The Death Penalty---OP/ED

[Skull Pilot]

Most of the civilized world and most of the U.S. Has given up on the death penalty

It is time for us to look at who we align ourselves with in still having capital punishment.....China, India, the Muslim world

Is this what we want to be?

It depends

Are you comparing the death penalty for the most heinous of crimes to the death penalty for adultery or political reasons?

Some people do deserve the death penalty. One case from my state comes to mind.

Cheshire, Connecticut, home invasion murders - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

IMO those 2 animals should not only be put to death but they should be burned alive

A civilized country should not sink to the level of eye for an eye Justice.

The fundamental goal is to prevent the crime. And just how do we do that? We enter consequences into the process. That more often than not will be considered by the would be criminal before he decides to commit the crime. Lets see, I want to die 'suicide by cop', to do that, just need to point my gun at them. On the flip side, I want to rape someone, depending on state, i'm looking at 10 to 20. We need to increase the consequence of the lessor crimes to that equal to suicide by cop. We don't hear about that very often do we? I mean not as often as rape, robbery, burglary, etc.

-Geaux

The U.S. Has 2.5 million people filling our prisons to capacity. More than any nation in the world

Our..."Get tough on crime" does not seem to be working

Yeah and most of those are nonviolent offenders we are talking about crimes that warrant death not kiting checks

 

[Skull Pilot]

I personally don't have a problem with a death penalty for the most heinous crimes.
I do however think that for death penalty cases the standard of proof must be much higher. Rather than beyond a reasonable doubt for capital cases it should be beyond any shadow of a doubt and must include irrefutable forensic evidence.

So it's okay to send people to prison for the rest of their lives on dubious evidence.

Here's the real problem. You look at who gets sentenced to death, and its usually POOR people. Rich people get good lawyers. Poor people get public defenders.

Now, if you required public defenders to be just as well funded as prosecutor's offices, then you MIGHT have something resembling justice.

Oh. Wait. Poor people don't deserve justice. You aren't even for paying them a living wage.

Obviously the idea of a different standard of proof is too much for your tiny brain to comprehend

 

[rightwinger]

Once Hillary gets elected, she will name at least three liberal judges bringing the number to six for the next twenty years

Capital Punishment is not used in the majority of states. Drug makers want nothing to do with it

The court will abolish it on the first legitimate case as cruel and unusual

 

[ChrisL]

I personally don't have a problem with a death penalty for the most heinous crimes.
I do however think that for death penalty cases the standard of proof must be much higher. Rather than beyond a reasonable doubt for capital cases it should be beyond any shadow of a doubt and must include irrefutable forensic evidence.

So it's okay to send people to prison for the rest of their lives on dubious evidence.

Here's the real problem. You look at who gets sentenced to death, and its usually POOR people. Rich people get good lawyers. Poor people get public defenders.

Now, if you required public defenders to be just as well funded as prosecutor's offices, then you MIGHT have something resembling justice.

Oh. Wait. Poor people don't deserve justice. You aren't even for paying them a living wage.

Obviously the idea of a different standard of proof is too much for your tiny brain to comprehend

DNA evidence can and IS in fact tampered with more than you would think. It can also be contaminated. If you do the research, you can find plenty of examples of this actually happening.

 

[2aguy]

ALL of the civilized country have done away with the DP. We are amongst third world countries with our use of the DP.

So....when there is incontrovertible evidence that the man is a murderer....you want him to live?

 

[JoeB131]

Obviously the idea of a different standard of proof is too much for your tiny brain to comprehend

well, no, it should be the SAME standard of proof no matter what the penalty is.

You know, the one about "beyond a reasonable doubt."

 

[JoeB131]

So....when there is incontrovertible evidence that the man is a murderer....you want him to live?

We've had to release 154 people from death row who had "incontrovertible" proof they did it.

so, um, yeah, I'd rather have him live than inflict a penalty that was wrong.

 

[JoeMoma]

ALL of the civilized country have done away with the DP. We are amongst third world countries with our use of the DP.

So....when there is incontrovertible evidence that the man is a murderer....you want him to live?

The problem is who is to say what incontrovertible evidence is. Our standard for conviction of any crime is "beyond a resonance doubt". Yet the Innocents Project has already helped free many people that were wrongly convicted.

 

[westwall]

Obviously the idea of a different standard of proof is too much for your tiny brain to comprehend

well, no, it should be the SAME standard of proof no matter what the penalty is.

You know, the one about "beyond a reasonable doubt."

Beyond a reasonable doubt is suitable for non capital cases. That is the judicial standard we enjoy now. And....people are wrongly convicted. That's why for the DP to be a possibility the standard of proof would be "AN ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY" of evidence in my perfect world.

 

[JoeMoma]

Obviously the idea of a different standard of proof is too much for your tiny brain to comprehend

well, no, it should be the SAME standard of proof no matter what the penalty is.

You know, the one about "beyond a reasonable doubt."

Beyond a reasonable doubt is suitable for non capital cases. That is the judicial standard we enjoy now. And....people are wrongly convicted. That's why for the DP to be a possibility the standard of proof would be "AN ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY" of evidence in my perfect world.

