Death Penalty

[The rebel]

Do you agree with it? explain your answer.

My self, I'm not interesting in punishment for scum, so much as ensuring that they'll never be in a position to victimise someone else. I believe in protecting the innocent far more than spending time and money trying to rehabilitate criminals.

A reminder to all: if you cannot contribute positively to this thread, PLEASE do not contribute at all. Also, it would be appreciated if you do not copy/paste articles, or link to third party websites. I would like this to be direct, one-to-one.

[fagash_killer]

i believe the death penalty is a reasonable societal response to the most serious crimes, and his Governor's Commission on Capital Punishment is charged with making "recommendations and proposals designed to further ensure the application and administration of the death penalty in Illinois is just, fair and accurate."

[avowedly-agnostic]

Civilised countries do not kill their citizens under any circumstances, because to kill as a punishment suggests that killing can be justified in some cases, when the message you ought to send out is that killig is not under any circumstance justified-period.

Rebel judging from your argument you don't appear to be particularly interested in debate, justice or what really works as a deterrent, you just want to kill criminal "scum" so you don't have to pay to keep them alive, despite the fact that by the end of the appeals process etc in many cases it actually costs more to kill someone in the USA than to imprison them for life.

As for those who argue that the death penalty serves as a mean of detterent, they've got to take into consideration the following: there are two examples of murders, those who plan their act, and those who kill in the spur of the moment. Those who meticulously plan also fully plan to get away with it, so being caught doesn't feature in their rationale, and thus the consequences are irrelevant. Those who act in the spur of the moment have given no thought to the outcome anyway, and thus the consequences are irrelevant.

Also, proponents of the death penalty must be able to answer the following questions:

1. How will you ensure that nobody is ever wrongfully put to death?

2. Are you 110% prepared to be mistakenly put to death as an innocent person wrongfully convicted? (Or are you OK with it as long as it only happens to someone else?)

3. How do we compensate someone who is wrongfully executed?

4. Do you believe it's OK to kill people in some circumstances? If yes (as you surely must, if you support the death penalty), do you not see that this same logic could also be applied by a (potential) murderer in order to justify their killing - since killing is obviously acceptable in some circumstances (according to you)? Do you not believe it is clearer to state outright that all killing is always wrong, and that no killing can ever be logically justified?

[The rebel]

I'm first and foremost intrested for justice and above was just a quick opinion and not my arguement. I am ready to hear your arguement and other members too. Keep it up

[The rebel]

I agree 100% death plent if they know the person did the crime beyong the doubt

Throwing them in a cell for the rest of their lives is eating MY resources. (as does everyone elses)for feeding and taking care of these people.

Like I said, if they know, without a doubt, the person did the crime, why not put them to death? They obviously care nothing for anyone else's lives, why should we care about theirs?

[Demure]

I'm pro-capital punishment I don't want to see it taken away. If it's proven beyond reasonable doubt the accused killed for any motive other than self defense or unintended accident, the sentence should be death. As long as the whole process is channelled through a reliable system of Law, I don't approve of taking justice in your own hands. Life is the most precious thing endowed to us, taking it away carelessly should be met with the utmost punishment.

[QansaGabeyle]

To get this discussion started, I will post two points that I always make when I discuss the death penalty with friends and family:

#1) Innocent people are being freed from death row at an alarming rate. What if we excute someone who is innocent? In 2003, the United States freed almost one innocent person from death row every month.

#2) When I speak to someone about the death penalty, cost almost always comes up. "Why should society have to spend money feeding and taking care of this murderer," they say. Of course, when I tell them that capital punishment is far more expensive a punishment than alternative punishments, they do not believe me. But, do not give up on this point. Spending money on a few death penalty cases each year means the state needs to divert resources from other genuine crime control measures.

For more info on cost, go to:

http://www.amnestyusa.org/abolish/cost.html

If you are not already familar with the costs associated with the death penalty, you will be shocked. For example, in Florida, each execution costs the state $3.2 million, compared to $600,000 for life imprisonment!

[QansaGabeyle]

"If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murders, we have allowed the killing of a bunch of innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former. This, to me, is not a tough call."

John McAdams - Marquette University/Department of Political Science, on deterrence

That quote is from the pro death penalty site, and it's an attitude that I find quite disturbing. If murder is so wrong, then why are the pro-DP groups supporting it? In my opinion state-sanctioned murder is still murder.

When I am debating the DP - which as the brother of a man on Florida's death row I often do - there are a couple of points that I always raise.

The first being as already pointed out - the execution of innocent people.
I often wonder if someone was executed and later found innocent would the family then be able to charge the state with murder? Or the juror's?
With the number of people who have been released from death row due to their innocence there can be absolutely no doubt that innocent people have been murdered by their state. The execution of one innocent person is one too many.

A couple of days ago I was reading an interview with a man who is pro DP, and when the issue of innocent people being executed his reaction was "in any war there will be casualties". So this man accepts that there are innocent people being killed, and thinks that it's acceptable.

The second point is financial, but not the cost to the state.
Rather that if you are poor you can't afford a good lawyer and are more likely to be sentanced to die.

The final point is 'vengence'.
I remember when Timothy McVeigh was executed and there were interviews with some of the family members of the victims. Some of them were opposed to the execution, but the majority spoken to were supporting it.
My argument being that by these people almost celebrating the death of this man would make them no better than what they were saying he was.
In fact it never fails to amaze me that people who are traumatised by the death of a family member, or of someone they love, don't seem to think that by having the perpetrator killed they are advocating murder.

From a non-American perspective the attitude seems to be "murder is wrong, and in order to show you how wrong it is we are going to murder you"

[LionHeart-112]

We can debate why it's right or wrong to execute a murderer but the fact that Allah (swt) said it's permissible is good enough for me. I will leave the debating to the experts.

Apparently San dheer had another nickname:The rebel. She is clearly still rebelling against Islam and capital punishment.

[Mowhawk]

LionHeart

What has capital punishment in the U.S got to do with Sharia Laws? The capital punishment in the U.S is for those who lack capital, an example is O.J Simpson. Most of America's death row inmates are poor black people. You and many other poor Somalis are candidates for death row.

Demure

How could it be a deterent when Australia without the death penalty has less homocide per population than the U.S? Did it stop or slow homocides in the U.S? If guns are easily available, then people will kill:wink:

Blame the NRA.

[LionHeart-112]

Mowhawk..Please dont act stupid. I can luahg at a joke or two, but i'm not willing to tolerate ignorance.

[The rebel]

About innocent person put on death could happen, but there is no greater chance of an innocent person being sent to die than there is to this other grand proposition of a soul destroying 'life in prison without chance of parolle', living out their days without hope of release, without hope of ever spending a night at home with their families again...

I know that prison is a far greater punnishment than actually killing someone if suffering is what we want to inflict on them. That's why I said from the very beginning I was more interested in protecting the victims of criminals than I was in punnishment...

Putting an innocent man in prison for the rest of his life is no more humane than putting one to death.

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[DamallaXagare]

The likelihood that an innocent could face the death penalty whereas a criminal is freed is the most apprehensive outcome that everyone thinks about.

It is a capital punishment that engages the most extreme torture on someone's mind by living with it all of these years and waiting the moment he is going to die.

When they electrocuted a black inmate from Virginia if my memory is serving me right, his body turned into a coal and then shredded into the floor like a broken glass. That horrified every person and it was abolished afterwards. Now they use lethal injections.

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