To think we should bring back the Death Penalty for proven very serious offenders

[ILiveAtTheBeach]

They have raped and murdered. Yet, they have no money worries, a roof over their head, 3 square meals a day, Sky TV, PS4, arranged activities....why are we so bloody soft? We have an over crowding problem in jails. Why can't we give these monsters a lethal injection and be done with it? Sometimes they are released back into society under a false identity (to protect them). What about our protection? They could move in next door. Who would be up for getting rid?

You're not just being unreasonable, you're being inhuman.

What is so different between your type of murder and theirs?

State sanctioned murder is morally abhorrent.

The death penalty information centre published a report which found that 1:100 people sentenced to death since 1976 had their sentence overturned. They say there are probably more who are innocent but can't get justice because they have no or inadequate representation.

They listed some of the cases. The vast majority are poor black men in the Southern US.
There was a woman who was on death row for 3 years for killing her baby before it was determined it was a cot death.

Figures for those who were actually executed are harder to come by as there is no process by which you can be acquitted after you are dead but there were 23 cases they identify where it was very likely the wrong person was killed (that's just the ones with very solid evidence eg DNA or someone else later convicted of the same crime)

Last year the BMJ had an article about the horrific botched execution cases happening in the US in recent years. They can't get the right drugs for lethal injection because of ethical boycotts or anyone trained to administer them so the prisoners (albeit they may be guilty) are dying horrible, long drawn out agonising deaths. One guy lasted so long that in the end they gave up trying to kill him and took him to hospital instead.

None of this matters so much to me as the fact that killing is wrong whoever is doing it.

I'm so glad to see so many have said YABU. I also don't support the death penalty. There are so so many sex offenders and pedophiles around, many have only ever gone online and will never be discovered. But these are the dad's and brothers and sons of even some people who have posted here no doubt. I don't know where you can draw the line and plenty of actually convicted offenders have people who love them and would be destroyed further by a death sentence. It's such a complex area. I suggest op you focus your energy on protecting any little ones who cross your path because you can never win in the battle against sex offenders. And the death penalty is not the answer either.

So, if your daughter was raped and murdered, you wouldn't want the guy to be killed off?

No. I wouldn't. Here in Boston, against the wishes of the people of Massachusetts (where there is no State death penalty), the federal government decided to seek the death penalty against Tsaernaev, the marathon bomber. You'd be hard pressed to find a worse killer - he put down the bomb next to a child. He scarcely expressed remorse (my own opinion is that he feels little). Despite all of this the Richards family who had their 8 year old blown to bits by the bomb and died in front of them, and whose daughter lost a leg came out publicly and said they were opposed to the death penalty and would not want it imposed.

There are people who are able to think beyond revenge.

And that is without the injustice with which it is imposed, the horror of what has to be done to kill someone (google the latest botched lethal injections OP - although I'd be afraid you might enjoy it), and the possibility of killing an innocent person. I suspect the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six would have been top of the queue for being monsters who deserved the death penalty

A lot of people will say the death penalty should be brought back when another horrific story is reported on the news. In my shock/anger/upset I feel the same for a little while. However I know it isn't right.Who decides?What if they are actually innocent?Who has the right to take another persons life? It is a huge grey area and it has no place in our society.

I don't think prison should be a pleasant experience , I don't believe anybody feels it should. I very much doubt it is easy, I think longer sentences are the way forward and no rehabilitation for some cases.

These threads always shock me.. So many murderer sympathisers. I agree with you OP. Too much money spent on these evil bastards.. But then death is too easy. Why do we want evil people to exist? Why do we want to rehabilitate? They don't deserve it, they took a life/lives that can never be gotten back and ruined the families lives forever. If they confess (which many do as they are proud) and there is undisputed evidence I would turn the button off myself. I don't get how anyone could feel differently... If someone killed my child I couldn't bear the thought that they were alive somewhere.

op Are you from the daily mail

In a world where we could be 100% certain of someone's guilt, then yes I'd accept capital punishment. That world doesn't exist though, nothing is foolproof.

BillBryson, those of us who oppose the return of the Death Penalty are NOT murderer sympathisers. What a ridiculous and insulting suggestion.

The main objection I have, which can never be 100% removed, is the fear of miscarriages of justice. That does NOT mean I have sympathy with murderers.

What utter bollocks.

so many murderer sympathisers

So many facile, reflexive, unimaginative thinkers.

YABU.
As others have said, basing a criminal justice system on the feelings of victims families is not tenable. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't support victims and their families. And your suggestion that those of us who oppose the death penalty wouldn't really csre if our childen were raped and murdered is offensive.

