Death Penalty

[Radegast]

I totally FOR death penalty. Mankind should clear the ranks. I don't want pay taxes for life killers and etc. They should be destroy. It is favourably for all.

[Inaki]

The death penalty serves no reasonable purpose.

And life imprisonment does?

I don't see what so humane about keeping some murderer alive just to wait 'till he dies of natural causes.

[Anton, Bear's den]

Death Penalty is a good thing. If some sick maniac kills people just for enjoyment then he/she must be executed. Hope Russia will return such kind of punishment someday.

[edao]

Life is not precious, we have 6 billion humans and counting. We slaughter animals on an industrial scale for something tastey to eat.

I think that contemporary Western Societies should allow the death penality for serious crimes. There should be conditions:

1. The individual can only be "put down" if they agree to it (eg life term they choose to die rather than rot in a cell.) After all it would be an infringement on their human rights not to give them the choice

2. They would have 12 months waiting period before the state goes ahead (in case they find god).

3. Only for crimes that have a 99% guilty prosecution (eg they were on camera killing somone or their fake moustache was found at the crime scene)

At the end of the day I think once you have commited certain crimes there can be no reversal back to a point of normality. If you have murdered people your never going to be safe to work in a local supermaket. Much of the reform of prisonsers is based on misplaced Christian ideology of forgiveness and the ability to 'change your ways'. Once your done certain things your a write-off there's no going back.

[Reinaert]

Capital punishment is sick.

No human has the right, nor the duty to kill another human.

But the main reason is, death sentence is too expensive.
It's cheap to put criminals in jail all of their life.
A human on death row is costing a lot of money.
Nobody wants to be responsible of a wrong verdict.

In the USA there were a lot of cases where death row people were set free after a new trial.

In other countries people are killed just because they are political enemies.
China, Iran and others.

[toyomotor]

Although I have voted against the death penalty in the poll above, there are certain circumstances where I believe that imposition of the death sentence is appropriate. The cases I refer to are ones in which there is absolutely no question as to guilt. In particular, the death penalty should be reserved for mass murder, torture or rape leading to murder and the murder of an infant.

[LeBrok]

Although I have voted against the death penalty in the poll above, there are certain circumstances where I believe that imposition of the death sentence is appropriate. The cases I refer to are ones in which there is absolutely no question as to guilt. In particular, the death penalty should be reserved for mass murder, torture or rape leading to murder and the murder of an infant.

Why do you think that life of an infant is more valid or important that life of an adult?

[Boss]

Although I have voted against the death penalty in the poll above, there are certain circumstances where I believe that imposition of the death sentence is appropriate. The cases I refer to are ones in which there is absolutely no question as to guilt. In particular, the death penalty should be reserved for mass murder, torture or rape leading to murder and the murder of an infant.

But why though...I mean what good would it do if, say, Holmes was executed? we know that the death penalty probably doesn't deter crime (so future mass murderers will be unaffected). We certainly know it is not rehabilitative (the person dies). So why support it even for the most heinous of crimes?

[kamani]

But why though...I mean what good would it do if, say, Holmes was executed? we know that the death penalty probably doesn't deter crime (so future mass murderers will be unaffected). We certainly know it is not rehabilitative (the person dies). So why support it even for the most heinous of crimes?

The real purpose of it is not to correct but to punish so that justice is restored. For some crimes even the death penalty is too small of a punishment.

[LeBrok]

It's cheap to put criminals in jail all of their life.
A human on death row is costing a lot of money.

Only initial cost of judicial process is more expensive in death row cases. Final cost of incarceration for life and possibility of prisoner to strain justice system with countless appeals (they have a lot of time on their hands to play the system) is definitely much higher. One can only pray that prisoner is in good health otherwise medical costs can push the figure in stratosphere.

http://www.ehow.com/about_5409377_average-cost-house-inmates-prison.html

Typical cost of keeping a person in prison is 130.00 a day. That's almost 50 thousand a year. Times 40 years (life), that's 2 million dollars. Keep in mind that worse murderers are kept in maximum security prisons. That pretty much can double the cost to 4 million per prisoner for life. Add costs of initial trail, many appeals and retrials and we are at 5 to 6 million.
Now, death row, trail and housing prisoner for some time, might run the bill 1 to 2 million.

Let's take very obvious case of Anders Breivik from Norway. He admitted and everybody saw what he did. There is no doubt of mistaken identity and scale of crime is horrific.
Why would we keep him for life (21 years in Norway?) paying millions? On top of this, there is huge risk of him reoffending when released from prison. Heck, he is writing a book (perhaps new MeinKampf?), and he has already an audience of some radicals.
In such obvious situation, I don't have a problem with granting death penalty. In case of Breivik it is a must.

[sherlockholmes]

Death penalty is nonsense