Supporting The Death Penalty
A Guest Post from James Garry.
On the 5th of August, DazPearce contributed an article to this organ entitled “Opposing the death penalty“.
Mr Pearce’s article, I feel, contained misrepresentations of the ‘pro’ capital punishment argument. His argument also relied heavily on the unhappy case of a Mr Stefan Kiszko – dubbed The greatest miscarriage of justice of all time – which is a well-meaning but sophistic example that should not be used to skew the debate in his favour.
Mr Pearce begins by acknowledging that his side (i.e., the anti-capital punishment side) sometimes uses emotional argument against the death penalty. He offers this small concessionary crumb after making an unfounded generalisation that pro-capital punishment campaigners employ emotional arguments to further their cause, and are less inclined to be ‘level-headed’ and ‘rational’ than their opponents.
I think this is a common tactic used to caricature social conservatives. It is a small step from being less rational to being altogether irrational. The problem I have with Mr Pearce’s article is that to justify one unfounded claim he needs to make another: “That capital punishment is not about deterrence, it is all about lex talionis, i.e., retribution”. The word “retribution” conjures images of raging, resentful people who are satisfied only by the snap of another man’s neck. In short, less level-headed, less rational people.
He seems to rest his assertion that capital punishment is not about deterrence because, for a long time, no one has said it is about deterrence. Well, no one’s told me that my car is low on petrol. Doesn’t mean it isn’t.
I have had several debates elsewhere with people who claim that capital punishment is not a deterrent. As yet, not one of my opponents has been able to explain this: In the five years since 1965 when the death penaltywas suspended, there was a 125% increase in crimes that would have attracted the death penalty. Since the last capital executions in 1964, Britain has experienced a doubling of the rate of unlawful killings (NB. the growth in population has been accounted for in this figure).
Clearly the death penalty does deter people from committing capital crimes. Nonetheless, the success of the death penalty as a deterrent is often diluted by claims that it is more about retribution than anything else. Well, no, actually it isn’t about retribution.
Maybe it is a failure of imagination on my opponents’ part, but do they really think that having a murderer executed brings any peace or any feeling of restoration to the families of murder victims? No, I don’t think it does. I don’t think the execution of the murderer comes anywhere close to soothing the unbearable grief, to quietingthe anguish or to sating the howling emptiness caused by the loss of a loved one.
If you truly desire to avenge someone’s murder, you would keep their murderer in a state of perpetual, excruciating agony for the rest of their lives. That’s retribution.
No, as a capital punishment supporter, I see capital punishment as a compromise: It would be wrong to exact revenge on this person. The best we can do is to execute him so that other murderers may be deterred from putting other families through a similar ordeal by grief. Capital punishment is a consideration of future murder victims and their families; it is not an act of vengeance against the murderer.
Mr Pearce tries to diminish the strength of the deterrence argument by asking “Is a predisposed killer really open to the prospect of thinking rationally about the consequences of getting caught, especially when many believe themselves tohave been assignedsome sort of mission from a higher authority?”
I would suggest this is stunningly naive. Most killers – outside of Hollywood films – are not exclusively deranged and are not totally incapable of rational thought. Most killers are bad rather than mad, and are perfectly capable of assessing the consequences of an act of murder. There are a few who are completely off their rockers, but they are in the minority. Nonetheless, we must also countenance the likelihood that even the utterly psychotic (NB. psychotic means delusional, not psychopathic) do not live in complete isolation from the real world and could still be deterred from their murderous actions if they retained some sort of unconscious fear of hanging.
I am not sure, either, that the death penalty would fail to stop some killers who kill “in the heat of the moment”. Do we really, under provocation of the moment, lose all our ability to rationalise? Do we lose all our self-restraint? I would submit that the threat of the death penalty would prevent some people becoming uncontrollably murderous “in the heat of the moment”.
Mr Pearce raises a further objection to capital punishment: That if it were legalised then we would see more crimes being added to the list of capital offences. Well, it might and it might not. Since the height of England’s “Bloody Code” in the eighteenth century, the number of capital offences has only decreased. In 1823 the death penalty became discretionary for all crimes except murder and treason. By 1861 there were five capital offences. Hardly a slippery slope.
The most important matter Mr Pearce raises is that of the false imprisonment of Mr StefanKiszko. It was, indeed, a great miscarriage of justice and I defy any one to read his case and not be immensely saddened by it. However, this case is a very weak – and false – argument against the death penalty.
Forgoing that Mr Pearce’s argument is purely hypothetical (that is, the death penalty was no longer in existence and Mr Kiszko was wrongly imprisoned rather than wrongly hanged), it would have been the judicial system at fault for the miscarriage of justice not the death penalty.
A very important fact that Mr Pearce may have overlooked or been unaware of is this: Mr Kiszko was convicted by a majority verdict. This is why unanimous verdicts are essential to our justice system. If a unanimous verdict were required, then a 10-2 verdict wouldn’t have led Mr Kiszko to his sixteen year incarceration (or his execution, were the death penalty still in existence at the time).
But I know what Mr Pearce means. There have been cases in history were people have been wrongly hanged. This is unfortunate but no human system is perfect. No matter what we do in life, there is a risk of accidental death. Governments make policies all the time where people die as an unintended consequence of that policy. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and Libya have led to the deaths of people who did not deserve to die, people who were totally innocent. Innocent people die as a result of transport policies. Innocent people die because we arm our police forces. It is tragic but unavoidable and is not a robust argument against the death penalty.
The converse is also true: If you do not use the death penalty to deter crime, then you run the very real risk that innocent people will die in the future because their murderer has no real fear of the consequences of his crime. It cuts both ways.
