Capital Punishment

[Toro]

There's nothing more Big Government than the death penalty.

 

[Finder]

Re: RE: Capital Punishment

There's nothing more Big Government than the death penalty.

wow this must be the second or third something we agree on.

All you have to do is look at what Saudi Arabia and China do with this and see why it's not the best idea in the world.

 

[FiveParadox]

Opposition to Capital Punishment

In my opinion, no, Canada should not re-instate the death penalty in any shape, way or form. I would assert that to destroy the citizens who contravene the Criminal Code of Canada is unconstructive, and counterproductive. I would suggest that if citizens were to be executed for whatever crimes they have been convicted of, there would be too high a risk of wrongful conviction to warrant any such executions — not even DNA evidence is flawless, and the risk of executing an innocent citizen is not an acceptable possibility.

 

[Jay]

I believe it should, in extreme cases where the criminal is so obviously guilty. (Pig Farm Guy, Ed Gein, Etc....) If you have a man wanted for one murder, the death penalty is a little extreme, as he may be exonerated, if you come across a guy with a freezer full of his neighbours and a pair of footie pyjamas made out of a dead hooker... well... I think we can safely slot him....

I agree.

 

[zoofer]

Did you mean opposition or opitulation? 8O

As the NDP and Fiberals constitute the opposition are you suggesting Principled Conservatives are suppressing them with threats of the death penalty?

*writes down your name on my enemies list* Just you wait Zoofer, when I'm in power and we have the death penalty, you will be the first. However in light of the first Canadian execution in over 50 years you will have the delight of making history with my new way in executions. Death by TV being pushed into your bath tub. :twisted:

Math executions will take place in the Toronto Olympic pool when we have the prisons line up in the pools for washing and then we will dumb one 100 inch HDTV into the pool. :twisted:

You have earned yourself a paste. Gather your coffee klatches around and be prepared to take notes. Feel free to email the lesson to your pals, assuming the facility allows emails.... :wink:

No need to thank me .................
That's what I do ........................
as a Principled Conservative..............................
Educate the masses...........................
Who are lost and bewildered....................
And far from home.............................

 

[zoofer]

Capital punishment opponents
have blood on their hands
Posted: November 29, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern

By Dennis Prager
© 2005 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

Those of us who believe in the death penalty for some murders are told by opponents of the death penalty that if the state executes an innocent man, we have blood on our hands.

They are right. I, for one, readily acknowledge that as a proponent of the death penalty, my advocacy could result in the killing of an innocent person.

I have never, however, encountered any opponents of the death penalty who acknowledge that they have the blood of innocent men and women on their hands.

Yet they certainly do. Whereas the shedding of innocent blood that proponents of capital punishment are responsible for is thus far, thankfully, only theoretical, the shedding of innocent blood for which opponents of capital punishment are responsible is not theoretical at all. Thanks to their opposition to the death penalty, innocent men and women have been murdered by killers who would otherwise have been put to death.

Opponents of capital punishment give us names of innocents who would have been killed by the state had their convictions stood and they been actually executed, and a few executed convicts whom they believe might have been innocent. But proponents can name men and women who really were – not might have been – murdered by convicted murderers while in prison. The murdered include prison guards, fellow inmates, and innocent men and women outside of prison.

In 1974, Clarence Ray Allen ordered a 17-year-old young woman, Mary Sue Kitts, murdered because she knew of Allen's involvement in a Fresno, Calif., store burglary.

After his 1977 trial and conviction, Allen was sentenced to life without parole.

According to San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra Saunders, "In Folsom State Prison, Allen cooked up a scheme to kill the witnesses who testified against him so that he could appeal his conviction and then be freed because any witnesses were dead – or scared into silence." As a result, three more innocent people were murdered – Bryon Schletewitz, 27, Josephine Rocha, 17, and Douglas White, 18.

This time, a jury sentenced Allen to death, the only death sentence ever handed down by a Glenn County (California) jury. That was in 1982.

