If a murderer is obviously guilty why would anyone be opposed to the death penalty?

[0roo0roo]

Originally posted by: feralkid
">there level? the justice system in this country is a joke in this country becasue we have this mindset that mind set, the jails in this country are like a 4 star hotel, maybe if we start treating the criminals like animals they wont act like animals"<




Who could possibly argue with that?

haha yea i mean i guess he's never gone, i've heard things about people getting killed, tossing the salad, or losing anal virginity in said wonderful 4 star hotels. what 4 star hotels are you comparing em to eh? personally experienced that level of service eh? hahaha

But then you're punishing the people who have to pay taxes to support the murderer. Why should a family who had one of their members killed by some idiot have to have part of their hard earned money go towards paying for room and board for a killer, paying for his state appointed lawyer, paying for him to send appeals to the court which ultimately results in costly time being wasted. Why should a grieving mother and father have to be deprived of a child while the man/woman who killed that child continues to live which is tantamount to slapping them in face everyday that murderer continues to exist.?

which is funny because last time i checked it costs more to put someone to death then to keep em locked away for life. and thats not even garranteeing 100% that they are truely guilty. sorry.



that being said, the worst strike against the death penalty is that it doesn't prevent crime. no one that commits a death penalty offense thinks that way. if your that far gone, its not on your mind.

its vengence, thats all it is.




that being said, if you make me supreme dictator of the US, i'll execute whom i please, as my judgement is perfect i'll even torture some of you

 

[SnapIT]

Originally posted by: Dulanic
I got that you didnt think his was Just the ... at the end semi implied sarcasm Sorry for the confusion.

I always end my sentences with three dots or more....

 

[Dulanic]

Originally posted by: SnapIT

Originally posted by: Dulanic
I got that you didnt think his was Just the ... at the end semi implied sarcasm Sorry for the confusion.

I always end my sentences with three dots or more....

That explains it.

 

[Arkitech]

Originally posted by: Dulanic
You know WHY Gov. Ryan did this? Because the system is FLAWED! If he had his own motives behind it... fine. Im just glad he did it. In IL we have RELEASED more innocent people from Death Row then we have executed! Thats a MAJOR flaw. Most of thoose people are guilty.... but how many innocent lives is it worth before we stop the death penalty? 1? 5? 10? 100? Its just NOT worth it. I would like nothing more then to see a murder put to death, but if it risks innocent lives then we become no better then they are! IL has semi recently released 12 or 13 INNOCENT people on death row. As I said before thats more then the # of people we have executed.

The simple fact is until our justice system is FLAWLESS and is always 100% right, which its far from right now. We have no right to risk someone else's life. Id bet alot of money there is still someone innocent on death row in IL... I'm sorry but I couldnt morally sacrafice their life to execute someone else.

You can say when we have no doubt. But thats not how the system is. And you can RARELY be 100% when human error is involved. What's 100%? When we have their fingerprints? Did you see that recent news thing on fingerprints? They can and have be wrong, people not qualified are comparing fingerprints quite often, there is no trainign you are required to have, no test you have to pass, no standard on how many points you need to match. Or how about a confession? We know thoose can be wrong, people can and have admited to crimes they didnt commit. How about they were identified by witnesses? Again it involves humans, and people have and can incorectly identify people. Even with DNA we may sometimes be wrong... they find a hair and match it some guy... what if he shared a cab with the person? Or by random chance had some contact with them? Yes I know its very unlikely... but even if there is a 1 in 10000 chance to execute someone innocent, the risk is still wrong to take IMO. In reality its MUCH higher then 1 in 1000... its higher then 1 in 100 in IL heck its closer to 1 in 15.

Now yes sometimes we CAN be sure.... a cop saw it and chased the guy and caught him. But right now the law doesnt work like that... they just have to be guilty in the jurors eyes... and we know that has and can be wrong. Until we can and are 100% sure EVERY single person on death row is guilty, I am against putting anyone to death. We have no right to risk innocent lives like that. We become no better then the murderer if we put innocent people to death.

