The Capital Punishment Debate

[Glorified Ape]

The death penalty, or any punishment, shouldn't serve primarily as a deterrent, it should serve as retribution from society.   If someone has committed acts so heinous that they are to be kept out of society for the rest of their lives, perhaps the gallows is a fitting end for them.

They shoot rabid dogs, don't they?

What purpose does the retribution serve? What exactly are we supposed to gain, as a society, from executions? It won't fix what was done and it doesn't serve as a deterrent.

As for the rabid dogs analogy - we also put down animals that we can't find homes for, should we be doing the same with children that no one adopts? Should we execute the mentally ill because they may pose a danger to society the same way a rabid dog does?

 

[Steve031]

From a purely economic standpoint, it is actually cheaper to incarcerate criminals than execute them.  The reason for this is the lengthy process of appeals that are mandatory in order to carry out a death sentence.  So if the death penalty is not deterring anyone, and if it costs more than putting them in jail for life, then why have it?

The answer is revenge, and our justice system is not founded on that emotion.  It exists as a means of enforcing the social contract, specifically by inflicting punishment on people who break that contract.

 

[Roy Harding]

From a purely economic standpoint, it is actually cheaper to incarcerate criminals than execute them.  The reason for this is the lengthy process of appeals that are mandatory in order to carry out a death sentence.  So if the death penalty is not deterring anyone, and if it costs more than putting them in jail for life, then why have it?

The answer is revenge, and our justice system is not founded on that emotion.  It exists as a means of enforcing the social contract, specifically by inflicting punishment on people who break that contract.

Excuse me, but we don't HAVE capital punishment, therefore there ARE no "appeals that are mandatory".

Your argument is specious.

 

[old medic]

From a purely economic standpoint, it is actually cheaper to incarcerate criminals than execute them.  The reason for this is the lengthy process of appeals that are mandatory in order to carry out a death sentence.  So if the death penalty is not deterring anyone, and if it costs more than putting them in jail for life, then why have it?

I disagree completely. Executions happened in Canada until the 1950's.  Usually the trial would last a month, if convicted, there would be a single automatic appeal that would be held within four to six months.  If the conviction stood, they would be hung within another month or two.

 

[Acorn]

They would be "hanged." "Hung" has an entirely different meaning.

The fact is that our justice system is imperfect. Capital punishment must require a level of perfect justice. If it were a deterrent it may be worth the occasional innocent victim, but it doesn't deter, so the retribution must derive from a perfect system.

It'll never happen. We can solve the recidevist problem by ensuring that "life" means "life" in prison.

 

[career_radio-checker]

Usually the trial would last a month, if convicted, there would be a single automatic appeal that would be held within four to six months.   If the conviction stood, they would be hung within another month or two.

And for that shred of evidence found a couple of years after the crime, that could have proved the condemned man/woman innocent..

I support the death penalty. All those who say it doesn't deter other murders from happening obviously don't understand the concept of justice. If we wanted a deterant, an execution would entail sticking the bas-turds head on a pike in public view.  Now that's a good ol' medieval deterant. Of course that's not done anymore. Instead executions are not public and are professionally(i.e. death with least amount of suffering) done. And ya it does prevent repeat offenses

That said, the condemned must be proven beyond any reasonable doubt he/she is guilty. Thus the 15-20 year appeal process, and don't go whining about cost effectiveness. You don't put a cost on people's lives whether considering the victim or the condemned.

 

[Jarnhamar]

What purpose does the retribution serve? What exactly are we supposed to gain, as a society, from executions? It won't fix what was done and it doesn't serve as a deterrent.

How about taking murderers off the streets and not letting them live off society for 26 or 50 years?  Roof over their head and 3 meals a day. Sure prison life is hard, try living on the streets.
How much does it take to house an inmate per year. Times that by 50 years. If someone has wiped out a family and theres pretty good reason to believe he runs the risk of doing it again, wouldn't that money be better spent on

health care
education
policing
disease research (cancer aids etc.)
feeding the homeless
helping out 3rd world nations

I can think of quite a few things *I* would rather spend my money on that giving a murderer 3 meals a day until he dies of old age.

