Dennis Prager: The death penalty, a defense.

[billc]

To lighten things up here on martialtalk I'm linking to the most recent Dennis Prager on the always fun and delightful topic of the death penalty...

http://www.dennisprager.com/columns...nse_to_oregons_governor_on_capital_punishment

The governor of Oregon, John Kitzhaber, announced last week that he would not allow any more executions in his state during his time in office.
Kitzhaber, a Democrat, gave five reasons for his decision. My response follows each one.

An example from the column:

2. "I do not believe that those executions (the two that the governor allowed) made us safer."
We all acknowledge that two executions do not make us safer (though they do make it safer for prison guards and for other inmates). Who ever said two executions would make us safer? Overwhelmingly, the reason people give for supporting the death penalty is justice. It is indescribably unjust to allow everyone who deliberately takes a human life to keep his own.
But if you want to talk safety, then yes, we who support the death penalty are certain that, applied with any consistency, it is a deterrent. The late sociologist Ernest van den Haag had an interesting thought experiment. Suppose that murders committed on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays carried a death sentence, while those committed on the other days were punishable by a prison sentence. On which days do you suppose more murders would be committed?
The notion that parking tickets deter illegal parking but that death does not deter murder is truly irrational. It shows what happens when people put ideology over common sense.

3. "Certainly I don't believe (the executions of murderers) made us more noble as a society."
Why is it noble to keep all murderers alive? Was Israel less noble for executing Adolf Eichmann, the architect of the Holocaust? When two men enter the home of a family of four; rape the wife and two young daughters; beat all four nearly to death, leaving them in the agony of crushed bones and skulls; and then tie them up and burn the three females to death, why is it "noble" to keep the men who did that alive?

 

[Josh Oakley]

Ah, Prager. Based on his basic stance that morality must only come from God's authority, it makes sense that he is all for the death penalty.

But where I disagree with him AND his god is that the death penalty in most cases does not restore justice. Especially in this country, where a number of death sentences were overturned, post-mortem. I'd rather a guilty man live than an innocent man die. I don't think "collatoral damage" is adequate here. Any time an innocent man is killed, it is a shameful affront to justice, and unless we can perfect the court system (like that'll happen...) the death penalty in practice will mean innocent men die.

 

[ballen0351]

But where I disagree with him AND his god is that the death penalty in most cases does not restore justice. Especially in this country, where a number of death sentences were overturned, post-mortem..

Thats not true there has never been a person convicted and put to death that was later found not to have been guily since the Death penality was reinstated.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

The death penalty isn't a deterrent to crime.
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/det...alty-have-had-consistently-lower-murder-rates

A 1995 survey of police chiefs and country sheriffs found that most ranked the death penalty last in a list of six options that might deter violent crime. Their top two picks? Reducing drug abuse and fostering an economy that provides more jobs. (cite)

Data on murder rates seem to discredit the deterrence theory as well. The region of the county with the greatest number of executions -- the South -- is the region with the largest murder rates. For 2007, the average murder rate in states with the death penalty was 5.5; the average murder rate of the 14 states without the death penalty was 3.1.

Thus deterrence, which is offered as a reason to support capital punishment ("pro"), doesn't wash.

http://uspolitics.about.com/od/deathpenalty/i/death_penalty_2.htm

As to wrongful death convictions:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrongful_execution
http://listverse.com/2010/01/12/10-convicts-presumed-innocent-after-execution/
http://www.criminaljusticedegreesguide.com/features/10-infamous-cases-of-wrongful-execution.html

 

[Sukerkin]

As we've talked about before here, I am in favour of the use of the death penalty for those crimes deserving off it IF there is absolute proof of guilt. This is less about deterrence, for punishments only deter if they vastly outweigh the offence (death for parking offences!), than it is about removing a threat to public safety.

To elaborate a little, in my mind, there is no doubt that executing a serial killer is justifiable but executing a man who killed in a fit of rage (the so-called 'Crime of Passion') is less supportable because that man is less likely to repeat such a terrible offence again.

