That Death Penalty Thread...again.

[Aroura33]

//http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/11/01/21276779-child-killer-testifies-from-death-row-i-guess-the-lord-hid-my-veins?lite

A condemned child killer and rapist testified from Ohio's death row Friday in a bid to get his execution postponed because the state plans to use an untested cocktail of drugs for a lethal injection.
Ronald Phillips, who is due to be put to death Nov. 14, told a judge via video hookup that prison doctors couldn't find veins in his arm during a checkup two weeks ago.
"I guess the Lord hid my veins from them," Phillips said, according to The Associated Press. He added that he had a lifelong fear of needles.
Phillips, 40, was sentenced to death for the 1993 rape and beating death of his girlfriend's 3-year-old daughter, Sheila Marie Evans, and he was recently denied clemency.
His lawyers say they have not been given enough time to investigate recent changes to Ohio's execution protocol that might violate Phillips' constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment.
Ohio is one of several states that have been forced to tinker with execution methods because a commonly used drug — pentobarbital — is in short supply after the manufacturer banned its sale to prisons for executions.
The initial plan was to secure pentobarbital from a specialty pharmacy that would make up the lethal dose without oversight by the Food and Drug Administration.
In court papers, Phillips' lawyers said that method was too risky because no one could guarantee the pharmacist would not tamper with the dose to make the execution painful.
"Phillips understands that reasonable people find his crime extremely repugnant, brutal and shocking. He is now learning that an ethically challenged individual may be tabbed to make his execution drugs from scratch," they wrote.
They said there were no precautions in place to stop the druggist from spiking the solution with an ingredient that would "cause excruciating physical pain to Phillips while he is still conscious.

"The net result of this is that Phillips has an extreme fear — not just a substantial risk of that fear—that he will be chemically tortured if and when he is injected with compounded execution drugs."

The story itself is disturbing enough.  Then I read the comments, and became even more disturbed.  There are literally hundreds of people basically saying they would volunteer to kill him themselves, and as brutally as possible.

This is the kind of case that really tears us all up.  He's undeniably a monster who should never see the light of day.  What he did was a crime of the worse nature.  Will killing him somehow create "justice"?  Or will it just take all of society down a notch, closer to his barbaric level? Reading the comments, I am reminded that it is always, always the latter.

[Shiranu]

The story itself is disturbing enough. Then I read the comments, and became even more disturbed. There are literally hundreds of people basically saying they would volunteer to kill him themselves, and as brutally as possible.

I had completely forgotten about this quote till yesterday, but this in my opinion is a good representation on my view on it.

"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you." - Nietzsche

I see very little difference between someone who takes pleasure in hurting people who are weaker and someone who takes pleasure in hurting people who they dislike. History is full of examples of innocent people being hurt because the powers-that-be turned the masses against them and convinced them they were evil or a threat, guilty of a crime against the state or the crime of being a different ethnicity. I would like to be as far away from that mindset as a society as we can possibly get.

The death penalty is nothing more than, "We will cut your hand off for stealing!". When it is a different culture, "NO! That is unacceptable!" yet when we do it... meh?

[SilentFutility]

The death penalty is nothing more than, "We will cut your hand off for stealing!". When it is a different culture, "NO! That is unacceptable!" yet when we do it... meh?

It is more than that.
It is only that if the death penalty is used as a punishment or as revenge, as is chopping someone's hand off.

Killing people as humanely as possible in order to remove them from society is not the same thing, and saying that there is only one motive for it is intellectually dishonest in the extreme.

This man was sentenced to death in 1993. Do people think that a quick and painless death is less torturous than waiting 20 years being repeatedly re-sentenced to death and having preparations for your execution being made over and over again only to be called off as they draw near? There's a reason mock executions are considered a form of torture under the geneva convention and living in inhumane conditions on death row and being subjected to what are practically mock executions for 20 years sounds an awful lot like torture to me.

He's undeniably a monster who should never see the light of day.  What he did was a crime of the worse nature.  Will killing him somehow create "justice"?

