Should the death penalty be brought back?

[Guest]

I'd like to see some folks shocked off their ivory towers

Ivory towers, eh? You'll be flinging about the lefty do-gooder clichés next .

[Don_Kiddick 11]

Who me? :D

[Don_Kiddick 11]

Should I mention blinkers & rose tinted glasses before I leave tonight?

[Halibut 12]

I'd like to see some folks shocked off their ivory towers

 

If that means grubbing around among the revenge seekers and their clammy embrace of death, retribution and a casual acceptance of state sanctioned murder then I'll stay up here. It's a good view and my soul isn't tainted by the banality of evil. Ta.

[pk014b7161 11]

does anybody agree with life meaning life ?ie murderer,s paedo,s rapist,s when sentenced to life that they actually serve the full sentence & not let out period ,because the amount of re-offending is now an everyday occurrence,or should we just carry on unleashing them on the public,i may be wrong but i care for the victims & their family,s not the beast,s who prey on the weaker vunerable victims.no days out to go shopping banged up 24/7

[Halibut 12]

does anybody agree with life meaning life ?ie murderer,s paedo,s rapist,s when sentenced to life that they actually serve the full sentence & not let out period ,because the amount of re-offending is now an everyday occurrence,or should we just carry on unleashing them on the public,i may be wrong but i care for the victims & their family,s not the beast,s who prey on the weaker vunerable victims.no days out to go shopping banged up 24/7

 

I do agree pk0, that in some cases life should mean life, but I also strongly believe that banging people up 24/7 doesn't do a great deal to minimise chances of reoffending - yes there are a thankfully small (ish) group of people who have no chance of reform, but there's a much greater mass of the prison population who with the right kind of rehabilitation and treatment can be helped to lead productive and honest lives and make a useful contribution to society. The problem I see with with the current climate - hang 'em, flog 'em, bread and water - is that it closes people's minds to the reality that prison can and should be not just a place of punishment, but a place where people can go through a process of personal change and growth.

There is a good deal of evidence from various sources that there are real and positve programmes which can produce significant reductions in reoffending behaviour. Without the political will and the right degree of investment though, they'll never see tthe light of day.

[Plain Talker 11]

I remember a murder in the 60s, the murderer was called "sewell" or something like that.

He killed a young girl.

 

Murder was so rare then that people remember it for decades afterwards, as I remember the sewell case, it was on the news for ages. Weeks.

 

Now people get killed and it doesnt even make the headlines, and as for remembering names and places... There are just too many to recall each week.

 

You may be getting a murderer and his victim confuzzled...

 

In the early seventies there was a young woman, murdered in Bakewell, whose name was "sewell", and the chap (Steven Dowling) who was initially convicted of her murder spent 26 years in gaol on a wrongful conviction.

 

He spent that long in gaol, when most life sentences are generally 10-15 years because the parole board would not give him parole till he'd "shown true remorse and admitted to the crime". (one of the conditions of release).

 

Of course, as an innocent man, he wouldn't admit to a crime he hadn't done.

 

So he could not be released. Q.E.D.

 

A local newspaper reporter took his case, and fought to get it re-examined.

 

Recently, the case was retried, and Dowling was found to be innocent of the crime.

 

He has rec'd compensation... but how does that actually compensate for losing 26 years imprisoned in gaol, wrongly?

 

And, even worse, who would have fought for him, and his innocence, had he been executed?

 

Would folk have just dismissed it and said "Ok, he was hanged, he must've done it, they wouldn't have hanged an innocent man....!"

[Crusader 10]

If somebody kills somebody then they should be executed by leathel injection.

 

Maybe the prison's then would'nt be so overcrowded.

[Guest]

does anybody agree with life meaning life ?ie murderer,s paedo,s rapist,s when sentenced to life that they actually serve the full sentence & not let out period ,because the amount of re-offending is now an everyday occurrence,or should we just carry on unleashing them on the public,i may be wrong but i care for the victims & their family,s not the beast,s who prey on the weaker vunerable victims.no days out to go shopping banged up 24/7

I do agree with you pk, to a certain extent and for a proportion of offenders. The prison environment and the chance of rehabilitation, as Halibut has already referred to, might be something that we disagree on though. A brutal prison regime will succeed in nothing but brutalising and institutionalising the offenders, some of whom, whether you like it or not, will be released after a period of time that you consider inadequate.

 

Another point is that some people who have committed atrocious crimes clearly have mental health issues. I mentioned earlier that psychologists studying psychopathy etc find a ready-made sample in some prison populations. For many of these people the prospect of rehabilitation is tiny and a life term really should mean that, though whether they should be in the same prison conditions as other offenders is another issue.

[Halibut 12]

If somebody kills somebody then they should be executed by leathel injection.

 

Maybe the prison's then would'nt be so overcrowded.

 

Do you not see a bit of a contradiction there?

 

Killing is wrong, we both agree on that, but you think it's Ok to kill killers?

What if a murderer were to murder another murderer, what do we do then?

What do we do then? Buy them a pint and a sandwich?

 

Killing in my view is wrong, full stop. If we punish killers by killing that makes us equally immoral.

[taxman 12]

If somebody kills somebody then they should be executed by leathel injection.

 

Maybe the prison's then would'nt be so overcrowded.

 

And when they are subsequently found innocent? Then what, some sort of miracle resurrection?

 

Apart from that a reasoned and well thought out contribution to the thread

[rubydazzler 11]

And when they are subsequently found innocent? Then what, some sort of miracle resurrection?

 

Unfortunately, they're probably long dead by then and the point is moot.

The main point to me about convictions made in error, though, is that the actual culprit is probably still at large and free to do it again. I agree with a previous poster that I'd rather be killed than left to moulder away in prison for life. Although as 'life' now seems to be anything from 10 years upward, some people may feel that it's worth the risk of killing or raping. They may or may not be caught and if caught may get off, or may serve a laughably small amount of time.

 

Unfortunately, many killers, most rapists and paedophiles re-released are then at large and free to do it again, and probably will. So, in the face of incontrovertible evidence against them, I'd have them put down. If it later turned out that they'd been fitted up or a mistake had been made, I'd be very sad, of course.

 

This is probably the only occasion on which you'd find me agreeing with the OT idea of "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life"