Would I be for executing people who commit extreme crimes? ABSOLUTELY! like Child Rapists etc.. Would I be for executing them if there was ANY chance innocent people get executed also? ABSOLUTELY NOT!

We can argue about how some people deserve death.... but thats not what this is about. Its about the system being flawed. You can argue how some people might be 100% guilty and they deserve death. But as of right now our system does not work like that. Now if you want to argue about how we can take the flaws out... fine, but until we do and we can be 100% sure every single person is guilty on death row... what we are doing is wrong. Sacraficing innocent lives to punish the guilty is not right.

Originally posted by: Dulanic
We should want everything fool proof... hehe you are comparing apples and oranges there man. Being a hypocrite is putting innocent people to death because you want someone who killed someone to be put to death while innocent people may also be killed. Your killing innocent people JUST like the murderer did.

I think some of you are missing the point of this post, if a murderer is OBVIOUSLY guilty why would anyone be opposed to the death penalty. Despite what some people have said previously in this thread there are MANY murderers in prisons who are OBVIOUSLY guilty. For example look at serial killers like Gacy, Ramirez, Dahmer, Berkowitz. These are guys who are undoubtedly guilty Then you have gangmembers who have been caught doing drive-bys, you parents who have killed their children and tried to hide behind the insanity plea, then there's the guys who shoot up the local bar or the post office, not to mention the jealous spouse or lover, habitual drunk drivers, the mafia, robbers who kill in attempt to take someone elses property. There are many, many, many examples of clear cut guilt where it does'nt even take a jury to weigh various pieces of evidence. There are many murderers where detectives don't have to take fingerprint and bloodsamples and dna evidence. I'm talking about murderers where it was OBVIOUS that they were guilty.

 

[Moonbeam]

To quote myself:

Does God forgive the sins of a murderer who invites Christ into his heart? If it happened that the hate you feel for a killer is the hate you feel for your guilty self and by your own consent he and you have been falsely condemned, can you forgive. Each of us feels the least among us Do we not treat Him like the least among us?

You are the killer for you have killed your true self who is god. The door to heaven is blocked by your condemned self. Only forgiveness will move him away from the door. As ye judge, so shall ye be judged. It's the way it is. Sorry.
--------------------------------

How does absolute guilt of the killer change any of this?

The feeling you have to kill the killer is the feeling the killer had when he killed. Everybody who kills is self-justified in their killing. Nobody kills knowing the person they kill shouldn't be killed. We kill because we believe somebody has to die. That is where the problem is and that is why we are no better than the killer if we kill him. Of course this is dependent on the fact that we have structures in place to prevent killers from repeat killing. Before prisons I don't think yhere was much alternative to the death penalty. We don't have to hate killers, but we absolutely must stop them. And we have to stop ourselves.

 

[Arkitech]

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
To quote myself:

Does God forgive the sins of a murderer who invites Christ into his heart? If it happened that the hate you feel for a killer is the hate you feel for your guilty self and by your own consent he and you have been falsely condemned, can you forgive. Each of us feels the least among us Do we not treat Him like the least among us?

You are the killer for you have killed your true self who is god. The door to heaven is blocked by your condemned self. Only forgiveness will move him away from the door. As ye judge, so shall ye be judged. It's the way it is. Sorry.
--------------------------------

How does absolute guilt of the killer change any of this?

The feeling you have to kill the killer is the feeling the killer had when he killed. Everybody who kills is self-justified in their killing. Nobody kills knowing the person they kill shouldn't be killed. We kill because we believe somebody has to die. That is where the problem is and that is why we are no better than the killer if we kill him. Of course this is dependent on the fact that we have structures in place to prevent killers from repeat killing. Before prisons I don't think yhere was much alternative to the death penalty. We don't have to hate killers, but we absolutely must stop them. And we have to stop ourselves.

Maybe its just because I grew up in a christian household but if even god says to kill murderers I don't see anything wrong with. There's a difference in punishing those who flaunt the laws of society than simply going and killing random invididuals.

 

[Moonbeam]

Arkitech, could you please say "Maybe its just because I grew up in a christian household but if even god says to kill murderers I don't see anything wrong with." some other way. I can't understand a thing of what you mean. Something is just goofy with that sentence. Sorry.