As much as the anti-capital punishment brigade might not like it, supporters of the death penalty are wholly capable of dispassionate, rational thinking about the death penalty. I expect most supporters of the death penalty, similarly to me, want the death penalty reinstituted because of its success as a deterrent. We do not salivate at the prospect of the noose. Instead, I think we look a little further into the future than our opponents do.
Looking into the future we see the face of an innocent girl who has not yet been murdered. We conclude that if the threat of the death penalty could prevent her killer from killing her, then it is essential that we have a death penalty.
If you are concerned with protecting the innocent and the gentle and the law-abiding, you ought to support the death penalty.
August 20, 2011 at 03:23
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Late to the party, but this thread reminded me of this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKSV9F_-VdU&feature=player_detailpage#t=160s
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August 18, 2011 at 03:20
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I’m sorry, I’m absolutely against capital punishment.
The State very rarely gives up its powers and I’m pleased they won’t get
this one back. The public/media can bleat and whine until the cows come home
but while we’re friends with the lot on the continent there’s no way we can do
it. Which is just as well because we’ve executed people for inciting riots in
the past.
As for the statistics showing the increased murder rates since abolition?
Anyone care to notice the increased rates in countries that still have the
death penalty; like the USA?
My view is; if the State has the power to execute it’s citizens then the
citizens should also have the right to carry arms also.
- August 18, 2011 at 07:15
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As for the statistics showing the increased murder rates since
abolition? Anyone care to notice the increased rates in countries that still
have the death penalty; like the USA?
I’d need to look it up but I seem to recall stats that show a decreasing
homicide rate in the parts of the US that have relaxed their gun control
laws over the last decade. Certainly the last I checked the two most ‘gun
friendly’ states, New Hampshire and Vermont, had the lowest homicide
rates.
My view is; if the State has the power to execute it’s citizens then
the citizens should also have the right to carry arms also.
See above.
It might be relevant to consider that Vermont does not have the death
penalty and has such relaxed gun laws that it doesn’t even have such a thing
as a gun licence. Want a gun? Law abiding citizen over 18? Then go to the
gun store, man, why are you even asking? New Hampshire does have gun
licences but only for concealed carry in public places and for loaded
handguns to be carried in cars. Want a gun for to keep at home? Law abiding
citizen over 18? Same as Vermont. NH technically has the death penalty and
even has one man on death row, but it’s been so long since they used it they
haven’t actually had a death chamber for years.
The safest two states in the US. No executions, very easy legal private
gun ownership. Washington DC, no executions, legal private gun ownership
very hard – bloodbath. It’s more complicated than that of course, and some
states with fairly easy gun ownership still have disproportionately high
murder rates, but something to consider.
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August 18, 2011 at 00:10
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The death penalty is an emotive subject with arguments for and against,
some less cogent than others.
Here is mine:
Let us assume that the death penalty returns tomorrow. Let us further
assume that it proceeds to mistakenly kill not the first accused, nor the
tenth, but the hundredth.
That person will have been unlawfully killed. Immediately after the appeal
case there will be a coroner’s decision determining such, and the entirety of
those persons involved in his trail and execution will be privately prosecuted
by the bereaved family. That would include as a first step the executioner and
his assistants, acting upon a common purpose to commit murder. It might be
extended to the judge, the jury, those police officers who investigated the
offence. Their charge would be gross negligence manslaughter. Evidence would
not be a problem; the very process of trial, sentence and execution would
provide it.
A prosecution might not be possible. However, a civil action for damages,
upon the balance of probabilities would almost certainly be possible, as
happened in Rufo et al v Simpson (1996).
Whatever the arguments for the return of capital punishment, there is no
possible way that the justice system would expose itself to the risk of such
action. If the the death penalty was legal and sought at trial, few could be
found to engage in any step of the process. The recent riots are instructive:
Inspector Gadget writes that at briefings, assurances were sought from senior
officers that no prosecutions would result from any action taken to quell
disorder. Those assurances were not given, and the results were immediately
apparent.
Of course, statute could step in. Anna knows as well as I do that
Parliament can make black white by legislating for it; it could grant absolute
immunity from any sanction for any action taken in pursuit of an execution.
Legislation like that has been passed before: the Ermächtigungsgesetzt of
1933, or rather the executive diktats that flowed from it.
It is utterly impossible that any such penalty could be legislated for,
without the UK’s withdrawal from the norms of civilised behaviour, the
breaking of treaties, the enormous social disorder that would ensue (and you
can be sure I would be on the barricades), and the simple fact that if you
extend the state’s already large powers to kill it would abuse them as
thoroughly as it abuses its powers to coerce.
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August 18, 2011 at 01:52
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I’m not sure that a statutory blanket immunity would be necessary for the
state to protect itself, BFT. An incorrect conviction can come about in
several different ways, and not all of them require malice or even
negligence on the part of anyone involved. The executioner him or herself
would be safe. There’s been a conviction, he’s got to do the executing. It’s
not for him to look behind the decision. So long as he’s reasonably
satisfied the conviction actually happened, there’s no negligence. Likewise,
the Judge will be safe. So long as he ensures proper procedures are followed
during the trial, there’s no negligence on his part. The police, the
prosecuting lawyers and the defence lawyers might find themselves at risk,
but only if they actually did something wrong in the roles assigned to them
(failed to disclose evidence, failed to pursue relevant lines of enquiry,
etc). However, such risk of liability already exists because a defendant can
always bring a suit against his lawyer if they are incompetent or against
the police or CPS or the Ministry of Justice if their actions or inactions
caused a wrongful prosecution or conviction. In terms of criminal wrongdoing
or civil liability, it would be the conviction that gave rise to a claim,
rather than the execution.
