DC Sniper Executed

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Tensho
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12 Nov 2009, 6:35 am

bonuspoints wrote:

Your idea of an Advance Directive regarding the fate of a potential murderer would have no impact on their judgement. Seeking the death penalty for a murderer has little to do with justice for the victim. Taking the murderer's life would have no impact on the victim's fate. It is an act carried out for the "benefit" of those who remain, who seek revenge in the hope to find peace/meaning/comfort from the death of the criminal. I can honestly say, if I felt it would have any impact, I wouldn't hesitate to put such a clause in writing. I would hope my family wouldn't find comfort in the taking of any person's life.

*In taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy (Sir Francis Bacon).

(Just wanted to make it clear, it is not for the sake of the murderer that I would not want capital punishment were I the victim, their life holds no value for me. I wouldn't want to be the cause/reason for another loss.)

But there lies the problem in we all have different idea of what is right and wrong. What is revenge to you is justice to me. Where what happens to a person who killed you no longer matters to you I am thinking of it now and saying it does matter to me. We live in a religious world too where people tend to honour the wishes of a person after they have passed and thats why an advance directive can have an impact on a death penalty judgement.

Any punishment the murderer would receive is always going to be for the benefit of the living but I see the greatests benefit in the death penalty. The alternative is they never get to see life outside of bars again but this costs a lot of money which their life is no longer worth. I dont value the life of a murderer.

I still believe the only way we can all have what we want is by having the death penalty and having those who dont want the death penalty sign papers to say they dont want it. You never know maybe one day all people will sign those papers.

Fogman
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12 Nov 2009, 11:43 am

I'm generally opposed to capitol punishment due the generally unequal way that it is applied, however in the case of Malvo and Tim McVeigh, I'm not bothered at all by the fact that they are no longer with us.

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DeaconBlues
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12 Nov 2009, 11:54 am

I believe that it is an error to think of capital punishment as a punishment, or as a deterrent. The thought of death deters few criminals, as few criminals believe they'll be caught; and "punishment" generally implies a desire to teach the offender not to do whatever it was, which hardly applies to someone who's dead. Rather, I think of it as being more in the nature of putting down a rabid animal - we don't hate a rabid skunk or bat, we're not punishing it for becoming rabid, we're killing it because alive, it's too dangerous. Similarly, someone who has demonstrated a callous disregard for the lives of his/her fellow humans is not to be hated, but pitied - and put down for the good of us all.

I also believe in the adage voiced by Thomas Jefferson when the US's legal system was first being set up: "I would sooner see a thousand guilty men go free, than one innocent man unjustly punished." Proof in capital cases does indeed need to be established beyond a reasonable doubt, and even after conviction the accused should be allowed access to appeal after appeal - we want to be as certain as a human can be that we're executing the correct killer. (We can never be absolutely certain, of course - we're human beings, we can never be absolutely certain of anything.)

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ruveyn
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12 Nov 2009, 12:54 pm

DeaconBlues wrote:

Capital execution is not punishment, it is disposal. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

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showman616
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12 Nov 2009, 9:15 pm

Not sure Im for or against the death penalty.
But it anyone deserves the death penalty the beltway sniper does.

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12 Nov 2009, 9:46 pm

Tensho wrote:

The alternative is they never get to see life outside of bars again but this costs a lot of money which their life is no longer worth. I dont value the life of a murderer.

http://www.aclu.org/capital-punishment/ ... enalty-101

According to the info at this link, it is actually more expensive to execute someone than to keep them in jail for life. I can't verify this, but it would definitely be worth further research by the justice system.

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12 Nov 2009, 9:57 pm

DeaconBlues wrote:

Rather, I think of it as being more in the nature of putting down a rabid animal - we don't hate a rabid skunk or bat, we're not punishing it for becoming rabid, we're killing it because alive, it's too dangerous. Similarly, someone who has demonstrated a callous disregard for the lives of his/her fellow humans is not to be hated, but pitied - and put down for the good of us all.

BUT, the rabid animal is going to die regardless of our intervention! The murderer (in most cases) is not dying of a terminal disease. I for one, have absolutely no pity for the murderer (as I do for the rabid animal). I would hope the rest of their life is pure misery. As to putting the person down for the good of us all, they are already removed from society and no longer a danger to the public.

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12 Nov 2009, 10:02 pm

This topic had this quote going through my head, took me a while to track it down. I couldn't remember who had said it.

Many that live deserve death. And some die that deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then be not too eager to deal out death in the name of justice, fearing for your own safety. Even the wise cannot see all ends.
J R R Tolkien

DenvrDave
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12 Nov 2009, 11:00 pm

There is another aspect to the death penalty that I think makes it worth keeping around: It can be used as a bargaining chip. For examples, if there are two accomplices to a heinous crime, the prosecutor can offer a plea bargain (from death to life without parole) to one of the criminals in exchange for testifying against the other.

CRD
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12 Nov 2009, 11:04 pm

DenvrDave wrote:

Good point dave they also use it to get them to tell were the bodies at times and that realy does give the families some healing.

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13 Nov 2009, 3:00 am

The scumbag murdered many people just for the fun of it. He wasn't even political.

Then he has the nerve to say "Have compassion! Don't kill me!"

He got what he deserved.

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13 Nov 2009, 2:03 pm

bonuspoints wrote:

Tensho wrote:

The alternative is they never get to see life outside of bars again but this costs a lot of money which their life is no longer worth. I dont value the life of a murderer.

Generally it is more expensive to execute somebody than it is to keep them locked away in prison for life at first glance. What needs to be considered as well is how expensive is a person going to be for the prison system to house if they terrorise,assault,kill, or get other people to kill other inmates, as well as the psychological damage and trauma that they inflict in the process the sum of executing a a particularly violent inmate who is predatory, and will kill again is cheaper in the long run.

Again, I am against the way that the death penalty is applied, but there are just some people that humanity as a whole is better off without.

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hartzofspace
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13 Nov 2009, 3:29 pm

Fogman wrote:

Again, I am against the way that the death penalty is applied, but there are just some people that humanity as a whole is better off without.

I agree.

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visagrunt
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13 Nov 2009, 5:53 pm

Fogman wrote:

...there are just some people that humanity as a whole is better off without.

Who, precisely, gets to decide who humanity is better off without?

No one has yet presented a cogent argument that suggests to me that, viewed at a macro level, capital punishment provides any greater level of security, prosperity or welfare to a nation. So far, all that I am persuaded of is that people are willing to wash their hands of a problem, giving no thought to curing the disease, rather than the symptom.

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John_Browning
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13 Nov 2009, 6:06 pm

visagrunt wrote:

Fogman wrote:

...there are just some people that humanity as a whole is better off without.

A jury gets to decide who we are better off without. All 12 of them have to agree on the death penalty or the defendant gets life in prison. Usually in high profile cases, the public generally approves of the jury's decision. The only reason that the death penalty isn't as good of a deterrent as it could be is that it isn't used nearly enough.

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tcorrielus
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13 Nov 2009, 7:03 pm

I'm kinda neutral on the Death Penalty debate, but the one opinion I have on it is that it does not successfully deter violent crimes or murders in the USA nationwide. It could be because that American murderers aren't afraid of dying at the hands of the police or the judicial system (as a punishment for murder) and will just kill people if they want to. John Allen Muhammed for instance, wasn't afraid of being executed by lethal injection and just took it as a MAN.

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