 

[dabuddha]

I pity you guys who would still want someone to get life instead of death AFTER they harm any of your family members. Most of you have never had to go through it but I have and I?m glad the bastard is dead. The point isn't that the death penalty is supposed to be a deterrent, but that it keeps a murderer off the street with no chance of him going back. And like it was said earlier, the original question/post was how you can oppose the death penalty when the person is proven guilty without any doubt.

 

[Gaard]

Originally posted by: dabuddha
I pity you guys who would still want someone to get life instead of death AFTER they harm any of your family members. Most of you have never had to go through it but I have and I?m glad the bastard is dead. The point isn't that the death penalty is supposed to be a deterrent, but that it keeps a murderer off the street with no chance of him going back. And like it was said earlier, the original question/post was how you can oppose the death penalty when the person is proven guilty without any doubt.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't recall any anti-death penalty member stating that they've had a family member harmed.

 

[Electric Amish]

Hell! I'm not opposed to the death penalty for someone that isn't obviously guilty.

amish

 

[dabuddha]

Originally posted by: Gaard

Originally posted by: dabuddha
I pity you guys who would still want someone to get life instead of death AFTER they harm any of your family members. Most of you have never had to go through it but I have and I?m glad the bastard is dead. The point isn't that the death penalty is supposed to be a deterrent, but that it keeps a murderer off the street with no chance of him going back. And like it was said earlier, the original question/post was how you can oppose the death penalty when the person is proven guilty without any doubt.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't recall any anti-death penalty member stating that they've had a family member harmed.

my point is that i asked for consistency. if you're against the death penalty, then be against it no matter what then. Even if someone murders someone in your family, let that person be in prison for life. Wanting the death penalty for only those that don't harm your family is being hypocritical.

EDIT: for clarification, I never said anyone stated they had had a family member harmed. But I stated what I did to get people to see the other side of the issue. It's easy to stand on a soap box and preach your beliefs but things really change when your beliefs are put to the test. A long time ago, I was neither for nor against the death penalty. In fact, I really didn't care. But things changed when my uncle was murdered.

 

[Gaard]

Originally posted by: dabuddha

Originally posted by: Gaard

Originally posted by: dabuddha
I pity you guys who would still want someone to get life instead of death AFTER they harm any of your family members. Most of you have never had to go through it but I have and I?m glad the bastard is dead. The point isn't that the death penalty is supposed to be a deterrent, but that it keeps a murderer off the street with no chance of him going back. And like it was said earlier, the original question/post was how you can oppose the death penalty when the person is proven guilty without any doubt.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't recall any anti-death penalty member stating that they've had a family member harmed.

my point is that i asked for consistency. if you're against the death penalty, then be against it no matter what then. Even if someone murders someone in your family, let that person be in prison for life. Wanting the death penalty for only those that don't harm your family is being hypocritical.

EDIT: for clarification, I never said anyone stated they had had a family member harmed. But I stated what I did to get people to see the other side of the issue. It's easy to stand on a soap box and preach your beliefs but things really change when your beliefs are put to the test. A long time ago, I was neither for nor against the death penalty. In fact, I really didn't care. But things changed when my uncle was murdered.

My condolences. I have uncles who are like my brothers or friends. I come from a very close family and I wouldn't be surprised if I felt the same way you do if harm came to any of them. Your arguements, however, are quite lacking. Maybe it's because of your strong opinions on the subject, but some of the stuff you are saying, partricularly your 'hypocrites' arguement, don't make any sense.

 

[dabuddha]

Originally posted by: Gaard

Originally posted by: dabuddha

Originally posted by: Gaard

Originally posted by: dabuddha
I pity you guys who would still want someone to get life instead of death AFTER they harm any of your family members. Most of you have never had to go through it but I have and I?m glad the bastard is dead. The point isn't that the death penalty is supposed to be a deterrent, but that it keeps a murderer off the street with no chance of him going back. And like it was said earlier, the original question/post was how you can oppose the death penalty when the person is proven guilty without any doubt.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't recall any anti-death penalty member stating that they've had a family member harmed.

my point is that i asked for consistency. if you're against the death penalty, then be against it no matter what then. Even if someone murders someone in your family, let that person be in prison for life. Wanting the death penalty for only those that don't harm your family is being hypocritical.

