to not understand why it is so difficult to kill a human being humanely

[ReallyTired]

Animals are put to sleep or slaughtered for food every day. They do not suffer like this poor American did. People go under general anesthetic every day for major operations without mishap. Surely an excecution is easier to carry out than complex heart surgery.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-27220406

I don't want to discuss the pro and cons of captical punishment, but surely if the state is going to kill someone it can be done quickly and simply. Why is killing a person more complicated than killing a cow or a pig? I see no excuse for botched executions.

"Messages of life from death row" is a great book (can't link on my phone)

As PP said. There are no rich people on death row. Mainly poor black men who were given piss poor state defence lawyers (lots of whom are incompetent and/or alcoholic).

The executions are barbaric, the day to day "living" conditions are also barbaric.

Totally agree, rain.

Since 1991 I've been writing to a prisoner on Death Row. His day to day life is dreadful. I hope that satisfies people who want prisoners to have a lifetime of misery and loneliness. Be assured - they do.

"My feelings against the death penalty have nothing whatsoever to do with Christianity, OP."

I never said it did. Christians don't have an monopoly on compassion. There are plenty of people with a wide range of religious views who don't like the death penalty or want those who are being executed to suffer more than can be avoided. My point is that that there are lots of other people other than mumsnet that would find botched execution horrifying.

SuburbanRhonda

What do you think should happen to sadistic murderers? I favour the UK approach of whole tariff life sentences for the worst murderers like Ian Brady. I agree with you that the conditions of some US jails are unacceptable. I feel that jail inmates should be treated as humans.

Texas and the Deep South, where most executions take place, is nothing like New England or California. I share a President, Congress, and a currency with them, but little else. The former Confederacy is a much more vengeful and less civilized place.

It ironic that the bible belt of america are the most vengeful. (I suppose that fundementalist christians are similar in mindset to fundermentalists of other religions. People get so caught up with rules, that they forget the spirt of what is written.)

Off topic a bit but is Ian Brady dead?

i refuse to beleive that they dont have more humane drugs as they "cant buy them". bullshit! Hire their own pharmacists then !

they can fund a man on the moon and multiple weapons, but they can build a lab, hire some pharmacists and make something? meh

I can both be disgusted by someone's crime and disgusted at the state which reduces us all to the same level by perpetrating a similar crime against them.

Personally I am more disgusted at the state as it should know better.

I do not think thang killing of human beings is right or can conceivably be justified but this explains one reason why I am more disgusted at the state:

www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/race-death-row-inmates-executed-1976

I'm sure we only know about it because law has moved on and communication has moved on. I'm more sure that it's not the first time such a barbaric deed has happened, even within the field of 'legal'. :(

Yes they should be able to perform an execution without it being botched. I agree with that and indeed they do normally. This would appear to be an exception.

I do not agree with the 'Poor American' sentiment. His victim suffered way more then he did.

Alas, Ian Brady is still with us.

I also write to a death row prisoner, as one of the earlier posters does. I have researched extensively on the death penalty which is abhorrent to me and the blood lust of certain US states is sickening. By the way, the prison staff involved in the executions in the state where my penpal is volunteer to be involved, there's nothing compulsory about participating.

Sorry I'm from the States and when I read this I said "GOOD. Wasn't half as much as that poor girl went through. Sometimes there is justice"

If someone is enough of a psycopath to rape and murder an 11month old, or bury a young girl alive, are they going to care that much about losing their life? So what is the actual reason for the capital punishment? To appease the masses and give them the illusion they live in a safer society because of it?

Well if they are dead then Society IS safer, isn't it !! Not an illusion at all.

Killing a person humanely, isn't that an oxymoron?

"Killing a person humanely, isn't that an oxymoron?"

I probably agree with you. But surely its possible to avoid the suspendous fuck up that the US make of doing an execution. I said earlier that I wasn't discussing the arguements for or against the death penalty.

I feel that there is a difference between justice and revenge.

Taking the point up thread about it being more humane to put a bullet into a convicted murderer, I think you have to look at the psychological effects on the person actually performing the execution. Being personally responsible for pulling the trigger rather than one of a team inserting IV's and pressing switches shouldn't be underestimated.
I have a book about John Ellis, known as the Rochdale Hangman. Among many people he hung were Crippen and Edith Thompson. It destroyed him eventually, he slit his own throat after years of alcohol abuse. An executioner would have to come from the military, would they provide the proper support to them?