 

[ballen0351]

The death penalty isn't a deterrent to crime.
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/det...alty-have-had-consistently-lower-murder-rates

As said above its not always about being a deterrent its about being punished for the crime you committed. BUT its 100% effective in deterring the person put to death from ever killing again.

As to wrongful death convictions:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrongful_execution
http://listverse.com/2010/01/12/10-convicts-presumed-innocent-after-execution/
http://www.criminaljusticedegreesguide.com/features/10-infamous-cases-of-wrongful-execution.html

Ok my post still stands there has never been a person put to death that was later found innocent since the Death Penality was reinstated in 1976. And as we get better at testing things like dna the possibility goes down. I think there should be some safeguards like requirement for dna matches, video footage of the crime. Multiple independent wittness. If the state does not have something like that the risk is too high to execute for my liking. But I have no problem executing someone when we have solid dna evidence he commited the crime. Id also like to see the use expanded to include other crimes as well. You rape a child under 8 years old or 5 years old something like that you don't deserve to live on this earth your pure evil.


And

 

[Empty Hands]

I have no problem with the death penalty in principle, but the American justice system has demonstrated amply and repeatedly that it cannot be trusted to consistently apply fair standards and practices of justice. Thus, no death penalty because a not insubstantial number of those executed will be innocent. Look here. Even with a life sentence, there remains the possibility of exoneration and recompense for the innocent. Not so when they are dead.

I find it rather remarkable that a group of people who feel that the government is consistently and without fail incompetent when it comes to health care or welfare or most anything else suddenly feel that the incompetent government becomes omnipotent and infallible when the topic is criminal justice. Or intelligence gathering, war, and torture for that matter.

 

[Empty Hands]

Ok my post still stands there has never been a person put to death that was later found innocent since the Death Penality was reinstated in 1976.

That's because once someone is dead, no one bothers to look. Can't look actually, since the court will refuse to hear a claim without a harmed party. Dead people can't make appeals. Convenient for the government, no?

Many people on death row have been exonerated though. Look here.

 

[ballen0351]

That's because once someone is dead, no one bothers to look. Can't look actually, since the court will refuse to hear a claim without a harmed party. Dead people can't make appeals. Convenient for the government, no?

Many people on death row have been exonerated though. Look here.

I know many on death row have been released one guy lives in my town and I've apoken to him several times. The fact these people are being found innocent and released shows the appeals process is working and our technology in the field of forensics is getting to the point where we can be more confident then ever people are guilty. Like I said I don't think we sould use it without dna or video evidence or multiple. Independent witnesses. Not codefendant testimony or single witness information. People may lie or get confused but if its 5 people all independently telling you same thing then that's better. It shouldn't be used willy nilly but reserved for serious disturbing premeditated crimes.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Ok my post still stands there has never been a person put to death that was later found innocent since the Death Penality was reinstated in 1976. And as we get better at testing things like dna the possibility goes down. I think there should be some safeguards like requirement for dna matches, video footage of the crime. Multiple independent wittness.

Claude Jones: Claude Jones was executed in 2000 for the murder of liquor store owner Allen Hilzendager, in San Jacinto County in 1989. On Nov. 14, 1989, Jones and another man were seen pulling into a liquor store in Point Blank, Texas. One stayed in the car while the other went inside and shot the owner. Witnesses who were standing across the road couldn’t see the killer, but Jones and two other men, Kerry Dixon and Timothy Jordan, were all linked to the murder. Although Jones said he never entered the store, Dixon and Jordan testified that Jones was in fact the shooter and they were both spared the death penalty. The deciding factor and only admissible evidence in Jones’ conviction came down to a strand of hair that was found at the scene of the crime. A forensic expert testified that the hair appeared to have come from Jones, and he was sentenced to death. Forensic technology was underdeveloped during the 1990 trial and it wasn’t able to match Jones’ DNA with the hair sample. Therefore, before his 2000 execution, Jones’ attorneys filed petitions for a stay of execution with a district court and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and requested that the hair be submitted for DNA testing that was now possible, but all courts and former Texas Governor George W. Bush denied Jones and he was executed. In an attempt to prove that Texas executed an innocent man, the Innocence Project and the Texas Observer filed a lawsuit in 2007 to obtain the strand of hair and submitted it for DNA testing, which was determined to be the hair of the victim.