For 23 years, opponents of the death penalty have played with the legal system – not to mention played with the lives of the murdered individuals' loved ones – to keep Allen alive.

Had Clarence Allen been executed for the 1974 murder of Mary Sue Kitts, three innocent people under the age of 30 would not have been killed. But because moral clarity among anti-death penalty activists is as rare as their self-righteousness is ubiquitous, finding an abolitionist who will acknowledge moral responsibility for innocents murdered by convicted murderers is an exercise in futility.

Perhaps the most infamous case of a death penalty opponent directly causing the murder of an innocent is that of novelist Norman Mailer. In 1981, Mailer utilized his influence to obtain parole for a bank robber and murderer named Jack Abbott on the grounds that Abbott was a talented writer. Six weeks after being paroled, Abbott murdered Richard Adan, a 22-year-old newlywed, aspiring actor and playwright who was waiting tables at his father's restaurant.

Mailer's reaction? "Culture is worth a little risk," he told the press. "I'm willing to gamble with a portion of society to save this man's talent."

That in a nutshell is the attitude of the abolitionists. They are "willing to gamble with a portion of society" – such as the lives of additional innocent victims – in order to save the life of every murderer.

Abolitionists are certain that they are morally superior to the rest of us. In their view, we who recoil at the thought that every murderer be allowed to keep his life are moral inferiors, barbarians essentially. But just as pacifists' views ensure that far more innocents will be killed, so do abolitionists' views ensure that more innocents will die.

There may be moral reasons to oppose taking the life of any murderer (though I cannot think of one), but saving the lives of innocents cannot be regarded as one of them.

Nevertheless, abolitionists will be happy to learn that Amnesty International has taken up the cause of ensuring that Clarence Ray Allen be spared execution. That is what the international community now regards as fighting for human rights.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/printer-friendly.asp?ARTICLE_ID=47631

 

[bluealberta]

Capital punishment opponents
have blood on their hands
Posted: November 29, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern

By Dennis Prager
© 2005 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

Those of us who believe in the death penalty for some murders are told by opponents of the death penalty that if the state executes an innocent man, we have blood on our hands.

They are right. I, for one, readily acknowledge that as a proponent of the death penalty, my advocacy could result in the killing of an innocent person.

I have never, however, encountered any opponents of the death penalty who acknowledge that they have the blood of innocent men and women on their hands.

Yet they certainly do. Whereas the shedding of innocent blood that proponents of capital punishment are responsible for is thus far, thankfully, only theoretical, the shedding of innocent blood for which opponents of capital punishment are responsible is not theoretical at all. Thanks to their opposition to the death penalty, innocent men and women have been murdered by killers who would otherwise have been put to death.

Opponents of capital punishment give us names of innocents who would have been killed by the state had their convictions stood and they been actually executed, and a few executed convicts whom they believe might have been innocent. But proponents can name men and women who really were – not might have been – murdered by convicted murderers while in prison. The murdered include prison guards, fellow inmates, and innocent men and women outside of prison.

In 1974, Clarence Ray Allen ordered a 17-year-old young woman, Mary Sue Kitts, murdered because she knew of Allen's involvement in a Fresno, Calif., store burglary.

After his 1977 trial and conviction, Allen was sentenced to life without parole.

According to San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra Saunders, "In Folsom State Prison, Allen cooked up a scheme to kill the witnesses who testified against him so that he could appeal his conviction and then be freed because any witnesses were dead – or scared into silence." As a result, three more innocent people were murdered – Bryon Schletewitz, 27, Josephine Rocha, 17, and Douglas White, 18.

This time, a jury sentenced Allen to death, the only death sentence ever handed down by a Glenn County (California) jury. That was in 1982.

For 23 years, opponents of the death penalty have played with the legal system – not to mention played with the lives of the murdered individuals' loved ones – to keep Allen alive.

Had Clarence Allen been executed for the 1974 murder of Mary Sue Kitts, three innocent people under the age of 30 would not have been killed. But because moral clarity among anti-death penalty activists is as rare as their self-righteousness is ubiquitous, finding an abolitionist who will acknowledge moral responsibility for innocents murdered by convicted murderers is an exercise in futility.