The examples of having unprotected sex to prove a point or some such sounds like an argument from a highschool debate club. I'm sure you can come up with a better example or comparison when your talking about people who have
"unprotected sex" with little girls and boys then cut their faces off and leave them to die.

Apples and oranges.

 

[TCBF]

Funny we hear statistics on how much it costs to warehouse a Puke in prison per year, but never how much  economic and emotional (which is eventually economic) damage it costs to allow them to roam free each year.

Add up the security, healthcare, legal and insurance costs.  Impressed?

I'm not.

Lock'em up or eliminate them.  Younger the better.

Tom

 

[Michael Dorosh]

How about taking murderers off the streets and not letting them live off society for 26 or 50 years?  Roof over their head and 3 meals a day. Sure prison life is hard, try living on the streets.
How much does it take to house an inmate per year. Times that by 50 years. If someone has wiped out a family and theres pretty good reason to believe he runs the risk of doing it again,

Who cares if he runs the risk of doing it again, really?  Is that really the fear?  Most murders are between people who know each other.  If a guy kills his wife in a crime of passion - he's not likely to reoffend.  But that's not really the point, is it. 

Deterrence isn't just about repeat offenders, but new offenders as well.  But the DP isn't about deterence.  Justice and proportionality I think are the ingredients here. 

 

[Joe Blow]

Why people would go and protest the deaths of some of these guys is beyond me - like the guy who stabbed his wife to death with a screwdriver through the window of her car - while their 10 year old son sat in the passenger seat - because she asked for a divorce.

OK, I'm honestly conflicted about the issue but I'll take a stab at that.  I think the basic idea (emotion?) is that all life is beautiful and all death is heinous.  I don't mean to be glib or poetic.  I just think that an argument against capital punishment comes down to that basic sentiment, which is prior to considerations about the nature of the crime and cost associated with housing the offender, and even prior to considerations about whether or not one death is more just than another. 

I think it's fundamentally a religious question before it's a political one.  Maybe the question to ask first is: 'Is there a beauty to life (regardless of how it is lived) that trumps all other concerns?'

Anyway, Roy Harding's post resonates for me too.

It does, however, eliminate the possibility of repeated offences

 

[TCBF]

"Justice and proportionality I think are the ingredients here."

Our points exactly.  If you murder - you can die.

That is just.

That is proportionate.

I also believe in multiple executions for a single murder.  You launch a hit on your ex-wife for example, you and the hit man both get the noose.  The getaway car driver?  The noose.

Watch how the death penulty becomes a deterent when those who don't pull the trigger but were accessories ALSO have to face it.

That would cut down on gangs.

Tom

 

[Glorified Ape]

How about taking murderers off the streets and not letting them live off society for 26 or 50 years?   Roof over their head and 3 meals a day. Sure prison life is hard, try living on the streets.
How much does it take to house an inmate per year. Times that by 50 years. If someone has wiped out a family and theres pretty good reason to believe he runs the risk of doing it again, wouldn't that money be better spent on

health care
education
policing
disease research (cancer aids etc.)
feeding the homeless
helping out 3rd world nations

I can think of quite a few things *I* would rather spend my money on that giving a murderer 3 meals a day until he dies of old age.

If we had the death penalty, we would undoubtedly have as lengthy a process as the US given our left-leaning justice system. It costs more to imprison someone on death row and execute them than it does to imprison them in general population for life. Your support for the death penalty is actually support for wasting more money, not saving it.

The examples of having unprotected sex to prove a point or some such sounds like an argument from a highschool debate club. I'm sure you can come up with a better example or comparison when your talking about people who have
"unprotected sex" with little girls and boys then cut their faces off and leave them to die.

Apples and oranges.

Not at all - the examples were there to point out the idiocy and self-contradictory nature of 'killing killers because killing is wrong'. It's like screwing for virginity or having a "war on war" or saying "don't hit people" and then smacking your kid. The reason my examples sounded so stupid is because they're exactly that - stupid - as is the death penalty.

"Justice and proportionality I think are the ingredients here."

Our points exactly.  If you murder - you can die.

See above.

That is just.

Not by our society's standards and not by the standards of the overwhelming majority of the Western world.

That is proportionate.

So "an eye for an eye" should be the basis of our entire justice system?

I also believe in multiple executions for a single murder.  You launch a hit on your ex-wife for example, you and the hit man both get the noose.  The getaway car driver?  The noose.