EDIT: for clarification, I never said anyone stated they had had a family member harmed. But I stated what I did to get people to see the other side of the issue. It's easy to stand on a soap box and preach your beliefs but things really change when your beliefs are put to the test. A long time ago, I was neither for nor against the death penalty. In fact, I really didn't care. But things changed when my uncle was murdered.

My condolences. I have uncles who are like my brothers or friends. I come from a very close family and I wouldn't be surprised if I felt the same way you do if harm came to any of them. Your arguements, however, are quite lacking. Maybe it's because of your strong opinions on the subject, but some of the stuff you are saying, partricularly your 'hypocrites' arguement, don't make any sense.

well.... by hypocrite i mean "a person who professes beliefs and opinions that they do not hold." I refer to those that claim the death penalty is wrong but when they're put in a situation where a family member is harmed, they cry for the blood of the offender. I?m not saying anyone here did that.
i would also like to see everyone, who thinks the death penalty is wrong, go to the house of the mother of this child:

A woman and her boyfriend lured a 10 year girl into their car. After taking her back to their apartment this little girl was raped with a shoe and a hammer, they later used the same hammer to smash her skull while watching her die.

and tell her why the man and the woman should be allowed to live while her child was forced to die. If you can look into the mother's eyes and explain your reasons and have her accept them, then I'll agree with the supposed fallacy of the death penalty.

 

[BooGiMaN]

Originally posted by: Xenon
Killing in the name of revenge is just wrong no matter the crime. For the ones you mentioned I'd prefer an 8x8 box with no doors (yes welded shut), a slot for food, 1 sink, 1 toilet. Absolutely no medical attention whatsoever, except for one syringe for the prisoner to take his own life should he find it necessary at some point. That is it. Basically dead to the rest of society.

You forgot a beating and whipping every year on the anniversary of their incarceration, just liek in the movie the Count of Monte Cristo.

 

[Dulanic]

I think some of you are missing the point of this post, if a murderer is OBVIOUSLY guilty why would anyone be opposed to the death penalty. Despite what some people have said previously in this thread there are MANY murderers in prisons who are OBVIOUSLY guilty. For example look at serial killers like Gacy, Ramirez, Dahmer, Berkowitz. These are guys who are undoubtedly guilty Then you have gangmembers who have been caught doing drive-bys, you parents who have killed their children and tried to hide behind the insanity plea, then there's the guys who shoot up the local bar or the post office, not to mention the jealous spouse or lover, habitual drunk drivers, the mafia, robbers who kill in attempt to take someone elses property. There are many, many, many examples of clear cut guilt where it does'nt even take a jury to weigh various pieces of evidence. There are many murderers where detectives don't have to take fingerprint and bloodsamples and dna evidence. I'm talking about murderers where it was OBVIOUS that they were guilty.

And I think your missing my points... what is 100% guilt? Fingerprints? Eye Witnesses? Confessions? All can be wrong, and have been in the past. So where do we draw the line? And as I said... you can argue that point... but thats not how the system works as is right now. If you want to change the laws, well then thats for another post. But as it currently stands Im very much against the death penalty because our justice system is very very flawed as it is right now. How is it OBVIOUS they were guilty? Unless you have a ton of people witness it and the guy is caught at the scene. Yes Gacy Dahmer etc... deserve death, but I wont support the death penalty even for them when it also kills innocent people. Now if the system is changed, and we have a way to always be 100% sure their guilty... then yes Ill side with you. But until that day, I wont. And I dont see that day coming anytime soon. We need to get rid of the death penalty period right now because it still kills innocent people.

