Name the last rich man who was executed in the US.

[Amelia]

The fact that the ratio of poor to wealthy people that commit capitol crimes is likely 10,000 to one makes it very unlikely that rich people will be even charged in a death penalty case.
Yes, the wealthy do kill, but it's more likely a Phil Spector type case, where the crime doesn't meet the criteria for the death penalty. The O.J. Simpson case could have met the criteria, but, well his defense team turned the trial into an indictment of Detective Furman and he skated,
Should we make sentences for murder convictions like income tax so that rich people pay at a higher rate. Should we institute an earned income murder credit for killers below the poverty line?

Well, since you ask .... the government taking a person's life is far more serious than the government taking a person's money. Much higher standards should apply. It's obscene that rich people can intimidate DA's into plea deals for crimes for which poor people feel the full measure of the law. Since the gov't has demonstrated that it cannot administer the death penalty fairly, the gov't should not be killing its citizens.

In this citizen's opinion.

 

[Sky Dancer]

Since when do we execute someone based on their wealth or lack thereof?

When have you ever heard of a rich man being executed in America?

 

[Tank]

When have you ever heard of a rich man committing murder in America?

 

[Avatar4321]

The fact that the ratio of poor to wealthy people that commit capitol crimes is likely 10,000 to one makes it very unlikely that rich people will be even charged in a death penalty case.
Yes, the wealthy do kill, but it's more likely a Phil Spector type case, where the crime doesn't meet the criteria for the death penalty. The O.J. Simpson case could have met the criteria, but, well his defense team turned the trial into an indictment of Detective Furman and he skated,
Should we make sentences for murder convictions like income tax so that rich people pay at a higher rate. Should we institute an earned income murder credit for killers below the poverty line?

Well, since you ask .... the government taking a person's life is far more serious than the government taking a person's money. Much higher standards should apply. It's obscene that rich people can intimidate DA's into plea deals for crimes for which poor people feel the full measure of the law. Since the gov't has demonstrated that it cannot administer the death penalty fairly, the gov't should not be killing its citizens.

In this citizen's opinion.

Please, the plea deals people get have virtually nothing to do with money. Deals usually depend on who the DA is and how political the case is.

 

[mskafka]

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg? They allegedly passed information to the Soviet Union about the atomic bomb. Dunno...but I doubt that this was done for free.

Had I done it, I would have commanded a hefty fee.

 

[Amelia]

When have you ever heard of a rich man committing murder in America?

Not the last time, but one I was trying to remember yesterday:

Leopold and Loeb - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia




Homicide by the rich and famous: a ... - Gini Graham Scott - Google Books



Of course, the wealthy can often pay/manipulate others to do the dirty work, but they do sometimes wield the weapons themselves.

 

[Ernie S.]

The fact that the ratio of poor to wealthy people that commit capitol crimes is likely 10,000 to one makes it very unlikely that rich people will be even charged in a death penalty case.
Yes, the wealthy do kill, but it's more likely a Phil Spector type case, where the crime doesn't meet the criteria for the death penalty. The O.J. Simpson case could have met the criteria, but, well his defense team turned the trial into an indictment of Detective Furman and he skated,
Should we make sentences for murder convictions like income tax so that rich people pay at a higher rate. Should we institute an earned income murder credit for killers below the poverty line?

Well, since you ask .... the government taking a person's life is far more serious than the government taking a person's money. Much higher standards should apply. It's obscene that rich people can intimidate DA's into plea deals for crimes for which poor people feel the full measure of the law. Since the gov't has demonstrated that it cannot administer the death penalty fairly, the gov't should not be killing its citizens.

In this citizen's opinion.

Granted taking life is more serious than taking money, but isn't it obscene that government can take much more of my money and give it to poor people, simply because there are more poor people?
The government is free to tax 1% of the people at a higher rate and give that money to 47% of the population that pay nothing at all. Why? Because the people getting screwed get 1 vote while the people rewarded for sitting on their asses get 47 votes.

Your claim that the government can't administer the death penalty fairly is bullshit. Show me a rich person convicted in a capitol case that has not been executed because his wealth gave him an advantage.

 

[Ernie S.]

Since when do we execute someone based on their wealth or lack thereof?

When have you ever heard of a rich man being executed in America?

Show me one that should have been.
Your argument is flawed. It's like arguing that smart people score higher on IQ tests, so the test must be flawed.

