It amazes me that the same people who have absolutely no trust in government to regulate businesses, collect taxes, provide services, etc, have absolute faith that government always gets it right when it comes to applying the death penalty. I oppose the death penalty because getting it wrong means never, ever, being able to get a do-over.
Further, the truly guilty should spend the rest of their natural lives behind bars. No visitors, no perqs, nada. True social banishment. Let’em wake up every morning remembering why they’re in that cell.
“[I am] haunted by the demon of error – error in determining guilt and error in determining who among the guilty deserves to die.” -George Ryan, former Illinois Governor
Advertisement
People typically spend decades on death row, if I am not mistaken.
Plenty of time for a do-over.
Most people, even most murderers, would have completed their sentences and been released by then.
Now those people can’t get a do-over.
Why does the “demon of error” only haunt people in connection with the death penalty?
And specifically the innocents who are sentenced to it?
I have not the least doubt that the vast bulk of convictions of the innocent involve other penalties and are never corrected.
But nobody seems to be haunted by those errors or in the least concerned about their terrible cost to the wrongly convicted or to society in general.
Nor does anyone remember at all the numerous and well-known cases of horrific crimes in which there is not the least rational, let alone reasonable, doubt as to the guilt of those convicted.
So far, it looks like the cases of those two guys up in Connecticut fall into this category.
Just one recent and well-publicized example.
I am indeed haunted by the error of innocent people rotting in jail. Being opposed to the death penalty on the grounds that an innocent person may die doesn’t mean that I’m okay with them being incarcerated for the rest of their lives either.
Not what I said at all.
I usually agree with you on everything – but I’m not sure about the “no visitors, no perqs, nada…” as this sounds too much like solitary confinement. I think absolute isolation is a form of torture and falls in the cruel and unusual category.
Whatever perqs are handed out these days will disappear as the entire prison system is privatized and inmates become subhumans exploited for their labor and such. This statement is not an endorsement for privatization – quite the contrary.
I also oppose the death penalty on a lot of grounds.
The death penalty doesn’t provide “closure,” it doesn’t deter criminality, and it doesn’t serve any purpose but revenge. Revenge doesn’t equate to justice.