NationStates Jolt Archive

People who are sentenced to death can live for as long as 10 to 20 years before their sentence is carried out. Rep. California Rep. Dan Lungren of California wants to cut the number of appeals and thus reduce the time from sentencing to execution to as little as two years. What do you think?
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,167236,00.html

I think we should do away with the death penalty

In America, the death penalty should be abolished. They keep executing the wrong guys.

In America, the death penalty should be abolished. They keep executing the wrong guys.

Would you please give some examples of the wrong guys that have been executed?

Would you please give some examples of the wrong guys that have been executed? I'm sorry, I can't right now as I don't live in America… I have heard before that that has happened… juveniles and the mentally ill are executed in America, ranking it alongside China as the only industrialised nation which does that.
One of the reasons the death penalty was abolished in Britain was that jurors often wouldn't convict someone if they felt the death penalty would be used and thought it would be unfair.
Nevertheless, it is an indisputable fact that the death penalty makes mistakes, and those mistakes are far more costly than if they were in prison (or better, slave labour).

Fuck the death penalty.

"Many that live deserve death. And some who die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement, for even the very wise cannot see all ends."

Why cut the number of appeals? Why not streamline the appeals procedure to allow the same number of appeals in less time?

I'm sorry, I can't right now as I don't live in America… I have heard before that that has happened… juveniles and the mentally ill are executed in America, ranking it alongside China as the only industrialised nation which does that.

Be careful about stating what you "have heard" as fact. If you make the statement that, the US keeps executing the wrong people you should be able to back that up with fact.

The laws in some states may allow for the execution of juveniles or those of diminished mental capacity but that doesn't mean that those individuals are executed. No state that I know of allows the execution of someone who is mentally ill.

No state that I know of allows the execution of someone who is mentally ill.
Surely anyone who murders is in some respect mentally ill...?

And get rid of the death penalty:
"Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person." Article 3 Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
"No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment" Article 5 Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

These things were agreed in 1948, why does the U.S. still murder people in the name of the law?

Would you please give some examples of the wrong guys that have been executed?
http://sun.soci.niu.edu/~critcrim/dp/dpill/dpill.html

Some information about something not dissimilar there.

No state that I know of allows the execution of someone who is mentally ill.

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?did=782&scid=66

More than one does.

"Many that live deserve death. And some who die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement, for even the very wise cannot see all ends."
Rule Tolkien :cool:

Be careful about stating what you "have heard" as fact. If you make the statement that, the US keeps executing the wrong people you should be able to back that up with fact.

The laws in some states may allow for the execution of juveniles or those of diminished mental capacity but that doesn't mean that those individuals are executed. No state that I know of allows the execution of someone who is mentally ill.

They have executed innocent people in the past. Evidence is out there, and is freely available.

Some states have also executed people who were children when they committed the crime and also mentally ill people.

The death penalty has no proven effect on cutting crime (in fact, there is research to suggest it can even do the opposite concerning murder rates).

It is inhumane. Frankly, if I was a citizen of a country that practised it and at the same time called itself a beacon of human rights and democracy I would be embarrased.

Frankly, if I was a citizen of a country that practised it and at the same time called itself a beacon of human rights and democracy I would be embarrased.

I'd be incensed.

Whether or not we've executed innocent people, there's no disputing the fact that we've come close on several occasions. Those people, for the most part, already got screwed by the appeals process. How many more will that happen to if we shorten it?

Is it not so that those who can afford a good lawyer is less likely to get the death penalty? You have to agree, otherwise you are saying that defense doesn´t matter.

So, those without money get executed. Each extra appeal serves as an equalizer.

Please speak up if you believe that those who are better off should get extra protection before the law.

If you remember a few years in Illnois, I believe, they cleared out death row, because some college students brought forth enough evidence to at least commute the sentences of at least 11 people on death row and put doubt on whether not many others were innocent or not. To me that is really distrubing. There are also many cases where people were convicted and sentenced to death on circumstancial evidence, but they were black or hispanic so being tried by a white jury so they were kinda screwed from the beginning.