Wealthy people are not executed as often as poor people because they commit fewer capitol crimes.

 

[Cammmpbell]

According to Republicans, it's very difficult for rich people to commit crimes. They're "special". Because they're "rich".

Yeah....they don't kill anybody. They just run roughshod over the economy then watch the poor walk the streets, become debressed and kill themselves or somebody else.

When Ronald Reagan left office there were 7 million more in this country below the poverty line than when he took office...the willful destruction of collective bargaining was more than obvious and the national debt had quadrupled but guess what...the wealthy made out like bandits. Very little of their wealth Trickled Down. The Republican party loved it so much they've been naming airports, buildings, bridges and trying to put his face on bills and praising him like jesus ever since. The most calloused bunch of human beings in the history of the world has to be the modern Republican party. I was a Republican for most of my life. They used to stand for small government, balanced budgets and individual rights. Now they are in the pockets of the corporations and the wealthy. Go read Eisenhower's 1960 admonition to this government about falling for the perils of a military-industrial complex. Reagan turned around twice and brought it to fruition.

Wanna know where his idea for the Star Wars(SDI) more than likely came from..... "Murder in the Air," a cheap, grade B 1940 spy thriller. The irony of all this is that Reagan was a Democrat and the president of a union until his B movies began to make some serious money...then he converted to the party of low taxes for the wealthy.

 

[Amelia]

Since when do we execute someone based on their wealth or lack thereof?

When have you ever heard of a rich man being executed in America?

Show me one that should have been.
Your argument is flawed. It's like arguing that smart people score higher on IQ tests, so the test must be flawed.

Wealthy people are not executed as often as poor people because they commit fewer capitol crimes.

You named a potential one yourself. OJ.

Rich people can hire dream teams.

In many cases they can downgrade charges before they ever see a courtroom.

The lawyers of rich people have more motivation/resources/time for creative defenses to clear their client.

When trying to get through their burdensome caseloads, game theory comes into unintentional play. DA's know who can put up the biggest fight. They know when to cut their losses and strike a deal.


And juries tend to go easier on well-off people than they do on the kind of person they fear they'll meet in an alley.

 

[Ernie S.]

When have you ever heard of a rich man being executed in America?

Show me one that should have been.
Your argument is flawed. It's like arguing that smart people score higher on IQ tests, so the test must be flawed.

Wealthy people are not executed as often as poor people because they commit fewer capitol crimes.

You named a potential one yourself. OJ.

Rich people can hire dream teams.

In many cases they can downgrade charges before they ever see a courtroom.

The lawyers of rich people have more motivation/resources/time for creative defenses to clear their client.

When trying to get through their burdensome caseloads, game theory comes into unintentional play. DA's know who can put up the biggest fight. They know when to cut their losses and strike a deal.


And juries tend to go easier on well-off people than they do on the kind of person they fear they'll meet in an alley.

There's one in the last 20 years that you can come up with. I'll give you 5, OK, well in that same time period there have been roughly 300,000 murders.
OK, How many executions have there been in that time period?
By my count, 1,190. So, roughly 4 in 1,000 murders results in an execution. By my figures. rich people would have to commit about 50 times as many murders for there to be the likelihood that a single wealthy person would be executed.
Do you see now that you are being manipulated by a liberal media?

 

[PoliticalChic]

I can see why they don't go after the rich, that would be a lot of money wasted on something they probably wouldn't win.

Exactly ......


Justice for the poor is different from justice for the wealthy.

By coincidence, I just picked up Glenn Greenwald's "With Liberty and Justice For Some: How the Law is Used to Destroy Equality and Protect the Powerful."

The premise is exactly as you posted above.....

 

[amrchaos]

OK--I give up

How about some Internet research on this--Lets start with the last ten people executed and search for their personal wealths, ok?

I don't think things are as "biased" as you guys are letting on. Of course I could be naive on the matter, bu still....

 

[amrchaos]

By the way--do weathy gang members count??

 

[amrchaos]

Wait--how about if their family was rich, then there is a famous case out west where a set of brothers killed their parents!! That case was infamous--let me look that up for you guys!!

 

[amrchaos]

Nope--life in prison

By the way, there is a website that list the past executions in the US

I have to go, but it does make for an interesting read!!

http://www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/death/usexecute.htm