Perhaps the most infamous case of a death penalty opponent directly causing the murder of an innocent is that of novelist Norman Mailer. In 1981, Mailer utilized his influence to obtain parole for a bank robber and murderer named Jack Abbott on the grounds that Abbott was a talented writer. Six weeks after being paroled, Abbott murdered Richard Adan, a 22-year-old newlywed, aspiring actor and playwright who was waiting tables at his father's restaurant.

Mailer's reaction? "Culture is worth a little risk," he told the press. "I'm willing to gamble with a portion of society to save this man's talent."

That in a nutshell is the attitude of the abolitionists. They are "willing to gamble with a portion of society" – such as the lives of additional innocent victims – in order to save the life of every murderer.

Abolitionists are certain that they are morally superior to the rest of us. In their view, we who recoil at the thought that every murderer be allowed to keep his life are moral inferiors, barbarians essentially. But just as pacifists' views ensure that far more innocents will be killed, so do abolitionists' views ensure that more innocents will die.

There may be moral reasons to oppose taking the life of any murderer (though I cannot think of one), but saving the lives of innocents cannot be regarded as one of them.

Nevertheless, abolitionists will be happy to learn that Amnesty International has taken up the cause of ensuring that Clarence Ray Allen be spared execution. That is what the international community now regards as fighting for human rights.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/printer-friendly.asp?ARTICLE_ID=47631

Zoof, when I read this the first time, I thought it was very appropriate, and reading it for the second time, I could not agree more. When to victims rights come in to play in this debate? And contrary to the opinion of the bleeding hear left, the murderer is not a victim. Everyone has things happen to them in their lives that are not "nice" or "good", but that in no way excuses murder, single of mass. The pig farmer, Olsen, etc. all deserve the death penalty for two reasons: They killed innocents, and secondly, they themselves do not deserve to live. Personally, I can live with this.

 

[Finder]

Well Mr Zoo, there's nothing to learn there, besides the stupity of the system. I never said a convicted murder, xp one who murders with no motive should ever be reliesed from jail. I just said the state murdering a citizen is in no way a viable solution as it can be easyly used against the innocent. I bring up again the picture of China and the middle east. I will also bring up the fact that murdering a citizen in the USA is a costly affiar with the appeals and the further clogging of the courts with there cases, plus the fact it takes years with inmates on death row to be murdered by the state which is unusual and cruel torture.

 

[I think not]

I have to say that my opinion on the death penalty changes all the time. My core belief tells me, no to the death penalty, however when I hear about a horrible crime, pedophiles raping and then murdering children, I pop a blood vessel, and I wish this criminal just be put to death.

I don't believe anyone has the right to take away another life, and that goes for abortion also, although I am pro-choice. I am probably not making much sense, but issues of life and death are not easy things to ponder.

 

[bluealberta]

I have to say that my opinion on the death penalty changes all the time. My core belief tells me, no to the death penalty, however when I hear about a horrible crime, pedophiles raping and then murdering children, I pop a blood vessel, and I wish this criminal just be put to death.

I don't believe anyone has the right to take away another life, and that goes for abortion also, although I am pro-choice. I am probably not making much sense, but issues of life and death are not easy things to ponder.

 

[#juan]

Never meant to be a deterrent. Its called punishment for premeditated murder.

Maybe a good deterrent would be bribes. Offer potential murderers a million dollar reward for not killing some one?

DNA and murders caught on tape, corroborated by 50 RC Bishops should be sufficient evidence the killer is guilty.

But it's better to spend hundreds of thousands rehabilitating the psycopath and then let him loose. How many recent post DNA testing innocent people have been wrongfully executed?
How many innocent people have been murdered after a killer has been prematurely released from prison?

Clifford Olsen got $100,000 reward for showing where he buried 10 children. Any doubt he is innocent? The $100,000 a year to keep him in club Med could be better spent on feeding starving children.

I hate it when I agree with zoofer.

