Death penalty - can it be justified?

[m-in-m]

I have just finished reading this article in today's Guardian.

It made me wonder: can the death penalty ever be justified?

I don't agree with taking a life for a life. I just don't feel that it is right nor feel comfortable with it. It seems hypocritical to me.

[Jenny]

For people who REALLY get on my nerves, oh yes.

[all new Phil]

I could never ever ever be comfortable with the idea of the death penalty. I don't believe that anybody has the right to decide that somebody deserves to die for whatever reason. It's barbaric, and we as a nation should be above that.

[DVB Cornwall]

Heard in connection with this case that some states are contemplating dropping the death penalty on economic grounds. Apparantly the court costs covering all the appeal processes are now significantly exceeding the cost of Life Imprisionment for the offender.

[Pete]

It's not the idea of executing murderers that gets to me, it's the concept of wrongful convictions. If you put someone in prison and then realise you were wrong you can let them go and throw big trucks of money at them. If you've killed them, what do you do?

The sheer thought of being arrested, jailed, put through a trial, wrongly found guilty and then sitting knowing you are to be killed by your own country for a crime you didn't commit is utterly hideous.

IIRC is there not some very iffy business going on in Texas where an executed man's appeal keeps being knocked back in case they find out they wrongly killed him?

[wells]

IIRC is there not some very iffy business going on in Texas where an executed man's appeal keeps being knocked back in case they find out they wrongly killed him?

Well you can't 'rightly' kill anyone.

Anyway lots of reasons why it's totally wrong, in my opinion.

1. It increases the circle of suffering (you have another family morning, children crying etc).

2. I think all murderers by the very nature of their crime are in a way mentally ill at least at the time they've committed the act, by the very fact the act is justified in their head. Serial Killers minds very clearly work differently and those who kill in the heat of moment aren't necessarily bad people and any potential punishment is unlikely to enter their thought process when the act is committed.

3. As Pete said the chance you could kill the wrong person, (wrong murder convictions can still happen, no matter what anyone says).

4. To make sure the process is watertight you need to throw loads of money at it, probably more than the cost of keeping them alive.

5. Almost every civilised country in the world doesn't do it, which must mean something.

[Chie]

A deterrent can only be effective if everyone in society agrees with it.

In this case, the deterrent is the threat of execution.

The death penalty is therefore useless, because would-be murderers know damn well that 50% of people are going to be against their execution, and, in the eyes of those people, they will be seen as a victim. Which is completely counter-productive and undermines the penalty's deterrent value.

So yes, I think abolish the death penalty and banish murderers from society by locking them away for life instead, which is a deterrent I'm sure everyone would agree with.

[Gavin Scott]

A deterrent can only be effective if everyone in society agrees with it.

In this case, the deterrent is the threat of execution.

The death penalty is therefore useless, because would-be murderers know damn well that 50% of people are going to be against their execution, and, in the eyes of those people, they will be seen as a victim. Which is completely counter-productive and undermines the penalty's deterrent value.

Is this another example of your hyperbole or do you really think "50% of people" have sympathy with those on death row? Really?

In all honesty I think you probably don't.

People may not like the death sentence on moral principle, but it doesn't follow that they feel anything at all about those on the waiting list.

There are exceptions - people with a vested interest - like the Scots man Kenny Ritchie who was on death row in the States for murder - but those in his family campaigned for a retrial as they believed all-along that his conviction was wrong.

And in that case they were right, and he was released.

But without having a vested interest, most criminals on death row are given no thought at all by most people.

All of that said, the numbers of death row inmates and the overall murder rate in the States is proof enough that its not a deterrent. People will kill, and that's that. If its cheaper now to incarcerate them for life then I hope they will choose that option instead.

I don't believe the State should have the right to take life any more than an individual does. What if they get it wrong? Does a "life for a life" extend to the families of someone wrongly executed, allowing them to take the life of the Judge who passed sentence wrongly? What's the difference?

If it was shown to reduce the number of murders then there might be an argument (which I would still oppose on principle); but as it doesn't there's no justifiable reason to allow State murder to continue.

[Chie]

I said that 50% of people (a statistic that, whilst not accurate, illustrates the extent of the divide which obviously exists) are against the death penalty. To somebody on death row this means that 50% of the state is on their side, in terms of his or her appeal against it.

For justice to work properly, society has to present a united front - everyone has to be behind the law. So on that basis, the death penalty should be abolished, because it is undermined by the fact that a vast number of people simply don't support it.

[Gavin Scott]

I said that 50% of people (a statistic that, whilst not accurate, illustrates the extent of the divide that obviously exists) are against the death penalty. To somebody on death row this means that 50% of the state is on their side, in terms of his or her appeal against it.

For justice to work properly, society has to present a united front - everyone has to be behind the law. So on that basis, the death penalty should be abolished, because it is undermined by the fact that a vast number of people simply don't support it.

As a new rule to Metropol; please don't quote statistics unless they are actually statistics. What you "reckon", "feel" and otherwise guess should be stated as such.

According to a glimpse at Wiki, only 6% of death sentences are overturned, so that would suggest your point is not correct.

I don't think death row inmates are comforted to know that some people abhor the death penalty; just as I don't think those who murder are particularly dissuaded by having the penalty.

As I said, I think people will continue to murder - for various reasons - irrespective of the consequence.

That's just the way humans are.

[Chie]

As a new rule to Metropol; please don't quote statistics unless they are actually statistics. What you "reckon", "feel" and otherwise guess should be stated as such.

Okay.

http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/us ... h_penalty/

Would you support punishing each of the following crimes with the death penalty? - Homicide

Canada:
Yes: 62%
No: 29%

USA:
Yes: 84%
No: 14%

Britain:
Yes: 67%
No: 23%

Statistics for other countries available at: http://www.angus-reid.com/issue/C9/

So *almost* a quarter of people would undermine the law if the death penalty was enforced here. I think that's still too many people. If 90% of the population supported the death penalty then I would say it's reasonable to bring it back. But they don't, so we shouldn't.