Another book I read is An Innocent Man by John Grisham. It's about a miscarriage of justice in America involving a death row inmate and the work of an organisation committed to researching potential miscarriages of justice. They saved him but it didn't have a particularly happy ending.

The John Grisham book is a huge part of why I am against the death penalty. It seems that if you're poor, or poor and black the State will fit your behaviour to the crime. People who were children at the time of the offence and people with obvious MH issues are executed.
Frankly there is no way to humanely execute someone, it's all varying shades of inhumanity.

I think that carrying out an execution is going to have pychological affects on the executioner whether a gun, electricity or IV drugs are used. There is no nice way of killing a person.

Albert Pierrepoint

Britain's last executioner became very anti the death penalty. Pierrepoint executed some of the most evil people who ever walked the earth/ (Ie. Nazis involved with the holocaust) yet he was anti the death penalty in later life.

Ploppy This point may have already been made, so apologies if I'm repeating a PP, but that is part of the psychology behind firing squads (rather than a lone gunman) - so the executioners don't know who fired the fatal shot.

I am not prepared to kill (with or without torture) another human being, irrespective of what he or she may have done. I cannot, in all conscience, ask the state to do it for me.

I abhor the types of crime that have been described here. It is right that the perpetrators are punished and society is kept safe. The death penalty is not a punishment that a civilised society should be comfortable with. It is state-endorsed vengeance. "Murder is wrong - except when we, the state, do it." Errr, no. Not for me.

It is also right that we should be examining the factors which lead people to commit these crimes and work to eliminate them. Truly "evil" people are comparatively few and far between. Most people don't operate in a vacuum. There are triggers more often than not - MH issues/psychosis, drug use, LDs, unimaginable abuse as children. The fact that more money and effort doesn't go into supporting and treating the poorest, most vulnerable and most despised of society, but instead is spent on legal battles to try to get state sanction to kill them, is just another inhumanity to add to the tally.

I seem to remember reading that about WW1 firing squads, it was 5 blanks and a live round I think? (A member of my family was executed and is commemorated on the a shot at Dawn memorial at Kew).
Sadly it all boils down to money doesn't it? It must seem cheaper and easier to keep someone on Death a Row sometimes for years, go through all the legal procedure so keep them there before they're killed than to provide long term support for those in the most need.
Frightening really.

Citrus I'm curious why you would want to have a death row prisoner as a penpal, what did they do to end up on death row?

Oh FGS it's not about sympathy for the criminal being put to death! It's about an act being committed by an organisation that is funded by and representitive of the people of that country, and how and in what manner it is performed.

If someone commits a brutal murder THAT person is responsible for that murder - there might be general hand-wringing about how it could be allowed to happen, what went wrong, problems with the education system etc..but that individual is still responsible for that crime.

If that person is executed it is being performed by the government on behalf of everyone in that society. They are ALL responsible for it. And there can be no mitigating circumstances because it isn't being carried out by a drunk/psychotic/depressed/angry* (delete as appropriate) fallible human being it is being carried out by the state., ie you and me. And it should be done as humanely and efficiently as possible. And if it isn't then it should be investigated and addressed.

Of course if you don't beleive in the death penalty then you might beleive there is no way of making it humane.....

FWIW I can't think of anyone in their last moments suffering and being frightened, and feel anything but horror and sympathy. Regardless of who they are and what they have done.

tinkerball, as I said early on in this thread, I've been writing to a prisoner on DR since 1991 (he's been there since 1985).

As a rule, those on DR have been convicted of a capital offence, usually aggravated murder. However, some states have the DP for offences where there is no murder, such as child rape, kidnapping, treason, drug trafficking, espionage and even placing a bomb near a bus terminal. It does vary from state to state but you can google all of the above. Needless to say, some prisoners are innocent of any crime, but are the victims of a flawed legal system.

If you meant that you wanted citrus to tell you the specific crime of the person she writes to, she may not want to - it's the question I get asked the most but I never answer it. I always believe the conversation would never end well, so no point in having it.