Would a confession of guilt from the suspect be a case of AN ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY? I don't know that I can be 100% absolute certain about much anything.

 

[JoeB131]

Beyond a reasonable doubt is suitable for non capital cases. That is the judicial standard we enjoy now. And....people are wrongly convicted. That's why for the DP to be a possibility the standard of proof would be "AN ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY" of evidence in my perfect world.

Or we could try not blowing millions of dollars trying to put the occasional person to death and so something reasonable like invest in better investigation, crime prevention, and so on.

Once more, I live in a state where we had to let 13 people go from Death Row because Police and Prosecutors either manufactured evidence or straight up lied. Finally, our Republican Governor had to commute the death sentences of 168 people because simply, he could not trust any of them did what they supposedly were there for.

You the death penalty has absolutely ZERO deterrent value. (Non-DP states have lower murder rates than DP states.) It's expensive and far too often, we find we've sent the wrong person to death row.

So what's the point, to satisfy your blood lust?

 

[JoeB131]

Would a confession of guilt from the suspect be a case of AN ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY? I don't know that I can be 100% absolute certain about much anything.

The Police get people to confess to things they didn't do all the time. That's another problem.

 

[Liberty777]

I don't think any other subject stirs up as much as the death penalty, short of abortion. The biggest problem is that while liberal democrats FIGHT any inclusion of morality in abortion they INSIST on its placement when talking about the death penalty. They CLAIM the right has a flawed idea of morals when it comes to the death penalty and that simply is NOT the case.

THE DEATH PENALTY IS INHUMANE
Killing an innocent in the womb that has committed no crime is inhumane. Killing a murderer a rapist or a child molester is justice. A given percentage of the populace is simply going to be criminals. There is no utopia no programs that is going to change that. And people simply need to be adult enough to accept that.

THE DEATH PENALTY SHOULD BE PAINLESS
Why? Granted I am not saying burn them at the stake but why should it HAVE to be painless? Down here in Arizona in the town I live in we had a meth head passing through town that beat a woman to death for her lap top and some change. Anybody care to guess how long it takes to get beat to death? Reports at the time said her beating MAY have taken 15 to 20 minutes. Why does his death HAVE to be painless? Why should he be allowed to just go to sleep?

THE DEAD BODY CAN TRAUMATIZE THE FAMILY
That's a good thing, its a wake up call your family has a failure in parenting OR where you live has a failure in community. Its the result of a socially unacceptable act. They USED to do it in public and people used to bring their children. It was a lesson is social morality. If you behave this way then that is the result.

THE DEATH PENALTY SHOULD NOT BE PUBLIC
Wrong again as there is every reason FOR it to be public. I am not talking required to watch but available. I would go so far as to leave it open to the press. I would allow it to be televised. The victims, their families and the general population have a RIGHT to see their justice system work.

Fury

I simply do not trust the government to murder it's citizens as a "punishment."

Then make juries mandatory in death penalty cases. Problem solved.

Nope. The states have been known to do some pretty shady things. No way.

Texas has a law if you have 3 people who saw it you go to the front of the line.

Texas is a great state

 

[westwall]

Beyond a reasonable doubt is suitable for non capital cases. That is the judicial standard we enjoy now. And....people are wrongly convicted. That's why for the DP to be a possibility the standard of proof would be "AN ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY" of evidence in my perfect world.

Or we could try not blowing millions of dollars trying to put the occasional person to death and so something reasonable like invest in better investigation, crime prevention, and so on.

Once more, I live in a state where we had to let 13 people go from Death Row because Police and Prosecutors either manufactured evidence or straight up lied. Finally, our Republican Governor had to commute the death sentences of 168 people because simply, he could not trust any of them did what they supposedly were there for.

You the death penalty has absolutely ZERO deterrent value. (Non-DP states have lower murder rates than DP states.) It's expensive and far too often, we find we've sent the wrong person to death row.

So what's the point, to satisfy your blood lust?

Wrong. The DP has no deterrent value because it is so rarely used, and then only after decades of wasteful litigation. On that part I agree with you. However, in certain very rare cases I believe the DP is warranted and provided the extremely rigid controls I would have placed on it in my perfect world. It would work. I agree that it doesn't deter murder for the most part but the perp himself would be extremely deterred from killing anyone else. Don't ya think?

 

[JoeB131]

Wrong. The DP has no deterrent value because it is so rarely used, and then only after decades of wasteful litigation. On that part I agree with you. However, in certain very rare cases I believe the DP is warranted and provided the extremely rigid controls I would have placed on it in my perfect world. It would work. I agree that it doesn't deter murder for the most part but the perp himself would be extremely deterred from killing anyone else. Don't ya think?

Not really. I suspect that if a guy knew he was going to die, he'd probably take any opportunity to shank a guard.

The reason why we have so much "wasteful" litigation is because we've had so many cases where people were exonerated. We've also had a lotof cases where the DP was wrongly applied - to cases of manslaughter instead of murder.

