After reading a couple articles in the Houston paper and some comments I wonder if this whole Death Penalty thing could not be solved in an easy manner. Give the Family members harmed the right to pick the method and carry it out if they so choose.. Be it hanging in a public square, firing squad, gun to the head like they do in China, or any of the other methods.

Your thoughts

Kill more
Make public
No sitting on death row for 10years+

Whack'em and stack'em.

Quoted: Kill more Make public No sitting on death row for 10years+

+1

1 appeal.

Execution follows immediately afterwards.

Quoted: 1 appeal. Execution follows immediately afterwards.

I agree 100%!

1. Public televised

2. No more then 1 year on death row

3. Limited to 1 appeal , but has to be appealed in the first 10 days after conviction.

4. More executions.

5. Inmate can choose how he wants to die.

6. No lethal injection for sex offenders.

7. Draw and quarter for sex offenders.

For people we are 100% sure has raped, stolen/robbed, molested a child, or murdered execute them.


Publicly.


I believe people who kill because they where driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs should be executed also.



Theres a guy around here that was driving drunk and killed a bunch of people.


He was supposed to get 15 years, he's getting out after only 3 years.

too many mistakes, double standards, and incompetance in the judical system.

4X4 cell with door welded shut.

California has a 3 strikes law that says on your third felony conviction you get a 25 to life enhancement.  That is wrong.  The trhird strike should be a death sentence.  We have too many POS sitting in jail cells.  Society would be better served if they were exterminated.  

If there is beyond ANY reasonable doubt (ie several witnesses, camera footage ect.) they should march the convicted behind the courthouse and carry out the sentence.  Period.

If there aren't any witnesses and the conviction comes from less convincing sources you should be allowed an appeal.  After it's upheld, take em' behind the courthouse and carry out the sentence.

Magoo

What, no poll?

+1 for the death penalty, -1 for its inefficiencies.

Since there are and will be convictions of the 'wrong guy',

I think it's important that the execution be swift and clean.

None of this 'torture to death' that pops up.  Hang them.  Shoot them.  Whatever.

But the 8th amendment exists for a reason.

Quoted: Quoted: too many mistakes, double standards, and incompetance in the judical system. 4X4 cell with door welded shut. Agree, there is too much room for error and no way to undo it.  Life in prison is the better option.

No.

I favor the death penelty. STRONGLY. but you have to think about it this way, do you want the government deciding what crimes are worthy of death? should they have that power?

also, prison is a much worse sentance than death in my mind.

still, I beleive that if you violate the social contract badly enough (rape, cold blooded murder, child abuse), and there is hard evidence (not just witnesses, or circumstantial) you should die. dont pass go, dont collect a hundred dollars. just die.

5 strikes and you're out, rape, murder, armed robbery, molestation, drug manufacture and distribution (white drugs), and any other crime that causes intense, unjust suffering on the victim.

No appeal. If a person is smart and they know the potential consequences they won't fuck with it in the first place.

Immediate execution with method dictated proportionate to the amount of suffering caused (punishment should fit the crime). I.e. if a meth manufacturer was convicted, he would be put to death by experiencing all the suffering an end user does...many times over, until it kills him or her.

Until you get tough on crime and show criminals you are serious, they will repeatedly take advantage of you.

Make Murder one a capital crime

Make rape a capital cime.

Make armed robbery a capital crime.

Those that prey on children sexually, should face it too.

Make the attempts at any of these a capitol crime.

One appeal. Then no drop hanging.

Televise it, all net all channels.

In no time at all you'd be execute a LOT less people and crime would drop dramatically.

Mike Nifong

Quoted: Quoted: 1. Public televised (PAY PER VIEW) 2. No more then 1 year on death row (agree) 3. Limited to 1 appeal , but has to be appealed in the first 10 days after conviction. (let's give them 30 days) 4. More executions. (agree) 5. Inmate can choose how he wants to die. (Just have hangings, again Pay Per View) 6. No lethal injection for sex offenders. (AGREE!) 7. Draw and quarter for sex offenders. (Hang with short rope, promotes strangulation) Hanging would sell well on Pay Per View, offsetting the cost of keeping the rest of the trash.

double yip.