Well Celtlund, here in Canada we haven't had a death penalty for over twenty years. In the time since the abolition of the death penalty, there have been several cases of wrongful convictions for murder that have been overturned. In most of these instances ( Guy Paul Morin, Donald Marshall, Stephen Truscott, David Milgaard, to name a few) those wrongfully convicted were thereafter wrongfully imprisoned for many years. The sole consolation is that with no death penalty on the books, we did not proceed to wrongfully execute these same men.

I have no doubts whatsoever that America's death rows are populated by those wrongly convicted of crimes. America's jails certainly are. I don't know the names of any Americans wrongfully executed (except for the Rosenbergs, of course), but then again, I can think of one American man who was wrongly convicted of three counts of murder: Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter. You do remember 'The Hurricane', don't you?

The Hurricane by Bob Dylan

Pistol shots ring out in the barroom night
Enter Patty Valentine from the upper hall.
She sees the bartender in a pool of blood,
Cries out, my god, they killed them all!
Here comes the story of the Hurricane,
The man the authorities came to blame
For somethin’ that he never done.
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

Three bodies lyin’ there does Patty see
And another man named Bello, movin’ around mysteriously.
"I didn’t do it", he says, and he throws up his hands
"I was only robbin’ the register, I hope you understand."
"I saw them leavin’", he says, and he stops
"One of us had better call up the cops."
And so Patty calls the cops
And they arrive on the scene with their red lights flashin’
In the hot New Jersey night.

Meanwhile, far away in another part of town
Rubin Carter and a couple of friends are drivin’ around.
Number one contender for the middleweight crown
Had no idea what kinda shit was about to go down
When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road
Just like the time before and the time before that.
In Paterson that’s just the way things go.
If you’re black you might as well not show up on the street
’less you wanna draw the heat.

Alfred Bello had a partner and he had a rap for the cops.
Him and Arthur Dexter Bradley were just out prowlin’ around
He said, "I saw two men runnin’ out, they looked like middleweights
They jumped into a white car with out-of-state plates."
And miss Patty Valentine just nodded her head.
Cop said, "Wait a minute, boys, this one’s not dead"
So they took him to the infirmary
And though this man could hardly see
They told him that he could identify the guilty men.

Four in the mornin’ and they haul rubin in,
Take him to the hospital and they bring him upstairs.
The wounded man looks up through his one dyin’ eye
Says, wha’d you bring him in here for? he ain’t the guy!
Yes, here’s the story of the hurricane,
The man the authorities came to blame
For somethin’ that he never done.
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

Four months later, the ghettos are in flame,
Rubin’s in south america, fightin’ for his name
While arthur dexter bradley’s still in the robbery game
And the cops are puttin’ the screws to him, lookin’ for somebody to blame.
Remember that murder that happened in a bar?
Remember you said you saw the getaway car?
You think you’d like to play ball with the law?
Think it might-a been that fighter that you saw runnin’ that night?
Don’t forget that you are white.

Arthur Dexter Bradley said, "I’m really not sure."
Cops said, "A poor boy like you could use a break
We got you for the motel job and we’re talkin’ to your friend Bello
Now you don’t wanta have to go back to jail, be a nice fellow.
You’ll be doin’ society a favor.
That sonofabitch is brave and gettin’ braver.
We want to put his ass in stir
We want to pin this triple murder on him
He ain’t no Gentleman Jim."

Rubin could take a man out with just one punch
But he never did like to talk about it all that much.
It’s my work, he’d say, and I do it for pay
And when it’s over I’d just as soon go on my way
Up to some paradise
Where the trout streams flow and the air is nice
And ride a horse along a trail.
But then they took him to the jailhouse
Where they try to turn a man into a mouse.

All of Rubin’s cards were marked in advance
The trial was a pig-circus, he never had a chance.
The judge made Rubin’s witnesses drunkards from the slums
To the white folks who watched he was a revolutionary bum
And to the black folks he was just a crazy ******.
No one doubted that he pulled the trigger.
And though they could not produce the gun,
The D.A. said he was the one who did the deed
And the all-white jury agreed.