The “state” as an entity is not shaken badly when such claims arise.
There are always “bad apple” police officers or prosecutors or inept defence
lawyers around as scapegoats in such matters.
Take the Rachel Nickell murder, for example. Now, obviously, Colin Stagg
wasn’t executed or even convicted, but it’s the most obvious wrongful
prosecution case I can think of off the top of my head. There was no
evidence at all and there was one of the most spectacularly dishonest
attempts to manufacture some evidence in recent legal history. It was
aggravated by the fact that for years afterwards the police were doing sotto
voce briefings to friendly crime correspondents that Stagg really was guilty
and had got away with it. Meanwhile, the actual killer, Robert Napper, went
on to kill two other people, and rape several more. Napper had been named as
a suspect early on in the investigation into Miss Nickell’s murder, but was
overlooked due to the police’s fixation on Mr Stagg. Had Napper been caught
first time around, then his other two victims might still be alive, not to
mention those other victims who survived but suffered appallingly at his
hands (he’s admitted two rapes and two attempted rapes; he’s suspected of
upwards of 70, with many occurring after he killed Miss Nickell).
Colin Stagg got a compo payout, as did the officer who acted as the bait
in the honeytrap (I’ll concede I know nothing about employment law and very
little about the nature of her claim, so can’t really give an informed
opinion on the merits of that case). However, no police officers or
prosecutors were sacked or prosecuted and, as near as I can see, no claims
have been successfully brought by those victims or relatives thereof who
suffered because Napper went free whilst the police focused their efforts on
fitting up Colin Stagg.
I’m fairly confident that if the state itself started executing people
again, the result would be much the same when it inevitably turned out that
at some point they’d hanged the wrong guy.
Mind you, as you quite rightly note, it’s all academic because short of
UKIP or another fringe party somehow getting elected, no government is going
to reintroduce capital punishment. There simply aren’t enough votes in it to
justify withdrawing from all those international treaties and whatnot.
- August 17, 2011 at 19:59
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Making the punishment fit the crime.
Actions have consequencies.
The most dreadful acts deserve the most dreadful punishment.
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August 17, 2011 at 19:55
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I am sure the author of this article would soon change his opinion if
arrested and convicted of a murder that he did not commit. I cannot imagine
his last words being “it’s a bit of a bugger, but I do not mind taking one for
the team”
- August 17, 2011 at 20:37
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The author accepts the remotest of possibilities that he could be
wrongfully convicted of a crime and punished for it. If capital punishment
existed, the author accepts the possibility that he might be hanged.
The author has thought about it long and hard and it is a price the
author is willing to pay for a better society.
The author is pleased that “ManNotNumber” knows the author well enough to
have an insight into the inner-workings of the author’s mind.
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August 17, 2011 at 22:13
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I am calling you out. People who allow the state too much power always
think that it will never impact them.
“There have been cases in history were people have been wrongly hanged.
This is unfortunate but no human system is perfect.”
No shit. Your words tell me all I need to know about the workings of
your mind.
Stefan Kiscow RIP.
- August 20, 2011 at
20:30
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The fact that you can’t spell Kiszko though it must have been written
at least ten times in the article and comments section tells me all I
need to know about how much attention you are paying…
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August 17, 2011 at 21:59
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MNM might not have an opportunity to change his mind if he too was
murdered by a convicted killer, released on licence.
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August 17, 2011 at 19:24
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From 2Mac:
“The legal system / defence firms do not want this to happen
as career criminals, gansters, maniacs, murderers, child killers, rapist
killers etc are their long term repeat clients for the legal aid money
train.”
Speaking as a defence solicitor, obviously I find this claim personally
offensive. It’s a bit like me claiming (without any evidence) that your
relatives joined the prison service in order to earn money smuggling drugs
into prison or to get sexual pleasure from arranging gladiatorial fighting
matches between prisoners.
Luckily though, it’s quite spectacularly wrong, so I don’t need to worry
about too much.
All the categories of offenders you listed get long sentences. Twenty years
and upwards for a gang-related murder. About the same for child killers and
rapist/murderers. I’d go bust pretty damn quick if I was relying on repeat
business from them to keep me in beer and cigs. It would also be a somewhat
tenuous hope anyway because, oddly enough, people who are convicted of serious
offences and get long prison terms when represented by a particular brief,
tend, as a rule, not to use the same brief if they get accused of something
else after they get out. Criminals are awfully fickle like that.
Reliable repeat business comes from heroin-addict shoplifters, alcoholics
with a fondness for ineptly fighting with people, etc. Ie: people who wouldn’t
get the death penalty even if we did reintroduce it.
Hope that helps
- August 17, 2011 at 20:32
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Ah, Mr “Psychonaut99″ is a defence solicitor. Even more worrying, then,
that he should put words in my mouth and totally gloss over what I actually
did say in my argument.
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August 17, 2011 at 21:12
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I was just offering presentational advice, mate. It’s your’s to take or
leave. On a similar note, referring to yourself in the third person, like
you do in the comment below, might make you seem a bit pompous, so you
might want to avoid that too.
The substantive point you made contained nothing terribly new. The same
“drunk using a lamp-post” statistical arguments that people on either side
of the argument have been re-hashing for years and a very
so-naive-it’s-almost-endearing view regarding a person’s chance of being
wrongfully convicted. Nothing that needed addressing really.