Quoted: Quoted: California has a 3 strikes law that says on your third felony conviction you get a 25 to life enhancement.  That is wrong.  The trhird strike should be a death sentence.  We have too many POS sitting in jail cells.  Society would be better served if they were exterminated.   Now THAT would be a good law. "But but but, I just stole a piece of pizza!" "Sorry...but you have two other convictions; your execution date is..... say bye bye, fucker!" Overnight reduction in crime...I guarantee you.

do you think that the death penalty reduces crime? I support it and I feel that it is a moot point in that respect. criminals will commit crime no matter what the punishment. I would RATHER die than go to prison.

The death penalty kills innocent people.

If not for that I'd be in total support of revoking the birth certificates of criminals.

Quoted: The death penalty kills innocent people. If not for that I'd be in total support of revoking the birth certificates of criminals.

Nothing is perfect.  Rotting in jail for 40 years happens to innocent people, too.


That's one of the main reasons the 8th amendment exists.

height=8

Quoted: do you think that the death penalty reduces crime? I support it and I feel that it is a moot point in that respect. criminals will commit crime no matter what the punishment. I would RATHER die than go to prison.

I have a long standing disagreement with a retired sheriff about this. He also claims it is not a deterrent. He won't give me a straight answer about how many murders were prevented when Ted Bundy was executed. I would call it the ultimate deterrent. That murderer will never kill again.

I have to agree with you on the last part!

I have changed my mind on this issue over the years.

The death penalty has no deterrent effect, it isn't cheaper, and the courts/law enforcement/prosecutors make mistakes, or worse, behave unethically.

I don't see the point - other than the state providing a sense of revenge to the victim/victim's family.  While this is a laudable goal, the costs outweigh the benefits, and I'm not sure that this is the proper role of government anyway.

I suppose in cases where DNA evidence positively ID's the accused, then perhaps the balance shifts.  

There have been many, many wrongfully accused that have been later exonerated by DNA.  This proves that, in the absence of this tool, courts and juries would get it wrong.  There are undeniably more that are wrongfully accused, but we will never know b/c there is no DNA, one way or the other.  Now that we have this tool, there should be fewer errors, but not DNA is not a factor in every death penalty case.  Often, it's just not present, either as exculpatory or inculpatory evidence.  

The simple fact is that eyewitnesses often suck.  Black people really do all look alike to whites.  And vice-versa.  When my wife lived in Japan, the Japanese remarked that they couldn't tell gaijins apart.  This is one part of the problem.  Maybe it's dark.  People are scared, things happen fast, etc...

As a lawyer, I don't do any criminal defense, but I have many friends who do.  And prosecutors (and defense attys) do, on occasion, play fast and loose, even in murder cases.  Human beings are flawed creatures, subject to ego, fear, grandiosity, self-delusion.  Look at Nifong, for example.  The sad reality is that a poor defendant might not have exposed Nifong's lies.  There are many more closer calls, where the LEOs and DAs really do believe, albeit incorrectly, the defendant to be guilty and fail to disclose exculpatory evidence.  The reason is that, if they get caught, the only consequence is that there's a mistrial or a continuance. Judges do not report these cases to the Bar for disciplinary action, and the defense attys don't either b/c they need a working relationship with the prosecutors.

And some defense attys stink.  Or don't have the resources to provide a good defense.  Here in VA, we recently had a death penalty conviction overturned, where the defendant seemed to have had a barely adequate defense, and was himself barely intelligent enough to participate in his own defense.  Nearing the end of his life, one of the LEOs told the Atty General that he had reservations about the accused who had been sitting on death row for 12 +/- years.  But for DNA, this guy would have been killed for a crime he flat out didn't commit.  Had the real murderer not left DNA, Earl Washington would have been killed by the state.  

