafe convictions and crimes that no sane person would regard as deserving the death penalty then you have to also consider the likes of China, Iran and Saudi Arabia. When Mike and I lived in Turkey one of our students was a member of Bulent Ecevit's family. He was a great servant to his country and one of the best Prime Minister's they've had in the last fifty years or so. Ecevit, in his second term of office, pushed a law through Parliament - in the teeth of opposition - outlawing the death penalty in Turkey. Cynics claimed he did it to try to get into the EU but I know from other speeches he made, other articles he wrote and from the simple words of a member of his family that he did it because he did not believe in capital punishment. As someone whose husband is an anti I know all the arguments on both sides of the fence. I do admit that I'm not a gung-ho type of pro who just wants to rush them outside once they've been found guilty and ice them. I'm very well aware that we in Britain have wrongly executed people - I used to live about 10 minutes away from Derek Bentley's home - and I also think that, in America, the Haymarket Bombers, Sacco and Vanzetti, Anna Antonio, Eva Coo, Bruno Hauptmann and Caryl Chessman were wrongly executed. As for the cynical shambles that countries like China, Iran and Saudi call 'justice,' I wouldn't hang a RAT on the basis of a criminal and legal system like theirs. I know what it's like to lose someone you love to murder. It cuts a knife right through your heart and you're never the same afterwards. I know for a fact that we have a number of members of this board who have also been victims of murderers and they too have been touched to the quick by this crime. I know some pros almost dance in the street when someone is executed but I find that pretty sick and only feel sadness at such an unnecessary and total waste of life. i support it because there is NO, nada, zip, zilch, as in not a single, intelligent or remotely rational reason for opposing it. the irrefutable FACT is that the death penalty is the ONLY morally proper response to murder. EVERY anti argument, without exception, is nothing but a lunatical touchy feely emotional feeling, totally devoid of any basis in logical reasoning. as i have said before, i spent half of my life in the delusion, and was as adamantly anti as i am now pro. thankfully, i grew up and got it right. the ONLY argument that antis have that even comes remotely close to intelligent is the innocence argument. that fails to get off the ground either. obviously, there have been innocent people executed in the past, but, the irrefutable REALITY is that there has not been a single factually innocent individual executed in the u.s. since 1976, and there is NO possiblity that such an event could occur. the fact that there have been 17 death row inmates exonerated by dna since 1983 is more than conclusive proof that no innocent could ever be executed in the future the ONLY sad thing about an execution is that a totally innocent person was murdered in order for it to happen. no rational person has any concern for the life of the individual that voluntarily chose to forfeit it. the only sadness that can be felt for the murderer's family is that they had such a worthless piece of shyt as a relative end of story
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Post by randomvioce on Jan 27, 2010 11:55:40 GMT
I'd hazard a guess that chances executing an innocent person are considerably less than the chances of the average commercial airplane pilot being killed in a crash. You can hazzard a guess all you want, but the statistics are not really the problem here. Every now and then people are released from prison because the evidence against them was fitted up, or just unsafe. If you are the one person it happens to it is a hundred percent, irrespective of how many other innocent/guilty people are let off/hung. I am not really going to tell a mother or young child that their son/father had to die for another person's crime, for the greater good and that had he became a pilot, there was more chance that he would have died in a crash. None of that matters. Do you want to ban air travel because it could result in the death of innocent people? Why would you want to ban the death penalty and not ban air travel if your main focus is risk to an innocent person?? I am not really sure at what you are driving at here. In Europe we don't shoot down planes with innocent people on board. If we started to do that, I would complain about it. People DO die on planes, but those deaths are not built into the system. There is no law that states that so many people have to die every year or anything like that. Every precaution is taken to prevent innocent deaths (missile attacks from rogue Nations aside) and if something was found that meant innocent lives were put at risk, then that would be eliminated. Failures in the aircraft industry kill people, not the deliberate policy of the airlines.
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Post by randomvioce on Jan 27, 2010 12:08:29 GMT
and there is NO possiblity that such an event could occur. the fact that there have been 17 death row inmates exonerated by dna since 1983 is more than conclusive proof that no innocent could ever be executed in the future Utter Bull. You have no RATIONAL proof of that stupid statement. You have no RATIONAL way of proving that people convicted on DNA evidence which had been falsified or that the DNA was planted at the scene or there legitimately or even that DNA evidence was used to convict someone. There is no way you can use 17 exonerated people as proof that everyone else is therefore guilty. That has no basis in FACT or REALITY. To anyone not born in a backward culture could see that the FACT that 17 people were released does not mean the rest are therefore guilty. The REALITY is that you support the death penalty because you are unable to understand the complex issues.
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 12:11:09 GMT
My view is that a dead killer is no longer a problem for potential additional victims and is a load off the back of prison system and therefore the taxpayer. I would place a mathematical value on the life of the killer making it approximately equal to Zip Squat to the Tenth Power. When we remove a killer from Planet Earth we make the planet a better and safer place. and of course, you are a million percent correct
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 12:15:21 GMT
According to information I've seen on this board - see for example the American Legal Association thread - keeping the death penalty in the US costs a huge amount. You could of course execute all convicted killers within a week of the jury verdict - that would save a huge amount of money, Unfortunately it also means a lot of innocent or vulnerable people will be put to death - mainly the poor and black. no, we can't do that. because of the appeals process, which has to be followed, it would be a minimum of two years before execution could be carried out. in most states, a death sentence is automatically appealed to the state supreme court. in texas, and a couple other states, it is appealed to the court of criminal appeals, then to the state supreme court. after the state remedies are exhausted, it then goes to the federal district court, the federal circuit court, then the u.s. supreme court. if proper timelines were strictly adhered to, an appeal could not get to scotus before two years
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 12:17:49 GMT
If there is NO reasonable doubt as to the guilt of of the DP eligible murderer than the execution should be carried out quickly! EVERYBODY convicted of murder is convicted with 'no' reasonable doubt. AFTER such convictions sometimes new evidence comes to light that throws up reasonable doubt, then what? if evidence comes to light that PROVES the individual factually innocent, he is released. there were two last year
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Post by iamjumbo on Jan 27, 2010 12:22:20 GMT
There is always the risk of executing an innocent person. However, our legal system is so heavily tilted in favor of the criminal that such an error is highly unlikely. We have reasonable doubt, presumption of innocence, requirement for a unanimous jury verdict by twelve jurors, strict rules of evidence, and appeals. Legal screw-ups are a two way street. I think the greater risk is that we will release a monster on technicalities. Another worry is that a flim-flam lawyer and a high paid jury consultant will be able to stack the jury using our jury selection procedures (think Johnny Cochran and OJ Simpson). I'm a lot more worried about a heinous murderer like Simpson standing in line with my family at the supermarket rather than being executed as should happen. with all the checks we have in place, it is an absolute impossibilty for an innocent to be executed. unfortunately, all too often, the guilty are freed. just a couple years ago, a punk was released on a technicality, and less than three months later, raped and murdered a five year old girl. of course, antis are unconcerned about events such as this
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