Utah counts down to firing squad execution

[Poisonshady313]

So I take it you're fine with innocent people being painfully executed so long as they get the right guy sometimes?

Not sometimes. 99% of the time. What other government run institution is that accurate? Can you name me one?

Innocent people in jail is a tragedy, but it's a tragedy we can fix.

But if people are innocent and in jail, there's less pressure to prove their innocence... because now they've got all the time in the world... and if it never comes to pass that they're exonerated.. they've still had their life taken from them... but they've been made to suffer every day for decades... in fear, frustrated, hopeless....

Is that really any better than capital punishment?

An innocent person is far more likely to be convicted and sentenced to prison time than he is to be executed. Convicting people isn't nearly as accurate or as careful as executing them.... and those mistakes can be just as permanent... but that (grossly)imperfect system is much better than the (imperceptibly) imperfect death penalty right?

 

[KatNotKathy]

Fwiw, if our prisons are worse than death itself, we are doing something horribly wrong.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Not sometimes. 99% of the time. What other government run institution is that accurate? Can you name me one?

The land surveying department of your state DOT would normally consider any error more than 1 in 5000 (i.e. an accuracy of 99.98%) to be a failure.

 

[Poisonshady313]

When we look at capital punishment, though, the same justifications don't apply. Where's the societal benefit of that extra step of going from imprisoning a criminal to executing him?

It shows that the consequences for violating the law is not a vague and meaningless concept. Capital crimes deserve capital punishment. Anything less shows a level of tolerance for murderers in our society that I just do not have. Also, if we executed our murderers in more proportion to how many are sentenced in a given year, it would help the prison overpopulation problem.

And you can't make the same argument that you have no viable alternatives, because there is a viable alternative to capital punishment: life imprisonment. It fulfills all the valid goals of capital punishment without having as high a cost in terms of punishment inflicted on the wrongfully convicted.

No, it doesn't. There is the risk of someone being wrongfully paroled... there is the risk of escape. There is the risk of conspiring with someone who is about to be paroled to murder someone on the outside. There is the risk of murdering prison employees, or other guards.

And for the wrongfully convicted, there is the risk of dying in prison, either as a result of prison violence, or of old age because there wasn't the same sense of urgency when it came to proving his innocence because after all... he wasn't being put to death.

But if you die in prison in 50 years... or if you die in prison in 5 years... are you any less dead? Would an innocent person be any less innocent?

 

[Poisonshady313]

Fwiw, if our prisons are worse than death itself, we are doing something horribly wrong.

When you're innocent and in prison, we are doing something horribly wrong.

And if you die of old age in prison serving a term for a crime you didn't commit... you aren't any less dead... you aren't any less innocent.... but in addition to having died in prison, you've also been stuck there for several decades.

When the end result is the same, does it really mean something for you to say it took a longer, more painful time to get there?

 

[Poisonshady313]

The land surveying department of your state DOT would normally consider any error more than 1 in 5000 (i.e. an accuracy of 99.98%) to be a failure.

You got me there.

 

[KatNotKathy]

When you're innocent and in prison, we are doing something horribly wrong.

And if you die of old age in prison serving a term for a crime you didn't commit... you aren't any less dead... you aren't any less innocent.... but in addition to having died in prison, you've also been stuck there for several decades.

When the end result is the same, does it really mean something for you to say it took a longer, more painful time to get there?

The problem is at least there's a possibility to release innocent prisoners. You're arguing to end even that possibility.

 

[KatNotKathy]

Just because our justice system is flawed is no reason to give it the power to kill people.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

It shows that the consequences for violating the law is not a vague and meaningless concept. Capital crimes deserve capital punishment. Anything less shows a level of tolerance for murderers in our society that I just do not have.

Wait... so you do think that capital punishment is worse than life imprisonment? Didn't you just argue that life in prison was worse? Which is it?

Also, if we executed our murderers in more proportion to how many are sentenced in a given year, it would help the prison overpopulation problem.

If we were to come up with a prioritized list of solutions to prison overpopulation, the death penalty would be far, far down the list... if it appeared on the list at all.

If we were to look at the data, do you think that we'd find that death penalty states have less of a problem with prison overcrowding than non-death penalty states?

If your real worry was prison overcrowding, you'd be advocating an end to prison sentences for minor drug offenses and a repeal of "three strikes" laws. Any effect of capital punishment would be negligible compared to either of those two things.

No, it doesn't. There is the risk of someone being wrongfully paroled... there is the risk of escape. There is the risk of conspiring with someone who is about to be paroled to murder someone on the outside. There is the risk of murdering prison employees, or other guards.

And the only way to mitigate these risks is to kill the prisoner? I find that hard to believe.

And for the wrongfully convicted, there is the risk of dying in prison, either as a result of prison violence, or of old age because there wasn't the same sense of urgency when it came to proving his innocence because after all... he wasn't being put to death.