In fairness, your comment below that you’d go bravely to the gallows
knowing that your death as an innocent man had somehow contributed to
making the world a safer place, is quite novel. However, as I rather
suspect that were it ever to be tested it would turn out to be inaccurate,
I’m not sure it takes us much further.
- August 17, 2011 at
22:10
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I was referring to myself as “the author” because the person to whom
I made the reply referred to me as “the author”. It was a bit of banter,
which is quite obvious.
You would have realised this if you paid attention to this comment
and all the others I’ve made in which I refer to myself in the first
person.
It was in context. Just as referring to you as “mate” is in context,
mate.
- August 18, 2011 at 09:11
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Defence Solicitors, the moral compass of a country sticking to the high
ground. (Giggle) Would this be the same people who bring up a young girls
skirt length, amount of alcohol consumed before she is brutally gang raped?
Yes, I know everyone is entitled to defence, blah, blah, blah. But I
could not sleep at night knowing my choice of job to buy my Mercedes was
helping murderers, rapists, perverts and scum avoid justice using clever
manipulation of the technicalities of law.
We are talking about the innocent person going to jail and getting all
emotional. Your profession prospers on ensuring the guilty go free.
How many guilty persons should go free to ensure an innocent person does
not go to jail?
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August 18, 2011 at 11:19
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Questioning regarding skirt length would be an unproductive line of
enquiry, even if it were permissible, which in most cases it is not.
Questioning regarding the consumption of alcohol is relevant to
determining whether someone was actually raped, which is, of course, the
purpose of a trial. The alternative would be to convict people and send
them to prison (or maybe even execute them, were capital punishment to be
introduced) based purely on an untested allegation.
It’s a bit odd to accept that a job is necessary (as you do) but then
make personal attacks on those who do that necessary job which you are
unwilling to do yourself.
- August 19, 2011 at 15:18
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On the charge or being an inconsistent cheeky bastard. I plead
“Guilty”
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August 17, 2011 at 18:47
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Speaking purely in terms of structuring an argument, I’d suggest it is
perhaps unwise to commence with a critique of emotional responses and an
appeal to reason, but then conclude with the image of a
hypothetically-murdered girl (not an adult, or a male child) peering forlornly
back at us from the future saying “I wouldn’t be dead now [in the future] if
you hanged people.” She’s probably holding a well-hugged teddy bear as she
says this, and a glycerine tear is sliding down her cheek.
- August 17, 2011 at 20:28
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I’d suggest you don’t put words into people’s mouths. It makes you look
silly.
Anyway, can you not understand that it’s possible to imagine future
murder victims in a rational way?
It is a fact that if you abolish the death penalty, more innocent people
will be murdered at some point in the future. I am merely stating that fact.
Whether you want to interpret this as emotional, that’s your lookout.
Besides, I don’t have a problem with emoting. More often than not we
arriving at conclusions because of emoting rather than rationalising.
I wasn’t critiquing emotional responses. I was criticising Daz Pearce for
saying that abolitionists are more rational.
I said all this in the first couple of paragraphs. Keep up, will you.
- August 17, 2011 at 20:31
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I’d suggest you don’t put words into people’s mouths. It makes you look
silly. Anyway, can you not understand that it’s possible to imagine future
murder victims in a rational way?
It is a fact that if you abolish the death penalty, more innocent people
will be murdered at some point in the future. I am merely stating that fact.
Whether you want to interpret this as emotional, that’s your lookout.
Besides, I don’t have a problem with emoting. More often than not we
arriving at conclusions because of emoting rather than rationalising.
I
wasn’t critiquing emotional responses. I was criticising Daz Pearce for
saying that abolitionists are more rational.
I said all this in the first couple of paragraphs. Do keep up.
- August 17, 2011 at 18:34
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I don’t trust the State. It takes money and freedom by force and stealth
and guile and deceit, it wants more every year and gives less in return for
it, and all the time it’s passing laws so that every day I can do less than
the day before. Why should I want to return to it the power to kill its
citizens? What guarantee do I have that even if the current rulers do not
abuse that power (as they abuse so many other powers) none of their successors
will abuse it?
My position is simple: if you love liberty you should never under any
circumstances give the State any power which you would not be comfortable
giving to a homicidal dictator. Most, if not all, democratic and nominally
free States already have a surfeit of such powers. Let’s not give the bastards
any more, eh?
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August 17, 2011 at 18:48
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Amen Exile
- August 17, 2011 at 20:21
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I don’t like the State much either. I think the State has too much power.
But the State I wish to see is not the one we currently inhabit.
A common misconception – often implied – is that to be in favour of the
death penalty you must be some sort of totalitarian.
Most social conservatives believe in minimal State interference, as do I.
Another misconception is that the death penalty *gives* the State power.
It is not the State, but an independent jury that determines the guilt or
innocence of the accused. It gives the State no more power than does
imprisonment.
A corrupt State can lock up people it doesn’t like; it can torture them.
A “good” State can successfully operate a death penalty. As did Britain at
the height of its civilisation.
As a side note, I wonder if “Angry Exile” voted for any of the political
parties who, over the last fifty years, made this country – and its State –
as awful as it now is? Before he/she became an expat, that is?
- August 18, 2011 at 06:55
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A common misconception – often implied – is that to be in favour of
the death penalty you must be some sort of totalitarian.
Not my misconception. The reason I say you should never give the State
power you would not entrust to a mad dictator is that there can be no
guarantee that the future does not hold one. Quite the reverse, actually.
Let a democracy run for long enough and it’s practically certain that one
will be elected. Ask a German or an Italian for relevant examples.
Another misconception is that the death penalty *gives* the State
power. It is not the State, but an independent jury that determines the
guilt or innocence of the accused. It gives the State no more power than
does imprisonment.