Yeah, it would be cheaper if we reduced the appeals process, didn't provide indigent defense, didn't give the accused access to experts to analyze ballistics, DNA, etc...

But in such a truncated system, I wouldn't death to be on the table anyway.

Human justice is imperfect.  We do the best we can.  Justice will not be served in those cases where a guilty person escapes deserved death, but that's better than the reverse, especially given the lack of deterrence.

I know this is viscerally unsatisfying.  I cannot help but think of the Harvey murders in Richmond, VA, or that case out in Ohio where the boyfriend/girfriend were tortured, then murdered.  There is no doubt these criminals deserve death.  But it's just not worth it, on balance.  I'm glad to live in a society where the visceral responses are tamed.      

I think the families of the victims should be more directly involved in the process of the death penalty and how it is carried out.  I do think most violent crimes (especially child molestation, rape, etc.) deserve more punishment, but it seems like our government too distracted over the unreasonable obsession with drug offenses.  I think being locked in 4x4 cell is a good form of punishment.  In addition, if you lock them in that cell and tell them sometime over the next 30 years they will be shot in the back of the head by a family member of the victim.  They might get shot in 2 weeks or in 19 years.  I think this would really bring to light the magnitude of their crime, never given the pleasure of knowing when they are going to die.  

Quoted: Mike Nifong

bingo!  I'll take political corruption for $600 Alex

Amazing how many ARFers have a deep set distrust for the .gov in all forms, but rally around when it comes time to decide who gets to live or die.

A government should never be allowed to kill its own citizens.

Quoted: Quoted: Mike Nifong bingo!  I'll take political corruption for $600 Alex Amazing how many ARFers have a deep set distrust for the .gov in all forms, but rally around when it comes time to decide who gets to live or die.

I concur...  I am way to cynical about .gov to let them make the final choice.

For every person wrongfully sentenced to death, there are many, perhaps dozens, perhaps hundreds, wrongfully sent to prison, languishing in hellish conditions, who will never get out because the exquisite moral sensitivity brigade doesn't actually care nearly so much about either miscarriages of justice or the welfare of criminals as it does about proving just how superior they are to the common run of folk in their lack of bloodlust.  Look, any system of enforcing laws and dealing with its violators is going to result in mistakes or even outright abuses.  The superior revocability of imprisonment is more theoretical than actual - in the first place because, in the absence of prefabbed moral outrage, hardly anyone lifts a finger for the imprisoned (and the imprisoned have far fewer opportunities for judicial review), and secondly, because, while you can restore a man to liberty, and even pay him off, you can't give him back his youth, or wipe away the scars of living with a bunch of animals for some substantial portion of his life.  Prisons are awful, awful places, a fact realized, and paradoxically touted, by opponents of capital punishment, who extol the greater punishment entailed in imprisonment, while professing shock at the brutality of execution.  It's also rather odd how those of a libertarian stripe profess to prefer a system whereby the inmate is subjected to constant surveillance, supervision, and behavior modification, rather like an experimental subject.  Death at least respects a convict's moral agency and humanity, while imprisonment treats him as raw material for the state's efforts at behavioral modification.  Hanging isn't barbaric.  Prison is, and "life without parole" most of all.  

height=8

Quoted: For every person wrongfully sentenced to death, there are many, perhaps dozens, perhaps hundreds, wrongfully sent to prison, languishing in hellish conditions, who will never get out because the exquisite moral sensitivity brigade doesn't actually care nearly so much about either miscarriages of justice or the welfare of criminals as it does about proving just how superior they are to the common run of folk in their lack of bloodlust.  Look, any system of enforcing laws and dealing with its violators is going to result in mistakes or even outright abuses.  The superior revocability of imprisonment is more theoretical than actual - in the first place because, in the absence of prefabbed moral outrage, hardly anyone lifts a finger for the imprisoned (and the imprisoned have far fewer opportunities for judicial review), and secondly, because, while you can restore a man to liberty, and even pay him off, you can't give him back his youth, or wipe away the scars of living with a bunch of animals for some substantial portion of his life.  Prisons are awful, awful places, a fact realized, and paradoxically touted, by opponents of capital punishment, who extol the greater punishment entailed in imprisonment, while professing shock at the brutality of execution.  It's also rather odd how those of a libertarian stripe profess to prefer a system whereby the inmate is subjected to constant surveillance, supervision, and behavior modification, rather like an experimental subject.  Death at least respects a convict's moral agency and humanity, while imprisonment treats him as raw material for the state's efforts at behavioral modification.  Hanging isn't barbaric.  Prison is, and "life without parole" most of all.