Rubin Carter was falsely tried.
The crime was murder one, guess who testified?
Bello and Bradley and they both baldly lied
And the newspapers, they all went along for the ride.
How can the life of such a man
Be in the palm of some fool’s hand?
To see him obviously framed
Couldn’t help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land
Where Justice is a game.

Now all the criminals in their coats and their ties
Are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise
While Rubin sits like Buddha in a ten-foot cell
An innocent man in a living Hell.
That’s the story of the Hurricane,
But it won’t be over till they clear his name
And give him back the time he’s done.
Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

Of course, Rubin Carter is now a Canadian citizen and lives in Ontario, so he'll never have to worry about death row...

But apart from the fact I think the death penalty is barbarous, cruel and misguided and ought to be abolished as a matter of course, No, I don't think the number of appeals for death row inmates should be reduced. I think they should be increased. Drastically.

http://sun.soci.niu.edu/~critcrim/dp/dpill/dpill.html

Some information about something not dissimilar there.



http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?did=782&scid=66

More than one does.

I saw a few "wrongful convictions" and one release from death row, but nothing about anyone who had been put to death and later found wrongfully convicted.

I am very much a liberal with a heart for everyone.

There were people killed for being a witch, for being black, for not conforming - and they made it public events with lemonaid and everything, but that's not now.
There ARE groups that go back for people 15 - 20 years to try to find evidence that was not technically available to overturn a conviction. I can see letting them get a life sentance since new technology is available.

We have DNA evidence and fiber analysis and much more technical analysis which makes SOME of the murders absolutely guilty.

Those who we KNOW did it and did it under the circumstances that make them available for execution with the above evidence plus an admission or confession need to die.
They live better than our homeless and mentally ill.

Remember if you kill once - you get about 10 - 15 years on average - they are not putting to death people who probably killed one person.
They are putting to death people who CAN NOT be reformed, who have committed such terrible crimes against society they CAN NOT be returned to society.

Dahmer, Bundy, and other serial killers should have MAYBE 5 years of appeals and study to find WHY they turned out like that - then ZAP problem solved.

What's up with Manson? He still has no remorse and god may save his soul, I don't care if the death penalty was repealled when he twisted the minds & killed innocent people. Do your study & Zap - meet your maker & answer to him/her.

That damed pedophile who killed that boy & tortured his sister & it's found he killed more children, who had that website about his evil and his desire to kill children. HE should have multiple appeals that last 20 years :confused: NO not on my tax dollars!

I wouldn't have minded as badly if HE was KEPT in prision for 20 years (or life) after the 3rd or 4th pedophile offense - but enough is enough.
Don't let these people be in a different section from the general prision cells - let them know what it's like to have done to them what they did - do unto others right?

Sure, send preachers in to try to convert them - try to save their souls - let them have bibles & cry all they want about how life is tough. Tough, there are people who have gone through much worse in life & didn't take these actions.

Is the death penality a deterrent - I don't think the facts support that.

Should someone live with food & a roof over their head & cable tv & a bed with blankets while someone else lives under a bridge in the cold who needs a doctor and medication (psycharitic as well as health)? Should those people go out and kill people so they have a nice warm dry cell for a lifetime?

Starry

I started this and I voted "undecided." Why? Because I am undecided about the death penalty. In the last few years, I have seen some people on death row who were convicted exonerated by DNA evidence. We could have executed the wrong person. At the same time I see people like Manson, Domler, etc. who do not deserve to continue living because of the nature of the crimes they have committed. It is really a dilemma for me. While I don't want to see, innocent people put to death. I don't want to see people who have committed heinous crimes live for another 20 or more years.

Are you kidding? Under law now convicts are only entitled to ONE appeal before the federal courts as a matter of right. This bill, btw, does not propose reducing that number to zero but instead proposes changing the way in which the courts handle that appeal. Or are you proposing that the potential optional (not as a matter of right) appeal allowed when you can prove someone else commited the crime, your lawyer was asleep during the trial, the cops lied and falsified evidence while hiding other evidence from you, the judge was drunk AND 3 of the jurors were bribed should be eliminated (and no, just proving someone else commited the crime and the jurors were bribed and the judge was drunk and the policed lied, falisfied and hid evidence is not enough to get an appeal)?