Equally, will keeping him in harsh, degrading conditions surrounded by other killers and insane people until he rots and dies create "justice"?
The reality is that "justice" is actually difficult to properly define, and difficult to enact in practice. The law and the penal system are supposed to serve the greater good for society, and as you've said yourself, clearly this man should be forever kept away from society forever. Ask yourself, would killing him as humanely as possible shortly after he'd been sentenced and maybe had ONE appeal be better or worse than what has happened to him over the last 20 years, and which would benefit society more given than millions have probably been spent on his case and his imprisonment by now?

[Shiranu]

Do people think that a quick and painless death is less torturous than waiting 20 years being repeatedly re-sentenced to death and having preparations for your execution being made over and over again only to be called off as they draw near?

No, and without a death penalty that would never be an issue.

Equally, will keeping him in harsh, degrading conditions surrounded by other killers and insane people until he rots and dies create "justice"?

No, but that is a statement on how we need to improve prisons, not lower our morals.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

Fine..hang the coward or shoot him. I have no reasons to want to continue his charade..
Fear of needles? Really? Tough shit pal.. I have no problems executing certain people. He's one of them.

[Jack89]

Will killing him somehow create "justice"?  Or will it just take all of society down a notch, closer to his barbaric level? Reading the comments, I am reminded that it is always, always the latter.

Yes, "justice" will be served.  In my view, killing this man is the right thing to do and it should have been done shortly after his conviction.  It is right to definitively remove a proven deadly threat from society.  Period.  Not because you hate him, or because you grieve for the little girl, but because he is a proven threat and there is only one to make sure he will never do it again.  Execution is the only responsible and just thing to do.

Bottom line, we need to ensure that this guy will never murder again and that everyone knows, without a doubt, that he will never murder again.  Security and peace of mind.

Now if there was some wondrous piece of technology that could prove that he would never harm anyone ever again, and people were convinced, without a doubt, that this technology worked, then an execution wouldn't be necessary.

[Hijiri Byakuren]

Morality vs practicality again. I'm not gonna bother dredging up my links again: if you didn't read them in the last thread, too bad.

The reason the death penalty takes so damn long and is so expensive to carry out is because of the appeals process. The death penalty is why we say, "It is better to let 10 guilty men walk free than condemn a single innocent." Unlike any other legal punishment, death kinda has this "no take-backs" policy. Once they're dead, they're dead, and if it later turns out the person was innocent then all the legal system can really do is say, "Oops." With the advent of DNA evidence there have been a number of acquittals in recent decades, and past (and more recent) executions that are now thought to have been wrongful. Wrongful death is generally called "murder," and we consider it to be unacceptable in modern society. It doesn't matter if the state pays restitution, because you'll never get that person back.

Regardless of whether execution in and of itself is moral, for practical reasons I think the death of any innocent is an unacceptable risk. Particularly in the country with the highest rate of incarceration in the world.

[Mermaid]

Now if there was some wondrous piece of technology that could prove that he would never harm anyone ever again, and people were convinced, without a doubt, that this technology worked, then an execution wouldn't be necessary.

Ok, so is execution to protect the public, or to exact revenge? An eye for an eye?
Isn't life in prison without the possibility of parole protecting the public?

[Jack89]

Morality vs practicality again. I'm not gonna bother dredging up my links again: if you didn't read them in the last thread, too bad.

The reason the death penalty takes so damn long and is so expensive to carry out is because of the appeals process. The death penalty is why we say, "It is better to let 10 guilty men walk free than condemn a single innocent." Unlike any other legal punishment, death kinda has this "no take-backs" policy. Once they're dead, they're dead, and if it later turns out the person was innocent then all the legal system can really do is say, "Oops." With the advent of DNA evidence there have been a number of acquittals in recent decades, and past (and more recent) executions that are now thought to have been wrongful. Wrongful death is generally called "murder," and we consider it to be unacceptable in modern society. It doesn't matter if the state pays restitution, because you'll never get that person back.

Regardless of whether execution in and of itself is moral, for practical reasons I think the death of any innocent is an unacceptable risk. Particularly in the country with the highest rate of incarceration in the world.