So, guilty because of a strand of hair, later found to not be his.

As long as we're sure that he did it based on the other evidence.

Wait. There was no other admissible evidence.

So, was an innocent man executed?

Simply put, as technology gets better, more will go free. If half the people on death row have been cleared and saved from the gallows since the reinstatement in 1976, and DNA testing's only been reliable since 2000, that allows for a number of innocents to have been executed prior to technology improving. Given that evidence is often destroyed after execution, we will never know how many innocents were killed, but we can use logic to determine the probability that some innocents were in fact executed.

So your statement that "there has never been a person put to death that was later found innocent since the Death Penality was reinstated in 1976." is in face a falsehood, based in part on the inability to accurately test it for truth.

 

[billc]

Hmmm...and then you have the over 30 bodies of young men taken from underneath john wayne gacey's home, and the refrigerator full of body parts found in jeffery dahmers apartment, and the bodies of girls recovered from the description of their burial sites by ted bundy....Hmmm...I think we can put those guys down with a pretty good degree of confidence in their guilt. I also support what Ballen is saying and that I don't mind that it takes so long to execute a murderer. I also want as much technology and skill put into confirming guilt before the death penalty is enacted...but...I believe in the death penalty and that it saves innocent lives.

 

[ballen0351]

Bob you may want to read the entire case of mr jones. Was he innocent not a chance. Im on my cell so I can't post all the details but read up on your innocent man. Read up on his prior murder conviction while in prison for bank robbery. Read up on the two other robberies he and his two were accused of during the same crime spree he shot the clerk. Read up on felony murder rule where even if you don't pull the triger your still as guilty as the one who did. Proving the hair belonged to a victim does not prove this man didn't kill anyone. And more to the point has he been put to death for his first murder then he would have never been involved. In his second and the clerk would have not been murdered in cold blood just trying to earn a living. Even the innocence project said just because the hair didn't blong to jones didn't mean jones was innocent

 

[ballen0351]

I wouldn't have a problem with and think it may be a good idea to change the law to only allow with conclusive dna or video evidence and to commute all currnt death row cases to life unless the meet the new law requirements. I just don't see the value in removing it all together forever.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Bob you may want to read the entire case of mr jones. Was he innocent not a chance. Im on my cell so I can't post all the details but read up on your innocent man. Read up on his prior murder conviction while in prison for bank robbery. Read up on the two other robberies he and his two were accused of during the same crime spree he shot the clerk. Read up on felony murder rule where even if you don't pull the triger your still as guilty as the one who did. Proving the hair belonged to a victim does not prove this man didn't kill anyone. And more to the point has he been put to death for his first murder then he would have never been involved. In his second and the clerk would have not been murdered in cold blood just trying to earn a living. Even the innocence project said just because the hair didn't blong to jones didn't mean jones was innocent

I never said he was innocent. I said that the 'key' piece of evidence was a hair that wasn't his.
I pulled 1 example out of a list.
If today we're overturning 50% and 10 years ago only 25%, that implies that either 10 years ago less innocents were wrongly convicted or 10 years ago 25% innocents were wrongly executed.

There's been enough questions about how prosecutions handle these cases to worry. They pick their man, build their case, and work to ensure a conviction. Mean while the real guilty party continues on, still a threat to society.

Put another way, execute a criminal, you save future victims.
Execute an innocent man....you just murdered Justice.

 

[Josh Oakley]

Thats not true there has never been a person convicted and put to death that was later found not to have been guily since the Death penality was reinstated.

First off, reinstated? I am from Washington state, where it's never been taken off the books. This is true for a number of states. Second, I am calling BS. http://listverse.com/2010/01/12/10-convicts-presumed-innocent-after-execution/ and http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/barry-scheck/innocent-but-executed_b_272327.html are just two examples of many I could bring up.

 

[Josh Oakley]

I take that back. The death penalty actually WAS removed from America from 1972 to 1976. The rest stands.