As for the bill, I am most reluctant to interfere with the way the judicial process is set up in order to expidite things. While I have no confidence in the judicial process being perfect or even fair, I have always been in the "err on the side of caution" camp with regard to the judiciary.

Are you kidding? Under law now convicts are only entitled to ONE appeal before the federal courts as a matter of right.

While you may have the right to only one Federal appeal, you have the right to unlimited state appeals.

Surely anyone who murders is in some respect mentally ill...?

Correct, which is why I believe that mental illness should not be the only reason someone escapes the death penalty.

And get rid of the death penalty:
"Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person." Article 3 Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Yes, they do, but they do not have the right to deprive others of these rights, and when these rights are abused the punishment should fit.

"No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment" Article 5 Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The death penalty for people that violently rape and murder people, or people who molest children, is not cruel and inhuman. If you're going to say punishment can't be degrading, then we shouldn't be able to put people in prison, either. I'd say prison is pretty degrading.

These things were agreed in 1948, why does the U.S. still murder people in the name of the law?

It's not murder if it's in the name of the law.

Anyone who claims that "many people are wrongly convicted" is simply wrong. A few were wrongly convicted, but it is incredibly rare that they are with today's advances in forensics and with improvements in the implementation of DNA evidence. And, while I'm fairly certain that it has happened once or twice before, I am hard-pressed to remember a single instance where someone was wrongfully executed in the last fifty years. Let me ask you this: which is better; the wrongful execution of 1 in two thousand people, or the release of one in a hundred people on good behavior, half of which are likely to reoffend?

Save a Child, execute a molester.

Less appeals means quicker justice for victims.

Save a Child, execute a molester.

Less appeals means quicker justice for victims.

Retribution, I think you mean. That's the one that's swift. Justice is an infinitely patient lady.

And a long-suffering one, at that.

Retribution, I think you mean. That's the one that's swift. Justice is an infinitely patient lady.

And a long-suffering one, at that.

Justice is people getting what they deserve. Justice is not necessarily patient.

*is glad to live in a place that abandoned such barbarity a century ago*

I'd rather just get rid of the death penalty and give them life in prison. They would have the same conditions as the other inmates but would have no parole and would be kept separate. That would keep them out of society while still giving them the opportunity to prove their innocence.

You can't have false executions, and there is plenty of time to work on your case to get out; it also stops countless appeals from stopping up the justice system and makes it more efficent.

What if I don't support the death penalty? Do I select "increased" or "undecided"?

why speed up the time to execution? they arent going anywhere. they arent living a FUN life on death row. isnt it more important that we be satisfied that they received the full measure of justice before we give them a punishment that cant be undone if we made a mistake?

*is glad to live in a place that abandoned such barbarity a century ago*

Sweden is the only 1st world country, who's government actually encourages Sexism, but seeing as how them Feminists are having their way, they'll corrupt the rest of europe.

The Solution: Execute the Feminists.

Sweden is the only 1st world country, who's government actually encourages Sexism

Oh, do please elaborate on this most irrelevant, and untrue, troll.

Sweden is the only 1st world country, who's government actually encourages Sexism, but seeing as how them Feminists are having their way, they'll corrupt the rest of europe.

Actually, Sweden's got the strongest economy in Europe, one of the lowest unemployment rates in the world, and one of the best life expectancy/infant mortality rates in the world. They also have considerably more freedom than a lot of countries. Plus, their economic and social democracy models work, moreso than any others in Europe.

Sounds like the "feminists" are running their country quite well.

Sweden is currently home to the Man-Only Tax. I think that's enough said.

Sweden is currently home to the Man-Only Tax. I think that's enough said.

The what? I'm a man. I pay no additional taxes because I am a man. What the bloody hell are you talking about?

Would you please give some examples of the wrong guys that have been executed?
As DNA testing because more and more reliable, certain lawyers began specializing in opening up old cases of people on death row. With new DNA evidence, dozens were pardoned after years on death row, and many who were already dead were found to have been innocent.