There is also the risk of a convicted murderer killing again, which is also unacceptable.  It happens, probably more than we're willing to admit.  Practically speaking, is it "better to let 10 guilty men walk than condemn a single innocent", if one of those guilty men you let walk kills again?  How about if 2 kill again?

[AllPurposeAtheist]

I've opposed the dp on many grounds before, but I'm also aware there are people just to dangerous to risk walking free ground. People do escape prisons and justice so the bar needs to be very high for execution, but not entirely ruled out.

[Hijiri Byakuren]

There is also the risk of a convicted murderer killing again, which is also unacceptable.  It happens, probably more than we're willing to admit.  Practically speaking, is it "better to let 10 guilty men walk than condemn a single innocent", if one of those guilty men you let walk kills again?  How about if 2 kill again?

Then they do. Guess what: people get life without parole for worse offences than those with the death penalty routinely. It's not like the death penalty is 100% removing the most dangerous criminals. If it were, that'd be great: it would also mean our legal system was good enough to screen out the innocent people, which it isn't.

Your solution to the problem of escaped or acquitted criminals killing again is akin to stopping a forest fire by burning down trees: all it does is kill more trees, and it doesn't stop the fire.

[Jack89]

There is also the risk of a convicted murderer killing again, which is also unacceptable.  It happens, probably more than we're willing to admit.  Practically speaking, is it "better to let 10 guilty men walk than condemn a single innocent", if one of those guilty men you let walk kills again?  How about if 2 kill again?

Then they do.

Have a nice day.

[Aroura33]

Morality vs practicality again. I'm not gonna bother dredging up my links again: if you didn't read them in the last thread, too bad.

The reason the death penalty takes so damn long and is so expensive to carry out is because of the appeals process. The death penalty is why we say, "It is better to let 10 guilty men walk free than condemn a single innocent." Unlike any other legal punishment, death kinda has this "no take-backs" policy. Once they're dead, they're dead, and if it later turns out the person was innocent then all the legal system can really do is say, "Oops." With the advent of DNA evidence there have been a number of acquittals in recent decades, and past (and more recent) executions that are now thought to have been wrongful. Wrongful death is generally called "murder," and we consider it to be unacceptable in modern society. It doesn't matter if the state pays restitution, because you'll never get that person back.

Regardless of whether execution in and of itself is moral, for practical reasons I think the death of any innocent is an unacceptable risk. Particularly in the country with the highest rate of incarceration in the world.

There is also the risk of a convicted murderer killing again, which is also unacceptable.  It happens, probably more than we're willing to admit.  Practically speaking, is it "better to let 10 guilty men walk than condemn a single innocent", if one of those guilty men you let walk kills again?  How about if 2 kill again?

How often have murderers escaped prison?  As far as my googling research takes me, it has happened by one man (more than one time though) in modern American history. And he did not kill while out of prison.

Why is it acceptable to you if the state murders innocent people (and it has), but unacceptable if a murderer gets out and kills innocent people?  In either case, innocent people die, but one is ok with you?  Why is locking them up for life out of the question?

Neither is ok with me.  There are ways to sentence people so they cannot be paroled and will never get out of prison.  There are detention facilities that built for high risk prisoners that no one has ever escaped from.  Why not use those 2 methods to remove a dangerous person from society, instead of risking killing an innocent person?

A lot of money does go into trying to legally murder a person.  Personally, I think a better use of all that money over the last 20 years would have been to study this man as much as possible.  MRI's of his brain, chemical studies, psychological studies, interviews with family and friends.  Discover what broke in his brain.  Was he born a sociopath?  Did it happen because of abuse? How extreme was the abuse?  Was there never an attempt at intervention?
All of this could, in the future lead us to PREVENT something like this from happening to other people in the future.  So not only have we not killed more people, we have saved lives.
You know criminologists 100 years ago had very little information on why people behaved as they did, because most of the world routinely killed them very soon after they were convicted.  It has only been since some countries and states have abolished the death penalty that we have made such great strides in understanding how these people work.  And you know what?  It has helped prevent more crime.  Profiling a killer helps catch them quicker.  Early intervention with kids displaying certain behavior has prevented them from ever becoming criminals.