Are you saying that the State – and let’s stick to the British one here
– does not abuse it’s power to imprison? The use of strict liability
offences doesn’t worry you at all? The first jury-less trials a year or so
back aren’t a concern? The way juries have so often been led into making
the wrong call by the Crown’s expert witnesses telling them that there is
no possibility of error (possibly coupled with a belief from CSI that
forensics are simply never wrong)? I’m all for locking up violent
criminals but the State’s power to imprison is already abused. Saying that
the death penalty gives it no more power than imprisonment is not terribly
comforting.
A corrupt State can lock up people it doesn’t like; it can torture
them. A “good” State can successfully operate a death penalty. As did
Britain at the height of its civilisation.
Tomayto, tomahto. Your standards for a good state or one at the height
of civilisation might not be universally shared. I’m no longer sure a
state can ever be good (I’m no anarchist though) and if it is possible I
don’t think Britain has ever been there yet. But we might both agree that
it’s slipped back lately, though perhaps for different reasons.
As a side note, I wonder if “Angry Exile” voted for any of the
political parties who, over the last fifty years, made this country – and
its State – as awful as it now is?
Yep, I did and I’m not proud of it. If you want a potted history of my
political leanings I was always broadly socially left and economically
right. I’ve supported Labour when the Tories were in charge, because I was
younger and naive enough to think that the problem was not the government
but the Tory government. In 1997 I was delighted when Labour got in, but
it wasn’t long before I loathed them even more and started supporting the
Tories as the lesser evil, though even before the next election I’d
decided that the problem was not the Labour government or the Tory
government but simply the government. Since governments of all stripes
abused power, and since modern British governments seem particularly prone
to ‘mission creep’ with new powers they grant themselves, it seemed
logical not to let them have any if you can possible help it.
As I say, not proud of it, and if I could go back in time and explain
to the tweenage Angry Exile that his problem is not with left or right but
with statists and the State I might have been more consistent over the
years. Incidentally, I don’t blame the parties for making the State so
awful. It’s a State and being awful is practically a default setting,
which is why I’m so opposed to giving it any more power.
- August 17, 2011 at 16:39
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Well as it happens I have just put down the Daily Mail so I am in fine
fettle for an opinion on this subject.
Multiple murderers who kill in an unprovoced manner or for a thrill should
be terminated.
We are pandering to a very small exception where the justice system gets it
wrong but we have a society at risk from people who kill more than once and
get a few years of playing the PS3 in a central heated jail cell when they are
not playing pool. Two members of my family work in the prison service and the
stories I hear would make you sick. The worse you are the better the system
treats you.
Death is a 100% effective deterrent to murders from killing again. In fact
it is a guarantee. Now I do not know the safe guards required to stop a
innocent person being put to death but terminating murderers would seem a step
in the right direction.
The legal system / defence firms do not want this to happen as career
criminals, gansters, maniacs, murderers, child killers, rapist killers etc are
their long term repeat clients for the legal aid money train.
I also accept there are a limited set of situations where I would be
willing to kill another person. We are all capable of killing if the correct
buttons are pushed and we need to have levels of murder. A soldier kills, a
policeman kills and state can also kill given the right circumstances. They
also can refrain from killing in other circumstances. Why is killing for your
family any different.
It should not be the act of killing that is a death penalty inducing
offence, it should be the motivational/reasons the killer had for doing
it.
I would vote for hard labour, prisons where people suffer as well as
prisons where people are sent to be rehabilitated. It is often very easy to
tell the difference between the good egg on a bad path type criminal and the
totally hardened criminal.
Harsh, I know but when has live ever been fair. When we live in a society
that panders to murderers we are exposing ourselves to risks we could have
legislated against.
What type of society spends more money and resources on murderers, perverts
and madmen than good honest hard working citizens.
Our current one! Why? Because sandal wearing middle class people do not
have to live within the part of society that houses the murderers, gangsters,
perverts and career criminals that their wooly ideals and religious believes
release into freedom.
The people at the bottom of the social ladder have to live with these
people every day.
- August 17, 2011 at 18:49
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>We are pandering to a very small exception where the justice system
gets it wrong but we have a society at risk from people who kill more than
once and get a few years of playing the PS3 in a central heated jail cell
when they are not playing pool.
I have to ask you for a number on that.
How many innocent people are you willing to have killed as murderers
before you called the Death Penalty off?
A percentage, please.
And, I suppose, would that number be the same if one of them happened to
be you – though I suppose the question would then become moot
.
- August 18, 2011 at 09:01
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“Self-sacrifice enables us to sacrifice other people without
blushing.”
George Bernard Shaw
You wish to keep REAL murderers amoungst us and a risk to innocent
people is so we can protect a THEORETICAL innocent person. AS for how many
innocents I would be willing to see die, not sure. I have not thought
about it.
I reverse the question. How many innocent people are you willing to
have murdered by a repeat killer to save one innocent person.
Then I ask which innocent person is the most important to you? The many
killed by the repeat murderer or the single one who is so innocent in this
life they are found guilty after a fair trial, an appeal.
Innocents convicted?
For example if you think the IRA terrorists who received compensation
were all innocent, or the Gitmo detainees who received millions recently
were all in Afghanistan on a bird watching trip, they you are kidding
yourself on.
Anyway, We are never going to get the death penalty due to Human Rights
legislation. We cannot even get Terrorists deported incase we hurt their
feelings
- August
18, 2011 at 10:41
- August 17, 2011 at 20:12
-
“We are pandering to a very small exception where the justice system gets
it wrong but we have a society at risk from people who kill more than once
and get a few years of playing the PS3 in a central heated jail cell when
they are not playing pool. Two members of my family work in the prison
service and the stories I hear would make you sick. The worse you are the
better the system treats you.”