 

[dabuddha]

Originally posted by: Dulanic

I think some of you are missing the point of this post, if a murderer is OBVIOUSLY guilty why would anyone be opposed to the death penalty. Despite what some people have said previously in this thread there are MANY murderers in prisons who are OBVIOUSLY guilty. For example look at serial killers like Gacy, Ramirez, Dahmer, Berkowitz. These are guys who are undoubtedly guilty Then you have gangmembers who have been caught doing drive-bys, you parents who have killed their children and tried to hide behind the insanity plea, then there's the guys who shoot up the local bar or the post office, not to mention the jealous spouse or lover, habitual drunk drivers, the mafia, robbers who kill in attempt to take someone elses property. There are many, many, many examples of clear cut guilt where it does'nt even take a jury to weigh various pieces of evidence. There are many murderers where detectives don't have to take fingerprint and bloodsamples and dna evidence. I'm talking about murderers where it was OBVIOUS that they were guilty.

And I think your missing my points... what is 100% guilt? Fingerprints? Eye Witnesses? Confessions? All can be wrong, and have been in the past. So where do we draw the line? And as I said... you can argue that point... but thats not how the system works as is right now. If you want to change the laws, well then thats for another post. But as it currently stands Im very much against the death penalty because our justice system is very very flawed as it is right now. How is it OBVIOUS they were guilty? Unless you have a ton of people witness it and the guy is caught at the scene. Yes Gacy Dahmer etc... deserve death, but I wont support the death penalty even for them when it also kills innocent people. Now if the system is changed, and we have a way to always be 100% sure their guilty... then yes Ill side with you. But until that day, I wont. And I dont see that day coming anytime soon. We need to get rid of the death penalty period right now because it still kills innocent people.

i see your point there but you have to realize, nothing in this world is fool proof, not even DNA tests. And letting these guys live just isn't really an option unless we follow Xenon's ideas.
BTW Xenon, I like your idea. Do you have a newsletter I can subscribe to?

 

[Dulanic]

Letting them live is an option... and one Im willing to live with if it saves innocent lives. It's not my favorite one... but with the justice system as is, its the best choice for now IMO.

 

[AgentDib]

Couple good reasons to be against the death penalty, even if you have no problem with killing obviously guilty murderers (I sure don't).

By the time you go through all the appeals, etc.. it is cheaper to give somebody life in prison then to electrocute them. $300,000 is not an unsual figure for court fees including the appeals compared to an estimated prison rate of about $9 per day per inmate for high security prisons. That's about 91 years worth of prison- The average prisoner lives just 31 years after being sentenced to life in prison. I'm not even mentioning the positive impact that many prisoners in work programs have on society.

Do i think murderers deserve the death penalty? Yep. Would i like to pay three times as much for that individual who is already a detriment to society? Nope.

Sure, you might argue we could just eliminate appeals etc and take obviously guilty parties straight from the courtroom to the electric chair. I don't think you can ever draw a firm line (this person is 100% obviously guilty, that person is 98% obviously guilty) and it's not worth jeopardizing our system of democracy just to get revenge.

I might also add i think the death penalty is the easy way out for a lot of prisoners on death row... keeping them in prison to work and pay back their crimes to society seems like a better solution.

Oh, and if I had a family member murdered i'd feel a lot better knowing that said murderer was going to be spending the rest of his/her life doing 7 day a week hard manual labor then I would feel spending $300k to kill him.

Just my 2 cents,

 

[Lash444]

Well, good old Michigan used to have it. So we used it and the first guy got put to the chair and was innocent. Nothing is a sure thing, but I agree with the death penalty to an extent. The facts better be rock solid however.

 

[desy]

Lash
Do you have the details on that.
I'm not doubting you but the ususal propenents of the DP 'claim' no innocent person has ever been executed.
Ususally the investigating is over and pointless after the deed, and political will to find the truth.
I'm against it but certainly agree it could be justified in certain cases . Support of the DP is eroding with still most people supporting it but every census that number falls.
We used to have slavery too, people thought that was a good idea as well.

 

[Fides]

---THE REASON NOT TO KILL A MURDERER---

If you kill him how are you any better?
Taking away his life is going to redeem the life that was lost?
Call the murderer savege, uncivilized, immoral, unethical, whatever. Then do the same thing yourself to him.
Hypocrisy?