But not, lets go back to the barbarity of just killing them.  'Cause that was working so well for humanity the last few thousand years.

[Hijiri Byakuren]

There is also the risk of a convicted murderer killing again, which is also unacceptable.  It happens, probably more than we're willing to admit.  Practically speaking, is it "better to let 10 guilty men walk than condemn a single innocent", if one of those guilty men you let walk kills again?  How about if 2 kill again?

Then they do.

Have a nice day.

Way to ignore the rest of the post and the context I wrote that in. What, your brain just can't process a legitimate counter-point? You have to quote-mine just to produce a response?

The only thing worse than dishonesty in a debate is cowardice.

[Jack89]

How often have murderers escaped prison?  As far as my googling research takes me, it has happened by one man (more than one time though) in modern American history. And he did not kill while out of prison.

Not just escapees, there's plenty of murderers that are released and murder again.  Google it an you'll see.  I'm sure there are many who kill other prisoners as well.  Here's an article I found in just a few seconds of searching - //http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/7147662/Killers-freed-to-kill-again.html  This particular article mentions 31 people dead from killers released from prison.  There where quite a few more search results as well.

Why is it acceptable to you if the state murders innocent people (and it has), but unacceptable if a murderer gets out and kills innocent people?  In either case, innocent people die, but one is ok with you?  Why is locking them up for life out of the question?

Good point.  It's a dilemma that I haven't fully come to terms with, to be honest.  Neither is OK with me, but locking someone up for life does not remove the threat, which is my primary point.  

Neither is ok with me.  There are ways to sentence people so they cannot be paroled and will never get out of prison.  There are detention facilities that built for high risk prisoners that no one has ever escaped from.  Why not use those 2 methods to remove a dangerous person from society, instead of risking killing an innocent person?

The dilemma remains.  On the one hand, we have an imperfect trial system that sometimes convicts innocent people, on the other, dangerous criminals are released and allowed to kill again.  In many cases they kill again in the prisons you're talking about, no escape or release necessary.  
On that note, to make sure a killer can't kill again you would have to isolate him or her from the rest of the prison population.  There are some pretty good articles out there on the effects of long term isolation.  I can't see long term isolation of guilty or innocent people as being any less barbaric than executing them.  I experienced short term isolation in the military during some training and I wouldn't wish it on anyone.  In fact, that experience changed my views on incarceration in general.  

A lot of money does go into trying to legally murder a person.

I wouldn't call it murder if a person was legally convicted and sentenced, just as I wouldn't call it murder if someone kills an assailant defending themselves or others.  I wouldn't call a soldier a murderer either.  

Personally, I think a better use of all that money over the last 20 years would have been to study this man as much as possible.  MRI's of his brain, chemical studies, psychological studies, interviews with family and friends.  Discover what broke in his brain.  Was he born a sociopath?  Did it happen because of abuse? How extreme was the abuse?  Was there never an attempt at intervention?
All of this could, in the future lead us to PREVENT something like this from happening to other people in the future.  So not only have we not killed more people, we have saved lives.
You know criminologists 100 years ago had very little information on why people behaved as they did, because most of the world routinely killed them very soon after they were convicted.  It has only been since some countries and states have abolished the death penalty that we have made such great strides in understanding how these people work.  And you know what?  It has helped prevent more crime.  Profiling a killer helps catch them quicker.  Early intervention with kids displaying certain behavior has prevented them from ever becoming criminals.
But not, lets go back to the barbarity of just killing them.  'Cause that was working so well for humanity the last few thousand years.

Using the cost of the death penalty as an argument seems like you're reaching.  Hell, if you want some money for research stop putting dope smokers in jail.  Still, you make some good points that I'll have to look at some more.  I doubt I'll change my mind, my sentiment on the matter is likely as fixed as yours, so it would be pretty hard to.