Hear, hear.
- August 17, 2011 at 15:51
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To describe the execution of an innocent as ‘unfortunate’ seems a tad
mealy-mouthed, but then I doubt those who can defend the death penalty ever
imagine themselves or someone they love being one of those innocents sent to
their death through miscarriage, fit-up or corruption, only ever some person
not like them whom they will never meet. An individual murdered by the state
in error is as much a victim as any other murdered person. Do we then execute
the executioner or prosecutor?
- August 17, 2011 at 16:02
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At the risk of pushing the debate down the slippery slope, I could see
the logic in making police/judicial/political corruption a capital
offence…
– Dick
- August
17, 2011 at 16:13
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I must admit, the use of the term “unfortunate” struck me. There you are
on death row waiting for the executioner to take your life for something you
didn’t do. Most unfortunate. That’s exactly what I would be thinking…
- August 17, 2011 at 20:10
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Mealy-mouthed means an unwillingness to state things in a forthright
manner. I’ve been nothing but direct.
“I doubt those who can defend the death penalty ever imagine themselves
or someone they love being one of those innocents sent to their death
through miscarriage, fit-up or corruption, only ever some person not like
them whom they will never meet”
And I doubt those who oppose the death penalty ever imagine themselves or
someone they love being one of those innocents murdered because our justice
system is too weak to deter murderers from murdering.
Actually, I have thought long and hard about myself being wrongly accused
of murder. I have thought about it and decided that it’s a risk I’m willing
to take in order to live in a gentler, law-abiding society.
Why is it that *you* can think so easily about *yourself* being
wrongfully tried but you find it harder to think about the future victims of
murder who may or may not be you.
-
August 17, 2011 at 22:30
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Please do not make presumptions like that when you have no information
on which to base your accusation. It will make no difference to your
thinking to know that I stood beside my cousin when he buried his eldest
son who had been killed by a spiteful, raging drunk with a half-brick. Or
that in the initial rage I fantasised constantly about beating the thug’s
brains out with the same half-brick. But to have the state terminate the
existence of a slightly retarded boy with an alcohol abuse problem would
have left two families in the same street, who had always been on good
terms and remain so, bereft, grasping after some hope, some kind of
meaning.
Your intention seems to be towant to police Future Crime, not the
messy, multi-faceted here-and-now. That you would be prepared to play
victim to the state for that I find, frankly, incredible.
Like the man said, you watch too many movies and spend too little time
considering the grey and fuzzy places in human relationships. I could kind
of respect, while disagreeing with, the straightforward lex talionis
argument from a religious standpoint, but you would cast us all the wolves
of the state for the sake of your imaginary ‘innocent girl who has not yet
been murdered’. Such a telling choice of victim, from the very group least
likely to be the victim of a violent death.
- August 18, 2011 at 09:38
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And I doubt those who oppose the death penalty ever imagine
themselves or someone they love being one of those innocents murdered
because our justice system is too weak to deter murderers from
murdering.
I have and it is a preferable risk to that of the state taking innocent
lives. I would prefer the jungle to the gilded cage.
- August 17, 2011 at 15:18
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It would be a great piece of research to see what the actual murder rate
was when advances in medicine were taken into account.
A bit like calculating the REAL value of money after inflation has been
taken into account.
Any sponsors? Has anyone tried?
-
August 17, 2011 at 16:10
- August
17, 2011 at 15:09
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“capital punishment is not a deterrent.”
It’s highly effective in preventing reoffending though! The only problem I
have with it is the possibility of wrongfully being found guilty or
state/police sponsored manipulation of justice, At the moment I don’t trust
either of them with the power of the death penalty.
- August 17, 2011 at 14:55
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I have two principle objections to the death sentence:
1. There can be
no appeal against an execution. In the case of a gross miscarriage of justice,
an imprisoned man can always be released, a fined man can be compensated. A
dead man cannot be brought back;
2. I find myself incredibly uncomfortable
with the concept of State-sponsored murder. The State should have a monopoly
on violence, using it only to protect individuals and their property, but I
fail to see how the death sentence does that.
So I would be opposed to the return of the death sentence. However, I am
also a democrat, so I firmly believe that if the majority of people in this
country want it brought back, then it should be.
- August 17, 2011 at 14:48
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@James Rigby
“What we need is US-style prisons. Harsh, and where a life sentence means
the only time a criminal comes out is in a coffin.
…
. Give me a choice
between 40 years alone in a basic cell with one hour chained exercise per day
and no socialisation/visits…”
US prisons are harsh because in the main they are run by the inmates.
Apparently a lot of criminals find US gaol a harsh awakening – but by then
it’s too late, and they have a long sentence to serve before going
straight.
IMO the UK needs a lot more prison places, so that there is capacity to
imprison more convicted criminals – and keep those who deserve it behind bars
for a long time. But they should also be controlled by the warders, rather
than lawless hell-holes, as in some US prisons.
- August 17, 2011 at 16:35
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You watch a lot of movies, don’t you?
- August 17, 2011 at 14:02
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I have no moral or ethical compunctions about the state killing murderers.
My objection is a practical one, acknowledged in the blog – “no human system
is perfect”. This means that innocent people will be killed. It is not like a
war where innocent people are killed as an unfortunate consequence of the
inevitable messiness and confusion in a war zone.
