Another reason why I'm against capital punishment

An Australian was arrested for being assaulted by two French men in Southern France. He would have gone to gaol if not for the intervention of the politicians. In his interview he stated that under the local law he was guilty as soon as he had been charged by the police.

I didn't say I'd want to get rid of the presumption of innocence or jury trials. What I did say I'd want to get rid of is the job of District Attorney as it exists in the United States. The ratio of power to accountability in that job too often goes asymptotic and the system is too hard for individuals to deal with.

My understanding of the French system is that nobody in it has any sort of a career or money incentive to put people in prisons regardless of evidence, and THAT is what I would want to see in America as one of several preconditions to death penalties.

My thought is and has always been that these prisoners work for their keep. While should they just laz around in cells and stuff - I am not against putting them to hard labor (under the right security of course). Why not have the prison have a factory or some such thing - where they work. Any profits are used for their minimal food and shelter.

Yes ! Especially minimal food. We currently feed them enough to body build and when they get out of prison they can kill police more easily. But in practice security becomes a nightmare when they are subjected to a workplace. We would need the death penalty for anyone killing another.

There are definitely advantages to what you suggest, and at one time I was in favour of it. A friend who has experience with the system says it has problems that dont justify a change from our system. For my part, I could be talked into giving it a try.

My thinking outside of capital punishment is that we might look to the old English system and pay third world countries thirties thousands a head or so to take our less desirable citizens off our hands.

They could work them for a few years and then if they survive they could become citizens of their new countries.

Might made arm robbery of a 7/11 less likely knowing it will earn you a one way ticket to a hot or a very cold climate with no way of returning.

Bartow, Florida (CNN) -- After more than three decades in prison, James Bain is eager to be able to help his wheelchair-bound mother.

If all goes as planned in a Florida courtroom Thursday, Bain, 54, will be allowed to go home for the first time in 35 years -- free from his life sentence thanks to a DNA test that showed he was not the man who took a 9-year-old Lake Wales, Florida, boy from his bed in 1974 and raped him.

"It's just hard to believe," said Bain's mother, Sarah Reed, who has been in and out of hospitals in recent years.

"He was just a child when he went in there. I've been trying to hold on. I've had things wrong with me, and I was afraid I wouldn't be here when he got out," she told CNN.

Of the 245 people in the United States who have been exonerated by DNA testing, none has spent more time behind bars than Bain, according to the Innocence Project, a national organization dedicated to exonerating wrongfully convicted people through DNA testing.

More here:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/12/16/florida.dna.exoneration/index.html?eref=igoogle_cnn

35 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. Suppose he'd been accused of a murder he didn't commit. In Florida, that would've been the death penalty.

Comments?

It would have been regrettable but in the same category as medical mishap, or running over a pedestrian on a crossing. Accidents do occur.

Two points,

1. As a member of "society" I must reject the death penalty on ethical grounds, but I am aware of my potential urge for revenge in the case of a personal loss.

2. "Life sentences" could be considered more vengeful than executions. The fact that further evidence might exonerate an inmate wrongly convicted goes little way to repairing the damage of years of incarceration.

No system is one hundred perfect and **** does happen rarely and so what?

It a shame but not something to change policy on any more then a plane crash now and then should result in grounding of all aircrafts. You look into what might had cause the crash and do you best to eliminate that cause from causing problems in the future.

In fact with the new technology such events will be rarer and rarer moving forward in time.

I always liked the concept too of sending them all to an island - one too far away and isolated that the opportunity to get off isn't possible. They will need to fend for themselves to survive.

Only cases involving DNA and the like are likely to be affected by the new technology. Thaere are many other cases where we can be dead wrong and not have a clue. My own brother was murdered premeditatedly, and I still have the sense to be against the death penalty.

If you do not wish your family members killers punish by the death sentence you can address that matter in a victim statement to the courts in the death phase of that killer or killers sentencing in most states. Off hand I would think that such a statement by the victim family would carry weight with most juries and judges.

You have zero moral right however to take away from other victims families the right to see their family member killers punish by death where it is clearly call for. Burying a little 9 year old girl alive clearly call for the death penalty for example.

Second the science of criminal forensics have had many others advances then DNA!

Dead wrong as I stated is rare and getting rarer and we do not stop flying in aircrafts because of crashes that can kill hundreds cause by some design error in the plane, all we do is fix the design fault if possible and keep flying.

You wish us to stop all capital punishments because someone might end up dying in error is the same as wishing to stop all flying because of planes crashes.

You have zero moral right to determine that the death penalty should be enacted, ever.

You have zero moral right to determine that the death penalty should be enacted, ever.
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That is your opinion that you had every right in the world to hold, however it was not the opinions of the US founding fathers or the courts or the majority of the citizens to this day that there is anything wrong with sentencing a convicted killer to death under most conditions.

As far as myself personally if place on a jury hearing a death penalty case I would have zero moral problem with being one of those who personally decide if the man or women should or should not face that level of punishment.

So yes we surely do have a right and as far as I am concern a moral right to imposed the death sentence,

My opinion is only my opinion. BUT - Your opinion carries no more weight. And you can cut and paste all the horror stories you like - It doesn't alter the fact that the death penalty is out of place.

Your opinion carries no more weight. And you can cut and paste all the horror stories you like - It doesn't alter the fact that the death penalty is out of place.
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Well I had posted some facts to back up my opinions that you had refused to deal with.

You are free to category /label them as horror stories if that give you any needed emotional support.

And yes the raping of a 9 year old and then burying her alive is indeed a horror story the only problem is that horror story came out of the newspapers and happen in real life not on the pages of a horror novel.

Just as the escape of six killers out of death row is a real event not part of a book of fiction.

In my opinion as long as people who would rape and then bury alive a 9 years old exist in real life then the death penalty is call for and is not out of place.

What methodology did you use to determine someone elses moral rights ?

You are arguing opinions but then change to facts ? How are your facts scientifically discovered ?

Probably the same way you did, except with a bit of humanity included.