I agree.

After watching Midnight Express, I was stunned by the realization that, in spite of the brutality and appalling conditions, I would much prefer to serve out a long sentence in that Turkish prison then in a max security US prison.

As to your arguments, ask any death row inmate whose been acquitted whether he would have just preferred to just die then serve the time he did and be released.  I'm guessing that in spite of loss of freedom, abuses suffered, and humiliations, most would prefer a shot at living.

The failures of the judicial and correctional systems in regard to non-death cases do not excuse or justify the imposition of death.  

Were it me, though, I'd prefer hand amputation to serving multiple years in a US prison.  That's how bad they suck.  Every year, there are around 30,000 rapes in US prisons (2 million inmates), which is insanely high given that the entire US population experienced only 200,000 rapes and sexual assaults (300 million).  That means a prisoner is about 22 times more likely to be raped then a free person, ignoring that men almost never get raped in normal society.

The reality is that a huge percentage of our prison population are NOT violent offenders.  Multiple convictions of simple possession of the most addictive illegal drugs will land you in prison, especially in a three-strikes state.

Quoted: For every person wrongfully sentenced to death, there are many, perhaps dozens, perhaps hundreds, wrongfully sent to prison, languishing in hellish conditions, who will never get out because the exquisite moral sensitivity brigade doesn't actually care nearly so much about either miscarriages of justice or the welfare of criminals as it does about proving just how superior they are to the common run of folk in their lack of bloodlust.  Look, any system of enforcing laws and dealing with its violators is going to result in mistakes or even outright abuses.  The superior revocability of imprisonment is more theoretical than actual - in the first place because, in the absence of prefabbed moral outrage, hardly anyone lifts a finger for the imprisoned (and the imprisoned have far fewer opportunities for judicial review), and secondly, because, while you can restore a man to liberty, and even pay him off, you can't give him back his youth, or wipe away the scars of living with a bunch of animals for some substantial portion of his life.  Prisons are awful, awful places, a fact realized, and paradoxically touted, by opponents of capital punishment, who extol the greater punishment entailed in imprisonment, while professing shock at the brutality of execution.  It's also rather odd how those of a libertarian stripe profess to prefer a system whereby the inmate is subjected to constant surveillance, supervision, and behavior modification, rather like an experimental subject.  Death at least respects a convict's moral agency and humanity, while imprisonment treats him as raw material for the state's efforts at behavioral modification.  Hanging isn't barbaric.  Prison is, and "life without parole" most of all.

You've condemned an institution.  Care to offer the idea for a viable alternative?

I'm not a huge fan of the death penalty. I don't have any moral qualms with it, but I can't shake the feeling that innocent people have been put to death. I understand that innocent people have spent life in prison (nothing is perfect), but at least we didn't kill them. And we've let some of those people back out, when we learned about the mistake. You can't bring a dead man back to life.

Personally, I'd like to see it as an option given to the convicted. If he knows he did it, he might opt for death. Fine and dandy. If he's innocent, then maybe he decides that he'd like to live, if even in prison. Or maybe he decides that there's no hope, and he'd rather be dead. Also, fine and dandy.

I'm also not convinced it has any deterrent effect whatsoever.

I haven't made up my mind 100% on this stuff, but that's where I'm at today. I was 100% pro death penalty a few years ago. As I've grown a bit older and thought about it some more, I've begun to temper my pro death penalty fervor.