 

[Lotuslander]

Reading the posts on this thread made me glad we have politicians instead of direct democracy. My God, talk about small mindedness.
Victims' rights? What they Hell is that? In a murder case the victim is dead, he or she has no more rights! People may retort: "what about the family?" legally speaking they are not the victim(s). What you are really talking about under the guise of "victims' rights" is revenge, which I think most would agree is hardly the basis for designing a legal system not to mention the moral and ethical questions it raises. Anyone who studies criminology soon comes to realise that the biggest influence on crime is poverty, bar none. If people have money they have no need to engage in illegal activities. So when the question is raised; "can a perpetrator of crime be a victim?" One needs to examine the life which the criminal has led, broken home, sexual abuse, alcholoic upbringing, little or no education. It is no wonder that those who are less fortunate often become criminals.

In any case capital punnishment is a silly idea for the simple fact that is costs far more money in leagl fees to pay for all the appeals than it would to keep the criminal in jail for the rest of his life. In my opinion death is the easy way out compared to spending the resat of one's life in jail where you have to think of wht you have done for the rest of your days.

 

[zoofer]

A human has the right not to be murdered. But when he is tough titty, he has no more rights? Next!
You can study criminology all you want. It is taught my leftwing nutty professors who have no idea about reality. There are billions of poor people on the planet. A tiny percentage of them commit murder. Just as many rich privileged dudes kill as do have nots.
So only people with no money cause crime? Sure dream on.

So when the question is raised; "can a perpetrator of crime be a victim?" One needs to examine the life which the criminal has led, broken home, sexual abuse, alcholoic upbringing, little or no education. It is no wonder that those who are less fortunate often become criminals.

No concern about the murdered person. No responsibilty by the killer? Probably a teenager raped and dumped in a lake. First order of business is to find excuses for the killer. Did he have a tough life? Was he insecure due to acne, a unsatisfactory love life?
Reading posts like yours shows that blame the victim is alive and well. As Prager says "You have blood on your hands".
It takes over 20 years to execute a serial killer in the States. If endless appeals were disallowed, reduced to two or three the costs would be reduced.
A life sentence in Canada is probably 7 years max.
If he get 3 life sentences for three separate murders it is served con currently. A hideous joke.

 

[Lotuslander]

Zoofer wrote:

A human has the right not to be murdered. But when he is tough titty, he has no more rights? Next!
You can study criminology all you want. It is taught my leftwing nutty professors who have no idea about reality. There are billions of poor people on the planet. A tiny percentage of them commit murder. Just as many rich privileged dudes kill as do have nots.
So only people with no money cause crime? Sure dream on.

A human has the right not to be murdered. But when he is tough titty, he has no more rights? Next!

First of all when a person is dead he/she has no more legal, ethical, moral, philosophical or theological rights. He or she ceases to be! Therefore any agency that person had is extinguished. You are surely derranged if somehow you think a dead person has rights. How would a dead person express them or use them?

Secondly, look at the statistics! People who are better educated or have more money or both are far and away less likely to commit crimes then those who are poor. In fact the better educated and more economically well off one is the less likely they are to be a criminal. I don't know why you would argue otherwise when there has never been any empirical, quantitative, qualitative or even philosophical suggestion that wealthy people are more likely to be criminals than poor people.

As for who commits murder: I would be surprised if in all other aspects of criminal behaviour the poorer one is the more likely to commit crime yet, in homicides somehow Socio-economic-status doesn't matter. However, you may be correct on this point as something like 90% of murders victims are killed by someone they know.

Zoofer wrote:

No concern about the murdered person. No responsibilty by the killer? Probably a teenager raped and dumped in a lake. First order of business is to find excuses for the killer. Did he have a tough life? Was he insecure due to acne, a unsatisfactory love life?
Reading posts like yours shows that blame the victim is alive and well. As Prager says "You have blood on your hands".
It takes over 20 years to execute a serial killer in the States. If endless appeals were disallowed, reduced to two or three the costs would be reduced.
A life sentence in Canada is probably 7 years max.
If he get 3 life sentences for three separate murders it is served con currently. A hideous joke.