Killing someone implies that there is no doubt whatsoever they committed the crime. It is 100% final. Someone wrongly convicted can be let go at any time if they are found innocent. Once someone's dead, there is no turning back.

Who is 1 judge to determine who can live and who can die?

-edit- Serapindal, you're talking out of your ass.

Sweden is currently home to the Man-Only Tax. I think that's enough said.

I think that was only a proposal, and was never made in to law. We've had similar ideas in the US, although for different groups.

I think that was only a proposal, and was never made in to law. We've had similar ideas in the US, although for different groups.

Is he referring to the kooky idea proposed by a washed up, tax-evading, impopular politician, and that was immediately shot down by an overwhelming majority in public debate, as well as the representatives of all Riksdag parties, and not to mention the Swedish constitution that bans sexual discrimination?

He actually thinks that was made a law? Bwahahahahaha!

There's no need to prolong the inevitable. ;)

Is he referring to the kooky idea proposed by a washed up, tax-evading, impopular politician, and that was immediately shot down by an overwhelming majority in public debate, as well as the representatives of all parties, and not to mention the Swedish constitution that bans sexual discrimination?

He actually thinks that was made a law? Bwahahahahaha!

Yes, unfortunately. :p

Check out the new thread he made on how we should send insurgents to US concentration camps and reeducate them...

Yes, unfortunately. :p

But that would be sheer ignorance!

Check out the new thread he made on how we should send insurgents to US concentration camps and reeducate them...

Such a pleasant and ethical idea. :rolleyes:

But that would be sheer ignorance!

He consideres Benito Mussolini and the Gestapo good ideas. Enough said.

Such a pleasant and ethical idea. :rolleyes:

It's always a great idea to violate international laws! Look at our past attempts to do so...

Meanwhile: If there's any hope to bringing this thread back: I have been circumsized...wait a minute...wrong thread.[/everyoneignore]

But that would be sheer ignorance!

Bwahahaha! Only a complete idiot would mistake the proposal of an impopular politician in another country to be law! :rolleyes:

Meanwhile: If there's any hope to bringing this thread back: I have been circumsized...wait a minute...wrong hread.[/everyoneignore]

Next time, post pics, k, thnx! :fluffle:

This sounds like a good idea for a change but I'm sure there's a catch. Death row is a joke for the media right now, we need serious reforms to make capital punishment the viable deterrent that it is nationwide.

This sounds like a good idea for a change but I'm sure there's a catch. Death row is a joke for the media right now, we need serious reforms to make capital punishment the viable deterrent that it is nationwide.

I can't conceive of a reform that would make capital punishment a viable deterrent to murder.

I can't conceive of a reform that would make capital punishment a viable deterrent to murder.
Well, actually getting around to the executing part before they die of natural causes would be a start. The death penalty needs to be much more widely and uniformly practiced on all murderers and other serious offenders, and quick and efficient convictions and hangings are much preferred to the liberal legalistic pit that is the modern courtroom.

While you may have the right to only one Federal appeal, you have the right to unlimited state appeals.
Not in many states, but that's up to the states and the federal legislature has no power to change the number of state appeals a state government wishes to grant in it's judicial system. I'm not certain how that would fit into the debate anyway, as the states most likely to issue the death penalty only give the one (US) constitutionally required state appeal anyway.

While you may have the right to only one Federal appeal, you have the right to unlimited state appeals.

Not true.

And why would you support a federal law to take away the control of states over their application of capital punishment and due process? I thought you generally support "state rights."

Would you please give some examples of the wrong guys that have been executed?

off the top of my head:

august spies, albert parsons, adolph fischer, george engel (and i would throw in louis lingg, even though he beat the hangman to the punch with a stick of dynamite he had smuggled in), joe hill, and at least bartolomeo vanzetti of sacco and vanzetti.

and i know there are several more recent ones, but i don't have those names written into my very being, so you'll have to forgive me.

Free the West Memphis Three!

I support the death penalty to kill those that we know "Beyond A Shadow of A Doubt" that did the crime.

Yes, reduce the number of appeals :)