Watch how the death penulty becomes a deterent when those who don't pull the trigger but were accessories ALSO have to face it.

That would cut down on gangs.

Tom

I seriously doubt it. Do you really think that the lack of deterrence in the death penalty is because accomplices aren't being executed?

 

[TCBF]

"If we had the death penalty, we would undoubtedly have as lengthy a process as the US given our left-leaning justice system. It costs more to imprison someone on death row and execute them than it does to imprison them in general population for life. Your support for the death penalty is actually support for wasting more money, not saving it."

Not at all.  Just take the money wasted on the gun registry and put it into death sentences.

"So "an eye for an eye" should be the basis of our entire justice system? "

Isn't it now? If not - remove the threat - permanently.

"I seriously doubt it. Do you really think that the lack of deterrence in the death penalty is because accomplices aren't being executed? "

I believe the data on deterence is flawed.  The death penalty deters less than it could because very few convicted killers ever are put to death ANYWHERE (USA, China, Japan).

As well, I think the death penalty for serious asault - where lack of timely medical intervension would have resulted in death - as well as attempted murder is correct.

What criminals fear is death - at the time of the crime and at the hands of their victim mostly, as a result of a long legal process eventually.

As for repeat offenders - yes, some do kill again.  No sucessful lawsuits against their parole boards so far, unfortunately.

Tom

 

[winchable]

I'd like to see some actual statistics that murder rates have dropped since the introduction of the death penalty.
And if they have I'd still seriously question that was a result of the death penalty, correlation is not causation.

Personally I don't agree with the death penalty, that's just me though, for a number of reasons I really don't feel like debating.



On the topic though, could the anti-death penalty protestors have POSSIBLY picked a worse example as the face of their cause???????
Tookie Williams, founder of the crips, socio-path, all around Mr. BadNasty.
Good God, the media will eat anything you feed them, they're like dogs or crack addicts.

 

[kcdist]

Here's a thought:

How many drug smuggler's are contemplating vying their trade in Singapore these days?

Whether the death penalty is a deterrent or not is a mute point. I believe it is not where a crime of passion is concerned, however, I do believe it is for pre-meditated murder. (See Toronto this year)

As a point of principle, I believe the death penalty should be mandatory in the the murder of a Peace Officer, as well as any pre-meditated, 1st degree convictions. The rest would be negotiable.

As for all the naysayers....how would you react to the murderer of your mother being released after a mere 15 years in prison (less actually, after receiving double time served for pre-trial custody). That's the litmus test.

Che asks if the murder rate would lower after the introduction of the death penalty? I ask "does it matter?"

If it was my family member who was the victim, the death of the murderer would go a long way in helping to put closure on the issue.

Not every member of our society is salvageable. Some simply deserve to die.

 

[winchable]

As for all the naysayers....how would you react to the murderer of your mother being released after a mere 15 years in prison

Does this need to be addressed via the death penalty?
Put them away for an actual life sentence instead, that can be addressed with tougher and logical sentencing.

A friend of mine was murdered in August of this year near where I live (Jonathan Reader for anyone from Halifax who might remember) if they catch the murder (when, hopefully) I don't want to think they'll die for it and neither do his parents. They don't want more death, after experiencing the death of someone first hand none of us do really, we want the cycle to end at Jon.
I do, however, want them locked up for life regardless of whether it is second or first degree, and I mean life with no chance for parole.
And I'll probably never see either option happening.

I ask "does it matter?"

Yes, if it serves no useful purpose beyond "revenge" then why not just cut out the middleman and say that if someone murders your brother you have a right to kill him.
I'd be happier with that, it gives families and people the right to decide rather than a faceless bureaucracy that supposedly knows what it's doing, no seriously I really would rather have that.

I disagree with the idea that the government executing someone is somehow so different from someone else killing someone in revenge.

If it doesn't act as an actual proven deterrent to violent crimes all it does is serves peoples desire for revenge, and I reiterate, why not just cut out the middle man?
I want less government, not more, giving the government a mandate to decide if someone lives or dies is one step over the line for me.

To a certain extent I suppose I do agree with you in that some people in society are unsalvageable and do deserve to die, I just don't think that the government should decide.