I don't know where you get off saying I "have blood on my hands" when you're the one in favour of capital punnishment! Which it must be remembered has killed innocent people. I don't go around slandering you though, maybe I should start!

In any case I am not trying to have murderers or murderesses shirk their responsibilities but, I think one should always have compassion! Unless one wants to be heartless! As for having concern for a murder victim well, I hate to sound cruel but, one can hardly be concerned for a corpse unless one is praying for their soul! Any reasonable person would agree! What one should try to do and what truly honours the deceased memory, is to make sure it never happens again. How do we lower the murder rate? It is not by introducing harsh punnishments which have absolutely no deterrent affect at all! Instead one should look for the root sources of crime-poverty. Right now North America has its lowest crime rate in 50 years! Is it anyone wonder that this also corresponds perfectly to the greatest economic expansion in history? Of course not, the two are directly correlated!

As for sentences I think you'll find the average sentence in Canada for murder is longer than seven years. And I hardly think taking away peoples appeals strengthens justice! The reason why there are so many appeals is because taking away someone's life is not a decision to be taken lightly, the state in essences in committing murder!

 

[zoofer]

Well I do think a dead person has rights. I may be deranged but if I stumbled across a corpse in the park I do not think I can remove the cadaver's kidneys. But then he has no rights so maybe I will make soap of the body.
If a person is starving and steals food for his family it is hardly a capital crime. If he kills everytime he feels like a cheeseburger then it is. With our safety net people shouldn't starve. If they blow their welfare cheque on 3 snorts of coke should we give him another and another in the hope he does not murder someone?

I don't know where you get off saying I "have blood on my hands" when you're the one in favour of capital punnishment! Which it must be remembered has killed innocent people. I don't go around slandering you though, maybe I should start!

If you read my educational paste on the previous page you would know where I am getting off. It is not only you but all death penalty opponents who have blood of innocent people on their hands.
Here is part of it. Enjoy

Capital punishment opponents
have blood on their hands
Posted: November 29, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern

By Dennis Prager
© 2005 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

Those of us who believe in the death penalty for some murders are told by opponents of the death penalty that if the state executes an innocent man, we have blood on our hands.

They are right. I, for one, readily acknowledge that as a proponent of the death penalty, my advocacy could result in the killing of an innocent person.

I have never, however, encountered any opponents of the death penalty who acknowledge that they have the blood of innocent men and women on their hands.

Yet they certainly do. Whereas the shedding of innocent blood that proponents of capital punishment are responsible for is thus far, thankfully, only theoretical, the shedding of innocent blood for which opponents of capital punishment are responsible is not theoretical at all. Thanks to their opposition to the death penalty, innocent men and women have been murdered by killers who would otherwise have been put to death.
.
.
The rest on previous page.

 

[Doryman]

A simple way to fix this is to let the criminal go free when his victim has recovered from his crime. If you rob a man, you stay in jail until he recovers the amount of money you robbed him of through his regular, workaday means. If you rape someone, you are given your freedom when they are psychologically and socially over it and can forgive you. If you murder someone, you get back out when that someone comes back to life!

Until then, you rot.

 

[elevennevele]

Re: RE: Capital Punishment

I’m not putting this out there as to suggest these are my views. I’m still on the fence with regards to various methods of dealing with criminals. I do however enjoy to read about what is out there, and I’m always interested to know of whatever works.

This also begs the question, do we use incarceration for revenge/as only a means of punishment, or is the ultimate goal to reform and to make a person useful again to society?

I know sharing this is going to drive some of you nuts. Remember, this is Norway. So I don’t want to hear somebody blasting Canadian Political Parties for what they do in another country.

Apparently, this has been working for them and as the article states, “Norway has one of the lowest incarceration rates in the world.”

There is a little more to the article toward the end that I didn't include. Feel free to read the rest via the link.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060323...ep9clis0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3NW1oMDRpBHNlYwM3NTc-

Break the law and live by a beach

By James KilnerThu Mar 23, 9:54 AM ET

The Web site reads like an advertisement for a holiday home.