There's also the "risk" of being released when jailhouse appeals, outside advocacy, or the discovery of new evidence demonstrates that the prisoner was wrongly convicted.

But if you die in prison in 50 years... or if you die in prison in 5 years... are you any less dead? Would an innocent person be any less innocent?

Death in prison isn't certain. Just ask David Milgaard, Steven Truscott or Rubin Carter.

 

[Smokeless Indica]

Ok, but why risk painfully executing an innocent (again)? With a painless execution, at least we can say "at least it was painless" when we inevitably get the wrong guy. Innocents being executed is a very real phenomenon, and implementing painful executions will inevitably lead to some innocent people being painfully killed. Can you sleep with that?

I can and do.

So I take it you're fine with innocent people being painfully executed so long as they get the right guy sometimes?

Innocent people in jail is a tragedy, but it's a tragedy we can fix.

How are we going to fix that? We can't stop jailing people and if we get rid of the death penalty they're still going to sit there for who knows how long before they're actually proven innocent. That cannot be fixed.

 

[KatNotKathy]

We can release and compensate innocents. Can't do that to a corpse. It ain't perfect, but it's better than state-sanctioned murder.

 

[Smokeless Indica]

Ok and what happens when it can't be proven they're innocent even when they are? How are we supposed to fix that?

 

[Poisonshady313]

Wait... so you do think that capital punishment is worse than life imprisonment? Didn't you just argue that life in prison was worse? Which is it?

Life in prison is worse for innocent people, because the risk of them never getting out is the same (or perhaps higher) than the risk of them being executed. However, guilty people with nothing else to lose don't deserve to keep their lives, even if it is in prison.

If we were to look at the data, do you think that we'd find that death penalty states have less of a problem with prison overcrowding than non-death penalty states?

The death penalty is carried out so infrequently in this country that the numbers would be meaningless. I suggest that the time to ask those questions is when we actually start to use the death penalty with any sense of regularity.

If your real worry was prison overcrowding, you'd be advocating an end to prison sentences for minor drug offenses and a repeal of "three strikes" laws.

I do... but that's not the subject of this thread.

And the only way to mitigate these risks is to kill the prisoner? I find that hard to believe.

It may not be the ONLY way... but it certainly is a most effective and certain way.

A dead person cannot kill anyone anymore. Had Kenneth McDuff been executed the first time like he should have been, he wouldn't have killed 14 people.

There's also the "risk" of being released when jailhouse appeals, outside advocacy, or the discovery of new evidence demonstrates that the prisoner was wrongly convicted.

That's like KatNotKathy arguing that the death penalty carries the risk of executing guilty people.

But KatNotKathy demands perfection.... but turns a blind eye to an imperfection which is more destructive than the imperfection of capital punishment.

Death in prison isn't certain. Just ask David Milgaard, Steven Truscott or Rubin Carter.

Didn't say it was... but why is it better for an innocent person to die in prison after 50 years than after 5? Is he any less innocent? Is he any less dead?

 

[KatNotKathy]

Ok and what happens when it can't be proven they're innocent even when they are? How are we supposed to fix that?

Just because we can't always release innocent prisoners doesn't mean we should just kill them instead.

 

[Revoltingest]

Ok and what happens when it can't be proven they're innocent even when they are? How are we supposed to fix that?

The criterion should be that they can't be proven guilty.

 

[KatNotKathy]

But KatNotKathy demands perfection.... but turns a blind eye to an imperfection which is more destructive than the imperfection of capital punishment.

If you haven't noticed, I've been arguing for measures that prevent violent criminals from reoffending without any risk of executing innocent prisoners. No blind eye here.

 

[Poisonshady313]

We can release and compensate innocents.

Not if it's too late... which is a very real risk when you consider how much more frequently innocent people are convicted than they are executed.

So the death of an innocent person in prison is ok just as long as they've been there for several decades, and the records read "life" instead of "death".... is that right?

 

[Smokeless Indica]

Just because we can't always release innocent prisoners doesn't mean we should just kill them instead.

I wasn't saying we should kill them, I was just pointing out that innocents in jail is not a tragedy we can fix. Yes we may be able to release and compensate some but not all of them will be proven innocent. It's still a tragedy.

 

[KatNotKathy]

No, just because we can't free EVERY innocent prisoner doesn't mean we should risk executing them. We should be working to release innocents from prison, not killing them.

I never said that innocent people in prison is acceptable, just that killing innocent prisoners is even worse.

 

[KatNotKathy]

I wasn't saying we should kill them, I was just pointing out that innocents in jail is not a tragedy we can fix. Yes we may be able to release and compencate some but not all of them will be proven innocent. It's still a tragedy.

I agree. It's not perfect, but we should strive to reach as close to perfection as possible. Just because we can't release all of them doesn't mean we shouldn't try.