To ask what you think of the death penalty? (Don’t open if you don’t like talking about death and crime)

[Chancewouldbeafinethlng]

I listened to Adam Buxtons newest podcast episode and found it very interesting.
I’m not sure how I feel about it. On the one hand there are some criminals who I would not piss on if they were on fire, I think they really deserve to die. But then there is always going to be a person who’s job it is to kill that person.
Also there is the risk that someone has been falsely accused and maybe not had a fair trial. How would you ever know?

The episode touched on the method used currently for the death penalty. The woman who was talking was saying how unreliable it is and is basically torture if it doesn’t work. What other methods could be used though?

Sorry I know it’s a very morbid subject but I would be interested in hearing other people’s opinions.

The death penalty is revenge not justice. We must aim higher than that no matter how difficult it may be.

The death penalty is fine if what you're looking for is a way of killing poor, black men for harming white people (or even just for being suspected of harming them) but as an instrument of justice it leaves a lot to be desired.

There would be a disproportionate amount of black people, poorer people, disadvantaged people put on death row nits like everywhere else in the world, how is that fair or just? And being from N.I. I have first hand experience of the misuse of government or authority powers, the risk of miscarriage of justice is too high to bring back the death penalty.

I think plenty of people deserve death but I think the risk of killing an innocent person is too high.

However, it's a tough one. I know a man who sexually and mentally abused his own daughter until she was institutionalised.

He then killed his wife in front of their young son.

I absolutely wish a very slow and painful death on him.

I don't agree with the death penalty under any circumstances but I would like to see proper sentences given. So, life to mean life etc.

I agree with this, time & time again you see people who have committed murder doing it again. Or soft sentences.

I will poke my head above the parapet.

I am 100% for the death penalty. There are loads of offences that demonstrate a criminal is not fit to be part of society. Society has a duty to protect other citizens from people who are thought to be beyond redemption. I have no compunction with the idea of capital punishment. It's not barbaric at all. It's a legitimate punishment for some offences.

The thing is people will want criminals to spend time to repent the enormity of their offences, and want life without remission. They don't repent though. The spend the time exulting in the enormity of their offences, and never repent.

I'd also like to see tougher sentences for death by dangerous driving. Don't even recall seeing one exceed ten years.

That's a whole other thread mind.

piedmontpepper agree.

If killing another person is wrong then it is wrong, the state ordering someone's death does not make killing right.

I think, if we are going to say that taking a life is a crime, then the state cannot be allowed to take a life either.

I don’t want to live in a state where the government of the day has the power of life or death over its citizens and decides who is worthy of living.

I agree rapists and child abusers should be in prison for life.

Also think men convicted of domestic violence ought to be locked away for life too where the abuse has been sustained.

Utterly against capital punishment.

Killing people to show that killing people is wrong doesn't really work. But as PPs have said, I know I'd feel like killing someone myself if they did anything to my family. I think killing them is a coward's escape for some too. Some people I wish could live for 100 years, with each day being more torturous and miserable than the last.
I think if people felt that justice was truly served in the prison system (e.g. tough conditions, life meaning life, realistic sentences, etc) then people wouldn't feel the need for more extreme 'justice' or punishment.

So it seems the majority on this thread are against it. It’s good to hear the opposing opinions too.

I wonder how much longer it will be allowed in certain states in the USA. They are so similar yet so different to us.

Without commenting on the death penalty, its interesting to see posters arguing that it would be revenge rather than punishment. Surely putting someone away for a long time and hoping that they rot or suffer is revenge?

On one hand I think that there are some crimes so heinous (rape, sexual abuse of children, murder) that I cant see any rehabilitation possible and to put it blunty, and probably clumsily, if a dog bites some one it gets put down and the danger is removed, we dont punish the dog or make it suffer, we remove the risk "humanely".

However, can you ever be 100% sure. And the reduced likelihood of guilty verdict by a jury that someone above quoted is scary.

It's a very emotive subject isn't it?

One thing that was interesting about the desperately sad James Bulger case was that the boy that the press said was more innocent (Jon Venables) was the one who's been in the most trouble since. I would hate to have been on a jury for that crime.

I don't think a blanket "all murder is wrong" applies here. What about battered women and children? Those two sisters in Russia who murdered their sexually abusive father?

I used to be into true crime. I remember in quite a few cases, an innocent person had been given the death penalty for the crimes before the real culprits were caught. That's the main reason I don't like it. It's rare that we know 100% someone is definitely the culprit. There are probably innocent people on death row today.

Chesntoots I know he's got it easy, but he's never getting out (he's very old now and unwell) and that's enough for her mum and dad so it's enough for me. Just knowing he'll never, ever do to another woman what he did to my pal is enough.

Thank you lovely posters

I don't think any civilised society should be in the business of murdering its citizens st all.

People do horrific crime, yes. But state-sanctioned murder is not a solution (or a deterrent by the look of it).

I watched a couple of Louis Theroux programmes last night - the one in San Quentin and the one where the paedophiles were kept in a holding prison.

San Quentin was so brutal - it was hard to think that anyone would come out rehabilitated. Everything about it was brutal. Having said that people in there often didn't seem unhappy - once they got used to being there (albeit it was a really rough place) they seemed happier than they were on the outside.

One thing I liked was the fact that when people get sentenced over there they often get consecutive sentences, whereas here they are concurrent. It's quite satisfying when a complete bastard gets a 500 year sentence.

On one hand I think that there are some crimes so heinous (rape, sexual abuse of children, murder) that I cant see any rehabilitation possible and to put it blunty, and probably clumsily, if a dog bites some one it gets put down and the danger is removed, we dont punish the dog or make it suffer, we remove the risk "humanely".

Don’t people have qualities that elevate them above animals? If I had, as a 15 year old girl watching her mother endure an abusive relationship, murdered the man involved, is it impossible to imagine that 25 years later, I might be a person perfectly capable of not murdering people?

If I had, as a 15 year old girl watching her mother endure an abusive relationship, murdered the man involved, is it impossible to imagine that 25 years later, I might be a person perfectly capable of not murdering people?

I wouldn't put such a person in prison in the first place.

The problem is that if those 25 years are spent in a brutal environment (thinking of some American prisons) I can't see how someone's character would improve.