"Is Bastoy the place for you?" it asks next to photographs of a sunset sparkling off the tranquil waters of the Oslo fjord and horses pulling sleighs over packed snow.

This wooded island could be -- if you are a rapist, a murderer, a drug trafficker or have accepted a large bribe.

"We try to take a cross-section of the country's prison population, not just the nice criminals," said Oyvind Alnaes, governor of the minimum security prison on Bastoy Island about 46 miles south of the Norwegian capital.

Inmates have included Norway's most notorious serial killer, Arnfinn Nesset, convicted of murdering 22 elderly people when he was manager of a nursing home in the 1970s. He was freed for good behavior after serving two-thirds of a 21-year sentence.

"A lot of people in Norway say that we treat them (the prisoners) too well because they should be punished. But this is the biggest mistake we have been making since the 1600s. Taking this line makes people bad," Alnaes said.

"You have to believe people are born good."

The one square mile island offers its 115 "residents" cross-country skiing, tennis and horse-riding, but before the inmates can slope off to practice their serve or head to the beach for a swim, there is work to do on the farm.

"We want to become the first ecological prison in the world," Alnaes said. "It's about giving the inmates responsibility (and) trust, and teaching them respect."

Alnaes, who wears jeans and t-shirts to work and is known to the inmates as Oyvind, says this model of open prison is the future. In 1997, he gave Bastoy Prison a new slogan: "An arena of the development of responsibility."

ESCAPE

Looking after the island's environment, he says, will nurture this sense of responsibility in the prisoners.

"Ecological thinking is about taking responsibility for nature, the future and how your grandchildren grow up," he said.

Only a handful of cars are used by prison staff on the island and along with the ferry, their engines will be converted to biofuel. The prison's six horses do most of the work, pulling carts driven by the prisoners, waste from the prison is used to generate power while oil heaters are being converted to wood.

The governor's development of responsibility goes further.

"The usual thing is that prisons are all about security," he said. "On the island, inmates work with knives and saws and axes. They need to do the work. And if an inmates increases his responsibility, you have to give him trust."

Norway has one of the lowest incarceration rates in the world but the justice system does receive some criticism, notably for lengthy pre-trial detentions and cramped holding cells at police stations.

Rather than watching and guarding, the 69 prison employees at Bastoy work alongside the inmates until it is time to go home and from 3 p.m. every day only five remain on the island.

The onus is on the prisoners not to escape

There have been few attempts, when friends have come over in a boat during the night to pick up a prisoner, but Alnaes says making a break for it is not a smart move.

"The prisoners understand that there is nowhere to go if they do escape. What is the alternative? Spend your life on the run or serve your time at Bastoy? And one attempted escape means you lose your right to stay here."

Prisoners have to apply for a place at Bastoy and applicants are vetted to filter out those who could cause the most trouble.

"That is the only place you can watch cable T.V. (in prison)," a short grey-haired man said, pointing to a stone building that houses the prison library.

 

[elevennevele]

Re: RE: Capital Punishment

It should be noted the types of countries that practice capital punishment. You have to wonder if you would want Canada to be lumped in with the countries listed. No surprise USA is near the top on the list.

Number 7 would suggest capital punishment is more about revenge thinking. Unless someone can put forth statistics on the costs of putting someone on death row as opposed to incarceration as having any benefit. Saying there is benefit without numbers to back up the statement doesn’t make for a good argument. I would want to see numbers on that.

I included stats on what has been discussed here but I encourage anyone to read all the points on the website itself.


http://web.amnesty.org/pages/deathpenalty-facts-eng

• In 2004, 97 per cent of all known executions took place in China, Iran, Viet Nam and the USA.

