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.

I'm against the death penalty but for an unusual reason that not many have/agree with.

I think it's too good for the very type of criminal it's generally reserved for! It's an easy out for them. I'd far rather they be locked up for life, with no luxuries. Let them have to live with what they've done and the consequences for them even if they don't feel guilty. In addition study them so we can try and reduce the creation of such criminals (not always possible I know as with certain types there are genetic and brain physiology factors) and also so we can more easily spot those likely to commit such crimes and manage them appropriately.

I also feel it's lowering ourselves to the standard of criminals, it's a deception that killing "for justice" is any more acceptable than any other kind of killing.

I'm a (very) lapsed Catholic but I do believe in evil, and I do believe in the sentiment behind "the Devils greatest trick was making people believe he didn't exist"

We succumb to committing evil deeds ourselves at our peril.

Another issue I have is that I strongly suspect that in countries that have the death penalty it's used on occasion by govts in those countries to get rid of those they consider a threat to their power by framing them for a death penalty crime. Both to eliminate and discredit them.

There's also the "what if" factor. The thought of executing an innocent person is horrifying and very much still possible. No evidence is perfect, we're only just starting to see some cases where people have been wrongly convicted on certain scientific evidence including DNA evidence. No one type of evidence or expert should be considered beyond reproach.

It doesn't work as a deterrent, it doesn't reduce costs to taxpayers, and it doesn't create more peaceful communities.

I do think the cost of keeping prisoners should be met in some way and as much as possible by the prisoner. By selling of assets and by their doing some kind of work from prison - with modern tech plus the old standbys of certain manufacturing jobs they should at least be able to contribute something to their keep.

I AM sick to the back teeth of pathetic sentencing for the most heinous crimes. At the time the abolishment of the death penalty was being discussed in uk the public were told life would mean life - that's been seriously eroded since and needs correcting! That's what is fuelling the desire in many people wanting the death penalty back in my opinion.

Murderers, rapists, paedophiles, sex traffickers and "top dog" drug dealers should get full life sentences mandatory. No ifs, bits or maybes.

"Financial" criminals - meaning those who don't directly cause personal harm - should be asset stripped, financially penalised in such a way as they pay back all they made from their crimes + interest + Costs of dealing with them (police investigation, court costs, administrating their sentence). That money may also be helpful in covering costs of prisoners and quite honestly would I think be a deterrent to those criminals who see a few years in prison as worth it for the financial reward of their crimes which they enjoy when they leave prison. Their primary motivation is money so makes sense to make the deterrent financial.

Just my thoughts

I’m against the death penalty for anyone.

As for the poster who thinks the 10 year old children who killed James Bulger should have been executed - words fail me. You’ve got to be almost as sick as they are.

"I think they were clearly damaged, abandoned little boys" agree - except that while Thompson seems to have benefited from rehabilitation and appears to have changed his ways (to the best of our knowledge) but venables has continued to offend and seek out more victims/potential victims - his sad story is no excuse to leave him free to create more damaged and abandoned little boys who may go on to create even more damaged and abandoned little boys. Also he's an adult now and has been convicted as an adult of vile crimes but reviewed pathetic sentences when anyone with an ounce of common sense can see he will never change and should NEVER be released.

"DNA evidence is definitive proof of guilt" absolutely not true! DNA evidence is just as vulnerable to failure as any other evidence and to think otherwise is both arrogant and naive. Poor collection technique, poor processing technique, technical failures or even outright corruption can result in DNA evidence being wrong. The mere presence of biological matter containing DNA proves nothing by itself!

Gah autocorrect

Venables RECEIVED pathetic sentences

I am completely against the death penalty. I think that in a civilised society the justice system should exist for protection of the public first and foremost and we can already do that by keeping dangerous people locked away. Some people are far beyond rehabilitation but where it is possible we should aim for that. The death penalty is not a deterrent - you only need to look at the crime statistics of countries that still do it for proof of that. Another thing is that it gives notoriety to people who may be seeking that.

There was a series on bbc3 a while back about death row prisoners and it was heartbreaking. It was so clear that these people had never had a chance, some had done some awful things but killing them was not going to undo the harm they had done. There was one young man on there who had attempted suicide lots of times in childhood and he was convicted of deliberately running over a police officer although there was overwhelming evidence that he had swerved out of the way of something and accidentally hit him. He pleaded guilty immediately knowing he would get the death penalty and refused to appeal, his mother and lawyer begged him to appeal as they knew he would get off but he wanted to die imagine the victims family having that on their conscience as well as dealing with their grief.

The Swedish system does not aim to punish and focuses on rehabilitation and their crime rates are very low, I think that is what we should be aiming for

It's wrong. I'd prefer there to be a continuous review of custodial sentences ensuring that prisons mainly house violent and drug related criminals.
I quite like learning about other crime and punishment systems eg Nordic.

It's barbaric and no country which has the death penalty can call itself civilised.

I was always extremely anti-death penalty until I came across a number of cases that made me physically sick and where the perpetrator was clearly identifiable.

I mean, what do you do with a person that smashed open their cellmate's skull and attempted to eat their brains with a teaspoon?

Or someone that facilitated the torture of a toddler to provide videos for paedophiles for profit?

This shit happens. You can't rehabilitate these people.

I'm still on the fence about the death penalty, but I do wonder whether some form of hard labour might be appropriate, along with a full life term (that actually means the entire life).

And it needs to be said that the only reason why we have a prison system of the size we do is because we are wealthy enough as a society to afford the cost of keeping huge numbers of males in an economically inactive state outside of normal society.