 

[ballen0351]

You implied he was innocent as your rebutal to my statement that no innocent man has been executed. That's just simply a fact that has not been proven wrong. You can speculate and guess all you want about cases but you don't know the facts on the case you know what the reporter decided to put into the story to make the story fit his beliefs.

 

[andy.m]

As we've talked about before here, I am in favour of the use of the death penalty for those crimes deserving off it etc

- sukurkin
I totally agree with your views, one thing about here (GB) that I also disagree with : life should mean life ! I would far rather be able to pardon and release someone than stand at a grave and try to say sorry.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-south-east-wales-15983761
These guys would have been executed on the corrupt evidence of the cops. Funny how some of the evidence was destroyed and the new case miss handled.
Andy (and his over active cynicism gland.)

 

[elder999]

To lighten things up here on martialtalk I'm linking to the most recent Dennis Prager on the always fun and delightful topic of the death penalty...:

You know, Dennis Prager is a moderately bright guy, but he's missing the mark here.

The governor of Oregon, John Kitzhaber, announced last week that he would not allow any more executions in his state during his time in office.
Kitzhaber, a Democrat, gave five reasons for his decision. My response follows each one.
1. "I refuse to be part of this compromised and inequitable system any longer."
This has become one of the most frequently offered reasons for objecting to capital punishment -- that because the system is not equitable, no murderer should be put to death.
This is a reason that is devoid of reason. If a system is not equitable, you don't end the system, you try to end what is not equitable

But the governor hasn't "ended the system." He can't. The death penalty in Oregon still stands-he's simply said that he's not going to carry those sentences out. It's a reasonable position-not devoid of reason at all. In many states, such as Oregon, where the death penalty exists, the one who ultimately signs off on executions is the governor-he has the option not to do this, whether it's based on reasonable doubt, or moral grounds-it's not like he'll be governor forever, and those prisoners will either die on death role, be released due to successful appeals, or, ultimately executed.

2. "I do not believe that those executions (the two that the governor allowed) made us safer."
We all acknowledge that two executions do not make us safer (though they do make it safer for prison guards and for other inmates). Who ever said two executions would make us safer? Overwhelmingly, the reason people give for supporting the death penalty is justice. It is indescribably unjust to allow everyone who deliberately takes a human life to keep his own.
But if you want to talk safety, then yes, we who support the death penalty are certain that, applied with any consistency, it is a deterrent. The late sociologist Ernest van den Haag had an interesting thought experiment. Suppose that murders committed on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays carried a death sentence, while those committed on the other days were punishable by a prison sentence. On which days do you suppose more murders would be committed?
The notion that parking tickets deter illegal parking but that death does not deter murder is truly irrational. It shows what happens when people put ideology over common sense.

The death penalty is not a deterrent. Murderers-like most criminals-generally don't consider consequences beyond the extent of trying to avoid them. Not recognizing this mentality-that murder is "truly irrational"-is a failure in critical thinking of the highest order. Sure. The possibility of a life sentence or death sentence (??) might keep most of us from committing murder, but it clearly doesn't keep 15,000 people from commiting murder every year. (And roughly 37% of those murders go unsolved-around 5,000 people literally get away with murder every year)

In this instance, Prager is an idiot, making a knee-jerk reaction to a measured moral and legal stand that is only a temporary setback for those sentences being carried out, because it came from a Democrat-a stand that he paints as "liberal" when it is clearly personal, and the perogative of that state's chief executive

Idiot.

To lighten things up
linking to the most recent
I'm Dennis Prager
here on martialtalk
the always fun
always delightful
death penalty...
Dennis
death
Prager
penalty
an example

 

[ballen0351]

First off, reinstated? I am from Washington state, where it's never been taken off the books. This is true for a number of states. Second, I am calling BS. http://listverse.com/2010/01/12/10-convicts-presumed-innocent-after-execution/ and http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/barry-scheck/innocent-but-executed_b_272327.html are just two examples of many I could bring up.

And All of the examples you posted have been studied by every overzealous law studient looking to make a name for themselves and the Innocence Project 100's of times over last 10 years and still nobody has ever found evidence them not guilty.