What we need is US-style prisons. Harsh, and where a life sentence means
the only time a criminal comes out is in a coffin. That, to me, is more of a
deterrent than the rather easy option of death. Give me a choice between 40
years alone in a basic cell with one hour chained exercise per day and no
socialisation/visits, or death, and I’ll have the latter thanks.
- August 17, 2011 at 19:36
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“It is not like a war where innocent people are killed as an unfortunate
consequence of the inevitable messiness and confusion in a war zone.”
Not all bombs are dropped out of confusion. Very few are, actually.
All policy kills by accident. Should we abandoned vaccination programmes
in the third world that have killed children by accident? Should we abolish
the NHS because it sometimes, inadvertently leads people to their
graves?
- August 17, 2011 at 13:22
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Hi James – nicely done
Of course there is emotion on both sides of the argument as gladiolys
points out. Maybe it’s unwise to get into an auction about who is slightly
more ‘rational’ than the person countering them and it’s a fair point.
When you hear of child-killers and suchlike, how frequently do you see the
conviction met with calls for the murderer to be hung? I can only speak from
my own experience that this is a common and instinctive reaction – I’m not
saying that ‘an eye for an eye’ is not an understandable emotion, but to
suggest that calls to restore the death penalty have nothing to do with
retribution is naive IMO.
It has a lot to do with the sentiment of revenge – something I can
understand but would not want the justice system to pander to.
You make an interesting point about unanimous verdicts, but does this not
send out a dangerous signal? Why is a 10-2 verdict ok when the possible
sentence is 15 years, but not when the death penalty is on the table as an
option? The danger of what you’re suggesting is we could end up with a
two-tier system of what defines reasonable doubt, which is a pit of snakes all
of its own.
I mention the Kiszko case for another very important reason – the prospect
of seeing the falsely imprisoned set free is clearly what motivates people on
the outside to work on their behalf, launching appeals and having the case
re-opened. Sometimes this involves exposing police work that was either
shoddy, incompetent or downright dishonest.
Without the ‘carrot’, if you will, of seeing someone in Kiszko’s position
released, those people might give up. The person sentenced to death may be
condemned by society and become the subject of macabre ‘killers’ books despite
having done no wrong. Most importantly, the conduct of those who cornered the
justice system (perhaps under huge public pressure) would never be
exposed.
Only by bringing the nature of useless or crooked investigations to light
can we tighten up the process and prevent future miscarriages of justice.
Given that the evidence to clear someone may take years to come to light, the
statutory appeal while on death row may well be insufficient, and keeping
those prisoners alive who continue to protest their innocence is the best shot
we have of establishing not just that a miscarriage of justice took place, but
why it did.
The death penalty puts a huge amount of faith in the police and courts that
they have 1) acted honestly/fairly at all times and 2) got it right. I just
struggle to find that degree of confidence.
- August 17, 2011 at 19:32
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Daz, thank you for your thoughtful, detailed reply.
I maintain that capital punishment should be used as a deterrent and most
rational people would use it as such. I also maintain that the death penalty
is unsatisfactory if it is used as a means of retribution. I can’t see how
it could satisfy the family of the victim. And it is only for the family of
the victim for whom retribution is relevant, not the general public. Which
is precisely why the death penalty isn’t about retribution – because justice
isn’t only about making the victims’ family feel better. Punishment is
exemplary.
Of course, around the times of high-profile killings, you do see a rabble
of vengeful people campaigning to “‘ave the paedo ‘ung” [sic – I know it is
“hanged”]. They are, I’d suggest, in the minority – a minority exaggerated
by TV news crews, who film them in such a way to make them seem more
important and numerous than they really are.
That said, there is no reason why demand for the death penalty rises
after a high-profile killing because it helps to focus the minds of the
public. And it focuses the mind in such a way that people realise they way
to protect future innocent people from a similarly harrowing ordeal is to
reintroduce the death penalty.
On the subject of unanimous verdicts you attribute to me things I have
not said. I favour unanimous verdicts in all criminal cases, whether for
capital crimes or for other crimes. I do not advocate a two-tier system.
That is preposterous.
Your reasoning about wrongful imprisonments being better than wrongful
executions for exposing police incompetence is strange. What has this to do
with capital punishment?
Instead of saying “wrongfully imprisoned people help to expose flaws in
the justice system” we should be asking: How do we improve the justice
system so fewer people are wrongfully tried.
One way to start is to use jurors who are above the age of 21 and have a
professional qualification.
A lot of your argument against capital punishment also applies to the
prison system. This, for instance:
“The death penalty puts a huge amount of faith in the police and courts
that they have 1) acted honestly/fairly at all times and 2) got it
right”
Replace the words “the death penalty” with “prison sentencing”. Do you
propose we abolish prisons?
-
August 17, 2011 at 21:52
-
Hi James – you’re very welcome and thanks for the kind words
If you’re advocating unanimous jury verdicts across the board then
apologies for misunderstanding. Your observation had the appearance of
suggesting that unanimous verdicts should only apply where the death
penalty was an option. Happy to stand corrected and apologies for any
confusion.
I very much doubt that unanimous verdicts are practical across the
board since they increase the power of a solitary rogue juror to bring
about a perverse acquital. I’m actually coming to the view of believing
that juries need replacing – with what I’m not sure, since the
alternatives are loaded with danger, but your point about the fate of
people being in the hands of the dishonest or not-so-bright is a sound
one.
Of course the same principle applies to the prison sentence that does
to the death penalty, but then the prisoner at least gets the relative
fortune of being alive to hear their name cleared and handed a bag of
money for their troubles. The fact that they are still alive also
motivates people on the outside to keep working on their behalf, which may
not be the case were they dead.