In the cases of children murdered e.g. Sarah Payne, Holly Wells, Jessica Chapman, Milly Dowler & the many other children murdered there should be a death penalty, with one caveat: the man or woman who murdered the child must be 18 or over at the time of the murder.

Derek Bentley and Timothy Evans are the two names I always associate with any mention of the death Penalty, and those cases in the UK , made me very anti capital punishment, however living in the violent, soulless society that is South Africa where I now live has made me reconsider my view.

You might not want to read what I am going to write now so this is a warning.

  I hear heartbreaking stories every fucking day here  about children raped and murdered  here, whole families murdered, grandmothers raped and murdered , their grandchildren drowned in boiling fucking water,  Young women raped and their bodies dumped in toilets, young lesbian women raped and having their throats cut, because they are lesbians, a young woman out jogging raped and murdered  her poor mother killed herself because she could cope with what happened to her beloved daughter,  and I stop and think those fuckers who did all those vile evil thimust  be caught , tried and hanged. It makes me angry and sad that those bastards are allowed to live , and it makes me sad to feel that I have had a change of heart about something I once felt was wrong and had no place I never a civilised society, but that was before I lived in an uncivilised one.

Look at the countries who have the death penalty

A grim collection for sure

I can’t think of another way of performing the death penalty that would remove the persons who’s job it is. It must be a very traumatic job

I've read that in states of the US where they have the death penalty, they have people queuing up to apply for that job.

20 years ago, a nurse at the hospital where I worked was kidnapped as she left work. Taken to a forest and repeatedly raped and sodomised by 5 brothers , then she was strangled, set alight while still alive and then thrown into a river where she drowned.

Those 5 men are still alive and enjoying their three meals a day, their university courses and working out in the gym. Sorry but if the death penalty existed I'd cheerfully press the "exit" button on all five of them.

Most of the guns are firing blanks and none of the shooters know which gun has the live round.

When it comes to fire squad executions, this theory is a comforting one on the surface....but I’m afraid it simply isn’t true. Any experienced marksman (anyone who’s been in the military for example), knows the difference instantly between firing and live round and a blank round. The weight is different. The sound is different. The kick-back of your weapon is different. And even the smell is slightly different.
Those marksmen who participate will know instantly if they’ve been the one to have fired the fatal shot. And if they say they didn’t know, they are either a shit marksman or they are lying.

Oh, of course civilised countries don’t have the death penalty.

Punishment and rehabilitation is not the same as revenge and retribution.

Those who want the death penalty are mostly wanting the latter. Be careful what you wish for because that fundamentally changes a society. It wouldn't be one I'd want to live in.

“Punishment and rehabilitation is not the same as revenge and retribution”
Yes, this. And yes of course if it was my child who had been killed I would want revenge and retribution. Which is why we have a rule of law, not summary justice.

There are so many reasons why the death penalty is wrong: Birmingham Six, Guildford Four, Maguire Seven, Stefan Kizsco, Judith Ward, Broadwater Three, M25 (not) Murderers; the 3 men in the Carl Bridgewater case - allof these would quite conceviably have been executed had that been an option.

And the corrupt police practices that were used to incriminate some of them would quite possibly still be going on.

If killing people is wrong, how can judicial murder be right?

Miscarriage of Justice is more common than we think. If we had the death penalty Barry George, later aquitted for the murder of Jill Dando, would have been dead.

Killing people is wrong. If it's wrong for an individual to do, then it's wrong for a group of individuals (e.g. society) to do.

Plus all the other reasons such as we might execute an innocent person, it brutalises those who have to carry it out, etc.

My friend was abused and killed in a pre planned and sustained brutal attack when she tried to leave. He is now out after 7 years having convinced the owners that be that he is reformed. He has started the exact cycle again with a woman with a young child.

I would much rather it be him dead than another woman suffer years of abuse and end up murdered which is going to happen.

Some people are way beyond rehabilitation. Such as the most manipulative of them all paedophiles and psychopaths who can never be made to feel empathy. They are very good at doing and telling people what they want to hear though.

To those who point out the miscarriages of justice on innocent people I agree that’s awful and that the death penalty needs to be only used in cases which are beyond doubt but from the other side how about the many many innocent people put at risk and horrifically abused or killed by those who have convinced the system they are now safe? Why shouldn’t those people be protected. I personally don’t think it’s worth the risk to let certain types of criminals back into society.

If every rapist, and sadistic murderer were given life sentences then we would run out of prison space.

There really are some people that do not deserve a second chance. I would gladly press the button on the bastard who killed my friend.

Is life, as in life, in imprisonment not more cruel than execution though? I mean, the mental torture of stripping away someone's freedom must be inmense.

Is life, as in life, in imprisonment not more cruel than execution though? I mean, the mental torture of stripping away someone's freedom must be inmense.

Isn't that a better punishment then? Rather than give these people a release from the torment of living like that for the rest of their lives?

I disagree with the death penalty for many reasons including how it is used disproportionately on some members of society and the fact that undoubtedly innocent people have been put to death. Imo, it has no place in a civilised society.

It’s costs more to have a prisoner on death row in America due to the process of appeals.

It’s also proven that the death penalty is no deterrent.

@Nursejackie1 what happened to your friend is beyond awful and he deserves to be in prison until he dies. However there are always going to be miscarriages of justice cases that is the sad reality. The death penalty has no place in the U.K. the politicians in the 60’s realised it and nothing has changed.