 

[Infanteer]

What purpose does the retribution serve? What exactly are we supposed to gain, as a society, from executions? It won't fix what was done and it doesn't serve as a deterrent.

Retribution serves to appeal to our most basic instinct of lex talionis.  You say that justice isn't about retribution; what it is about then?  We fear the fickle nature of vigilantism and people taking "justice into their own hands" so we create a system at the communal level that is perceived to be fair and consistent; this doesn't change the nature of why we have the system.  Justice is the communities retaliation for transgressions against its norms and rules.

I support the death penalty because it is the most simple and efficient way of dealing with the most serious criminal offenders.  The community grants the state the right to use violence when the situation warrants it - military action, police conducting there duties, etc.  Impostion of capital punishment is another circumstance where I can see this as justified.  Of course, an alternative like banishment to a penal colony in the high arctic is another possibility.  The bottom line is if you rape and murder 40-some-odd women and feed them to your pigs, I don't want you in my society; not even writing books in a public-provided facility.

As for the rabid dogs analogy - we also put down animals that we can't find homes for, should we be doing the same with children that no one adopts? Should we execute the mentally ill because they may pose a danger to society the same way a rabid dog does?

We put down homeless animals for different reasons then we put rabid dogs, so that analogy sucks.  As well, the death penalty is given for a crime committed, not on the basis of danger posed, so don't attempt to throw this off topic.  If an inbred, violent dog rips the face off of a 4 year old, we don't give it 25 years with chance of parole for a reason.

 

[dutchie]

I disagree with the death penalty for several reasons:

1-It is not proven to be a credible deterrant.
2-The chance of executing an innocent person is too high
3-I don't believe the State has a moral right to kill (outside of national defence of course)
4-I have a moral objection to killing when other means are available. The whole "Thou shall not kill" thing.
5-It seems that a major argument FOR the death penalty is to somehow make amends to the victims family, to make them feel better. Not only is the victims families feelings largely irrelavant in the discussion of someone's right to live, I don't believe that killing the murderer will make them feel better. You always here quotes like, "That was too good for him," or "I'm glad he's dead now, but it won't bring him back." And even if it did make them feel better, killing someone to make another person feel better is barbaric. Revenge is a knee jerk reaction borne not of reason, but of emotion.
6-There is a real alternative: life in prison.

You want to eliminate the chance of re-offence (which as has been pointed out is not really an issue anyway) - LIFE in prison, no option.


edited to add # 6.

 

[Steve031]

The last execution in Canada occurred in 1962, but the law remained on the books until 1976.  Are you telling me that nobody was sentenced to death during that time period?  Canada had an appeals process that took more than a couple months.  Two of the more famous executions in the 1950s (as part of the Albert Guay affair) took 2 years to carry out.  And that was in the '50s, a time period when the nature of justic was different than it is today.

The opinions expressed by anti-death penalty views on this forum parallel those expressed by parliament when capital punishment was abolished and that decision reaffirmed later (both in free votes).

 

[Jarnhamar]

If we had the death penalty, we would undoubtedly have as lengthy a process as the US given our left-leaning justice system. It costs more to imprison someone on death row and execute them than it does to imprison them in general population for life. Your support for the death penalty is actually support for wasting more money, not saving it.

Why does it cost more to imprison them on death row than just in prison them for like? because of the appeal process? Don't people imprisoned for life (which in Canada is what, 25 years? dumb) still get to do the appeal thing?
If it's true then that's a good point. We really need to speed up the process and not play around with this appeal for 20 years bullshit.  Give them a year to come up with something. Even then it's 365 more days than they gave their victim.

I don't really care whether or not the death penalty is a deterant though..

How many drug smuggler's are contemplating vying their trade in Singapore these days?

Is a great point.

Might be a little graphic.
I read an article once about a guy who , if memory serves me right, raped and killed a mother while the daughter was forced to watch. Then took the daughter and made her crawl through a barbwire fence, put a shotgun up between her legs, fired, and waited and watched for 15 minutes while she died.
I don't want these people in my society.

I agree with infanteer. The death penalty is given for a crime committed, not on the basis of danger posed.

Justice IS about retribution.
A criminal takes something away from society so society takes something away from them.  takes away their money, privileges, freedom and in extreme cases their life.