Agreed that the key issue is to tighten up our judicial system and
minimise the risk of miscarriages of justice, but it is often by
establishing exactly how previous instances occurred that we do this.
Keeping people alive who ‘show no remorse’ and protest their innocence is
the best way of exposing as many of these cases as we can.
Like you, I want a cleaner and more effective justice system. I just
believe that the death penalty would allow bad or unscrupulous
cops/solicitors to go unchecked in too many cases. I’ll post a response
and look forward to debating this further.
ATB
Daz
- August 17, 2011 at 12:51
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left unsaid in the argument is the fear of being caught , in retain to that
how may affect the “heat of the moment” criminal.
Is part of the growth in violent crime and murder due not to the lack of
the ultimate penalty, but rather a weakening of the policing system. Gladiolys
makes a good point.
As a “meat eating” social libertarian (conservative on law ‘n order, fiscal
policies etc, liberal on matters personal and social) I just can’t help
avoiding the conclusion that taking a life is just wrong wrong. Increase the
probability of detection and the likelihood of a long (permanent) hard gaol
term…..
- August 17, 2011 at 18:40
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I think the police are far more effective at deterring rather than
detecting. A murderer with a bit of forensic knowledge can quite easily
cover his tracks.
True deterrence is far more effective. About crime in general, the police
would do well to return to one-man foot patrols.
As for murdering a criminal being wrong: I think it is wrong not to do
what we can to deter murders from murdering people in the future. If you ask
me whether I want one criminal to live or many innocent people, unknown in
some future time, to have life then I’d choose the innocent.
The choice really is that simple for me.
- August 17, 2011 at 12:38
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If it is so successful as a deterrent, why do murders still persist in
countries with the death penalty. Indeed, why did we have them here before
abolition?
Facts can be used by both sides to argue their case but in the end, it does
come down to emotion and, indeed, faith, in what one believes to be right or
wrong.
- August 17, 2011 at 18:31
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Murders persist because no human system is perfect and there will always
be law-breakers. The best we can do is try to deter criminality as far as
possible. And countries that operate a death penalty do have fewer murders.
Yes, evidence can usually be produced on both sides. But the two pieces
of evidence that I refer to are incontrovertible: A 125% increase in crimes
that would have attracted the death penalty during the five years it was
suspended, and a doubling of the rate of unlawful killings since abolition.
No one I have debated with on the “anti” side has yet explained our
countered these statistics. In fact, no one I’ve debated with has even
acknowledged these statistics when I’ve quoted them.
This makes me suspect that reason is on the side of the “pro”
campaigners.
-
August 17, 2011 at 20:10
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Capital punishment might not be much of a deterrent, but it sure stops a
repeat-offence.
[The downside being that miscarriages of justice occur.]
- August 17, 2011 at
12:35
-
You have made a rational argument in a world where such is often lampooned
by the legal profession very few of which would agree with you. Insofar as the
oft quoted views that many “innocent” people would have or have been hanged
the judicial system is capable of reducing the scope for error. You mention a
requirement for a unanimous verdict. There could be two juries in place and
both would have to be unanimous in their guilty verdict. The principle is all
important; it is often overlooked.
- August 17, 2011 at 18:24
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Yes, reducing errors in the system is the best way to minimise
miscarriages of justice, particularly in the case of capital punishment.
Unanimous verdicts, jurors at least twenty one years of age who are
professionals and possess an IQ higher than a crisp packet would be a
start…
- August 23, 2011 at 18:31
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Intelligent juries would be a help, but all that would be needed to
prevent a gulity verdict would be one ‘anti’ who couldn’t bring themselves
to vote ‘guilty’, no matter the evidence.
- August 17, 2011 at 12:21
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I agree with your opinion and would only add two further points.
In considering the murder stats over the past decades it is worth bearing
in mind that great advances in A&E medical expertise will have saved
inumerous people who might otherwised have been dead victims.
Secondly, it seems to me that the many, on both sides of the argument
suffer with a lack of imagination. They either concentrate their feelings on
the victims, or on the killers. Very few consider the victims who *will die in
the future*. That is, those people who, as I write, are alive and well but
will die in dreadful circumstances. Yes, the Justice system might well
occasionally hang the wrong man or woman but that tiny few will never reach
the level of people who will certainly die because potential killers have very
little to deter them.
- August 17, 2011 at 18:18
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David,
Thanks for your comment.
Yes, you’re absolutely right that the figure for unlawful killings would
probably be higher but for advances in trauma surgery in the last few years.
I totally agree with the second point too. The very point I was making:
Capital punishment should be a deterrent that saves the lives of people in
the future.
In this sense, the “anti” brigade have an unfair advantage: They can
refer to real cases of people hanged by accident. The “pro” brigade cannot
refer to a real person whom the death penalty saved from the hands of a
murderer. We can only infer from statistics.
- August 23, 2011 at 18:28
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But you could refer to the nearly 200 people that have died since the
abolition of the DP in the UK, at the hands of a convicted killer who has
already served a ‘life’ sentence and been released back into society, only
to kill again. If one is concerned purely with the numbers, the statistics
are weighted enormously toward the FACT that releasing killers instead of
hanging them results in the many times more deaths than miscarriages of
justice ever did, or would.
- August 17, 2011 at 12:01
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To me, the main case against cap punishment is Evans of Christie/Rillington
Place. A ‘wrong’ execution was that involving Bentley where the person hung
had not been the one who fired the fatal shot. Many executed were just sad
people who may not have realised what they were doing – example the last woman
hung. The man from the Moors Murders is still suffering in prison and that is
right.
{ 59 comments }