Point is, the rest of the civilized world has abolished the DP, and they are just fine.

 

[DarkFury]

Most of the civilized world and most of the U.S. Has given up on the death penalty

It is time for us to look at who we align ourselves with in still having capital punishment.....China, India, the Muslim world

Is this what we want to be?

It depends

Are you comparing the death penalty for the most heinous of crimes to the death penalty for adultery or political reasons?

Some people do deserve the death penalty. One case from my state comes to mind.

Cheshire, Connecticut, home invasion murders - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

IMO those 2 animals should not only be put to death but they should be burned alive

A civilized country should not sink to the level of eye for an eye Justice.

Says you.

Those 2 mutts do not deserve to be drawing breath after what they did

A society should be setting an example for moral behavior

Kind of like a woman running for president SHOULD be setting an example of ethical behavior.

 

[Ravi]

I don't think any other subject stirs up as much as the death penalty, short of abortion. The biggest problem is that while liberal democrats FIGHT any inclusion of morality in abortion they INSIST on its placement when talking about the death penalty. They CLAIM the right has a flawed idea of morals when it comes to the death penalty and that simply is NOT the case.

THE DEATH PENALTY IS INHUMANE
Killing an innocent in the womb that has committed no crime is inhumane. Killing a murderer a rapist or a child molester is justice. A given percentage of the populace is simply going to be criminals. There is no utopia no programs that is going to change that. And people simply need to be adult enough to accept that.

THE DEATH PENALTY SHOULD BE PAINLESS
Why? Granted I am not saying burn them at the stake but why should it HAVE to be painless? Down here in Arizona in the town I live in we had a meth head passing through town that beat a woman to death for her lap top and some change. Anybody care to guess how long it takes to get beat to death? Reports at the time said her beating MAY have taken 15 to 20 minutes. Why does his death HAVE to be painless? Why should he be allowed to just go to sleep?

THE DEAD BODY CAN TRAUMATIZE THE FAMILY
That's a good thing, its a wake up call your family has a failure in parenting OR where you live has a failure in community. Its the result of a socially unacceptable act. They USED to do it in public and people used to bring their children. It was a lesson is social morality. If you behave this way then that is the result.

THE DEATH PENALTY SHOULD NOT BE PUBLIC
Wrong again as there is every reason FOR it to be public. I am not talking required to watch but available. I would go so far as to leave it open to the press. I would allow it to be televised. The victims, their families and the general population have a RIGHT to see their justice system work.

Fury

People that support the death penalty support big government.

 

[westwall]

Wrong. The DP has no deterrent value because it is so rarely used, and then only after decades of wasteful litigation. On that part I agree with you. However, in certain very rare cases I believe the DP is warranted and provided the extremely rigid controls I would have placed on it in my perfect world. It would work. I agree that it doesn't deter murder for the most part but the perp himself would be extremely deterred from killing anyone else. Don't ya think?

Not really. I suspect that if a guy knew he was going to die, he'd probably take any opportunity to shank a guard.

The reason why we have so much "wasteful" litigation is because we've had so many cases where people were exonerated. We've also had a lotof cases where the DP was wrongly applied - to cases of manslaughter instead of murder.

Point is, the rest of the civilized world has abolished the DP, and they are just fine.

I've never heard of the DP being applied to a person convicted of Manslaughter, which is still murder, it's usually the result of a plea deal. That being said, for the most part I agree with you. The DP should only be used in the worst possible cases and carried out swiftly when sentence is passed. I don't really care how other countries deal with their criminals. Anders Breivik has the potential to be a free man in a couple of decades even after murdering over 70 people. Mostly kids. He's the sort that i would resort to a medieval form of punishment to deal with, and would have no problem going to bed at night afterwards.

 

[Skull Pilot]

I personally don't have a problem with a death penalty for the most heinous crimes.
I do however think that for death penalty cases the standard of proof must be much higher. Rather than beyond a reasonable doubt for capital cases it should be beyond any shadow of a doubt and must include irrefutable forensic evidence.

So it's okay to send people to prison for the rest of their lives on dubious evidence.

Here's the real problem. You look at who gets sentenced to death, and its usually POOR people. Rich people get good lawyers. Poor people get public defenders.

Now, if you required public defenders to be just as well funded as prosecutor's offices, then you MIGHT have something resembling justice.

Oh. Wait. Poor people don't deserve justice. You aren't even for paying them a living wage.

Obviously the idea of a different standard of proof is too much for your tiny brain to comprehend

DNA evidence can and IS in fact tampered with more than you would think. It can also be contaminated. If you do the research, you can find plenty of examples of this actually happening.

If it is proven to be contaminated then it is not irrefutable is it?

 

[Skull Pilot]

Obviously the idea of a different standard of proof is too much for your tiny brain to comprehend

well, no, it should be the SAME standard of proof no matter what the penalty is.

You know, the one about "beyond a reasonable doubt."

Not for death penalty cases which was the point that sailed right over your blunt little head

If the state is going to put someone to death and some people do deserve to be put to death then merely beyond reasonable doubt does not cut it

Most of the problem is the jury system anyway.