- Beheading (in Saudi Arabia, Iraq)
- Electrocution (in USA)
- Hanging (in Egypt, Iran, Japan, Jordan, Pakistan, Singapore and other countries)
- Lethal injection (in China, Guatemala, Philippines, Thailand, USA)
- Shooting (in Belarus, China, Somalia, Taiwan, Uzbekistan, Viet Nam and other countries)
- Stoning (in Afghanistan, Iran)

• Eight countries since 1990 are known to have executed prisoners who were under 18 years old at the time of the crime – China, Congo (Democratic Republic), Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, USA and Yemen. China, Pakistan and Yemen have raised the minimum age to 18 in law, and Iran is reportedly in the process of doing so. The USA executed more child offenders than any other country (19 between 1990 and 2003).


7. The deterrence argument
Scientific studies have consistently failed to find convincing evidence that the death penalty deters crime more effectively than other punishments. The most recent survey of research findings on the relation between the death penalty and homicide rates, conducted for the United Nations in 1988 and updated in 2002, concluded: ". . .it is not prudent to accept the hypothesis that capital punishment deters murder to a marginally greater extent than does the threat and application of the supposedly lesser punishment of life imprisonment."

(Reference: Roger Hood, The Death Penalty: A World-wide Perspective, Oxford, Clarendon Press, third edition, 2002, p. 230)


8. Effect of abolition on crime rates
Reviewing the evidence on the relation between changes in the use of the death penalty and homicide rates, a study conducted for the United Nations in 1988 and updated in 2002 stated: "The fact that the statistics continue to point in the same direction is persuasive evidence that countries need not fear sudden and serious changes in the curve of crime if they reduce their reliance upon the death penalty".

Recent crime figures from abolitionist countries fail to show that abolition has harmful effects. In Canada, for example, the homicide rate per 100,000 population fell from a peak of 3.09 in 1975, the year before the abolition of the death penalty for murder, to 2.41 in 1980, and since then it has declined further. In 2003, 27 years after abolition, the homicide rate was 1.73 per 100,000 population, 44 per cent lower than in 1975 and the lowest rate in three decades.

(Reference: Roger Hood, The Death Penalty: A World-wide Perspective, Oxford, Clarendon Press, third edition, 2002, p. 214)

10. Execution of the innocent
As long as the death penalty is maintained, the risk of executing the innocent can never be eliminated.

Since 1973, 122 prisoners have been released in the USA after evidence emerged of their innocence of the crimes for which they were sentenced to death. There were six such cases in 2004 and three up to December 2005. Some prisoners had come close to execution after spending many years under sentence of death. Recurring features in their cases include prosecutorial or police misconduct; the use of unreliable witness testimony, physical evidence, or confessions; and inadequate defence representation. Other US prisoners have gone to their deaths despite serious doubts over their guilt.

The then Governor of the US state of Illinois, George Ryan, declared a moratorium on executions in January 2000. His decision followed the exoneration of the 13th death row prisoner found to have been wrongfully convicted in the state since the USA reinstated the death penalty in 1977. During the same period, 12 other Illinois prisoners had been executed. In January 2003 Governor Ryan pardoned four death row prisoners and commuted all 167 other death sentences in Illinois.

11. The death penalty in the USA

* 60 prisoners were executed in the USA in 2005, bringing the year-end total to 1004 executed since the use of the death penalty was resumed in 1977.
* Around 3,400 prisoners were under sentence of death as of 1 January 2006.
* 38 of the 50 US states provide for the death penalty in law. The death penalty is also provided under US federal military and civilian law.

 

[elevennevele]

My personal opinion is that it is more better to address the pre issues which lead towards the committing of a crime than it is to solely concentrate on the consequence — after one has already committed the crime. In a way that one thinks the use of harsher penalties will be deterrent enough.

My other opinion is that reinstating capital punishment in Canada will serve nothing to improve our criminal system. Instead it will only serve to reflect negatively on our society and lump us among countries that have a low human rights record.

If an individual commits murder, I don’t think it sets much example for the society to in turn take life away as compensation. It almost becomes a way of stepping the society down toward the level of the criminal when the society itself should show a much greater regard for the value of life.

And yes, I do abhor crime.

 

[zoofer]

And yes, I do abhor crime.

and every possible excuse for it.