I also find it odd that, although you've spent extensive time working in prison, you don't seem to really be aware of what conditions are really like inside. You say that in your career as a bank manager you taught financial lessons to life sentence prisoners. In my (professional) experience of prisons, lessons for life sentence prisoners about coping with life after release happen towards the end of their time in prison, when they are in a Cat D establishment. Cat D prisoners tend to have more privileges, so their conditions can't really be compared with Cat A prisoners and the conditions they experience.

And then in your second career as a police officer, you visit prisoners to deal with complaints. Unless things hsve radically changed since I last visited a prison, you wouldn't go into the main prison to do this, you'd see prisoners in the visiting rooms, surely? Just as lawyers, probation officers and other visiting professional do. In which case you wouldn't see the wings, the cells, the activities rooms etc.

The murder rate in US states with Capital Punishment is higher than those without

Yes, but correlation doesn't equal causation. There could be a death penalty simply because murder rates are higher. There's plenty of things states with high murder rates have in common, including poverty and poor social safety nets.

Honestly though, living in the US... You don't want the death penalty. It's a drain on taxes to do so many appeals, and each trial gives the criminal another media spotlight instead of allowing them to just rot in solitary confinement. It's cheaper to keep them alive and forget about them.

Most states have death penalty by name only and rarely execute people. So it's a tax drain for a punishment that is never carried out more often than not.

No point citing Addiewell in your argument, it doesn't hold lifers or sex offenders. No murderer gets out after eight years. If you think they do, I'm a bit About your "professional capacity" visiting prisons. Maybe it was emptying sanitary bins or delivering stationery.

There are some people who should be in prison for the rest of their life. Most of these people will be in prison for the rest of their life. Just because murders or serious sex offenders get a minimum sentence doesn't mean they get out after that time, despite what headline makers would have you believe.

I'm of the view murder is wrong. Doesn't matter who does it.

Ah, just read one of your later posts.
So you think prison life is "luxury". If so, I feel a little sad for you. Maybe you are one of these people who think tampons are a taxable luxury item though.

So many murderer sympathisers
Are you really that hard of thinking. Of course I don't sympathise with a murderer, nor do most folk. That's why we don't want to murder them!

OP having re-read the posts, I actually find it unlikely that you have taught cooking etc in prisons, in my experience, they don't usually employ people with such strong views.

Guildford four, Birmingham six. Yabvu.

I too cannot get past the irony of punishing murder with murder. Illogical, quite aside from the other good arguments against it stated here. Yabu. And that's not to say that my personal emotional reaction to anyone who harmed my son wouldn't be to want to kill them, but that's an emotional reaction that the state should be above.

YABU

I completely understand why people want the death penalty. I know a lot of people who have been murdered or raped. South Africa does not have the death penalty.

Why? Because people all over the world are well aware of miscarriages of justice, of innocent people being murdered in the name of justice.

But there is of course the even bigger issue. Government sanctioned murder is not a good thing. It is the thin edge. Where does it end? In the UK we have a very easy life. We vote red or blue and nothing really changes. But the truth is things can change and the last thing you want is a corrupt government and state mandated murder. No no no.

I do think prisoners only serving half their sentences is wrong, some are too short, others seem over the top. I dont think the current system works 100% and I do think it needs a rethink. I also think prisoners should be working towards a better society. Not hard labour but they should be made to work while in jail.

Some people do not deserve to live, but that doesn't mean I have the right to kill them.

Also Timothy Evans, George Kelly ...

I love the way people always say 'when it is absolutely proven', when they're arguing for the death penalty.

Because prisons are full of people about whom judges and juries have said 'well, we're not 100% on this one, and he may not have done anything, but let's pop him in prison to be on the safe side.'

No-one is supposed to be in prison if his/her crimes aren't proven - you can't start distinguishing between people incarcerated for Definitely Doing It, and people who we must acknowledge Might Not Have Done It!

And there is a reason why juries aren't carefully selected to comprise only people who have been specifically affected by a crime similar to that with which the defendant is charged!

of course if my child had been hurt, I'd want to hunt the person down and gouge his eyes out - which is exactly why my views should be dismissed out of hand as lacking any objectivity whatsoever!

The death penalty will never, ever, ever, ever come back in the UK.

It doesn't work as a deterrent. It's more expensive than life imprisonment and it's fundamentally wrong.

Also: what utter bullshit to suggest that going to prison is easy because you get free food and access to TV. Never mind that the one thing that people value more than anything else and yet take completely for granted - their freedom - is completely stripped away from me.

I go batshit mental if I spend more than a couple of days in my own home without going out. The thought of years of being in a prison with no control over what I do is terrifying.

So, if your daughter was raped and murdered, you wouldn't want the guy to be killed off?

Possibly, even probably. That wouldn't make it right.

Tolkien said it perfectly.