Death penalty is wrong, this is why..

[balrog666]

And here I thought this thread couldn't get any sillier.

 

[Last of the Fraggles]

It absolutely does precisely that. If we take, from the same group, 982 people and execute them, and exonerate 121 others, we can calculate an expected number of innocent people on death row.

No, you can't. Which is the point I was trying to make. The appeals/re-examination of evidence process is a completely separate one from the execution process (technically they are two stages of the same process).

You CANNOT assume they have the same error rate.

If you are saying the majority of these cases are the result of new processes (DNA etc) then the best this statistic gives you is the historical error rate before that new technology was employed. Its irrelevant to the current or future rate of errors.

Imagine a factory where quality control finds that 1 in 9 items are faulty and they are removed from the production line. Can you assume that 1 in 9 of the finished product on shop shelves is faulty too? Of course not. Same thing for this case.

 

[fuelair]

OK, then, in your opinion, the behaviour of the husband is moral

Part II
For those who think that the behaviour of the husband was moral

The husband arrives home, takes a shower, hides the gun.
Infortunately ( for him ), two little children saw him killing the burglar.
One of the children, even saw his car number plate.
They go to tell the police.
The police does some researchs, and arrests the husband.
They even find the gun, hidden in the closet.
The husband, at first, denies everything, then, he has to confess.
" I did it! But, it was only for justice, as that man [ the burglar ] killed my wife and son "
The day of the process comes.
The husband is sent to death.
So, is this sentence of the jury to be considered as " moral "?

No - but unless the husband has a complete idiot for a lawyer, this won't happen so is a strawman. Lawyer will have the husband polygraphed, will have him interviewed by psychiatrist and may well use funds to work backwards on the earlier case. Husband may go to jail (if my wife has that happen to her, I'll take that chance - though I will not kill immediately unless I have no option either) but I think he would accept that - and were I on the jury, it would be a hung jury.

 

[CFLarsen]

No, you can't. Which is the point I was trying to make. The appeals/re-examination of evidence process is a completely separate one from the execution process (technically they are two stages of the same process).

You CANNOT assume they have the same error rate.

You just say this is so. You don't explain why.

If you are saying the majority of these cases are the result of new processes (DNA etc) then the best this statistic gives you is the historical error rate before that new technology was employed. Its irrelevant to the current or future rate of errors.

I am specifically not saying anything about future rate of errors - except that we can expect better methods in the future. But I doubt we will ever find a way to ensure, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that all those on death row also belongs there.

Imagine a factory where quality control finds that 1 in 9 items are faulty and they are removed from the production line. Can you assume that 1 in 9 of the finished product on shop shelves is faulty too? Of course not. Same thing for this case.

Yes, you can. That's precisely what happens in a production line: If enough test samples are bad, then you deduct that the similar percentage are also bad. And, as is the case here, you are looking for just one bad example, then finding just one proves that there is at least one.

 

[wollery]

No - but unless the husband has a complete idiot for a lawyer, this won't happen so is a strawman. Lawyer will have the husband polygraphed, will have him interviewed by psychiatrist and may well use funds to work backwards on the earlier case. Husband may go to jail (if my wife has that happen to her, I'll take that chance - though I will not kill immediately unless I have no option either) but I think he would accept that - and were I on the jury, it would be a hung jury.

In which case you aren't fit for jury service.

The only job of a jury is to determine whether or not there is enough evidence to find someone guilty of the crime they are charged with. In this instance the man is demonstrably guilty of premeditated murder, albeit with mitigating circumstances.

 

[DanishDynamite]

So, do you think that the husband " justice killing " of the burglar, at the beginning of this thread, was " moral " or " immoral "?

No idea, as I didn't read it. But if someone planned to kill someone and executed the plan, I have no problem with this person being killed by the state.

 

[TX50]

In this instance the man is demonstrably guilty of premeditated murder, albeit with mitigating circumstances.

If there are accepted mitigating circumstances then he can't technically be
found guilty of murder. Even if he was to be found guilty of murdering the
criminal scumbag, the man would be unlikely to receive a capital sentence,
as he is demonstrably not a danger to society at large.

Whether it's "moral", or "immoral" is just pansy-ass, rotten-ivory-tower
philosophizing. Very few things are black or white in the ****** world most
of us live in; it's all shades of grey, shades of grey.

 

[wollery]

If there are accepted mitigating circumstances then he can't technically be found guilty of murder.

If the evidence is overwhelming (as it is in this hypothetical) then the jury have no choice. Their one and only job is determine whether or not the evidence proves the charge.

Even if he was to be found guilty of murdering the criminal scumbag, the man would be unlikely to receive a capital sentence, as he is demonstrably not a danger to society at large.

And here is the point, the sentencing is where the mitigating circumstances are taken into account.

Whether it's "moral", or "immoral" is just pansy-ass, rotten-ivory-tower philosophizing. Very few things are black or white in the ****** world most of us live in; it's all shades of grey, shades of grey.

Indeed.

 

[Bob Klase]

Certainly.

No, I must not have "lied". That claim is true. The innocent isn't among the executed. How can it be, since they don't bother to check if the ones they execute were innocent?

That was exactly the question- how could you know how many innocent were among the executed if nobody bothers to check the ones executed.

I'll do the math for you:

For 8 executed, 1 is found innocent. Since there are 3,350 on death row (Jan 2007), that gives us 372.

Wow- 372. The math seems pretty easy when you can just make up the numbers.

But Matteo's reference

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=9&did=188#year

says 125- significantly less than 372. And that's 125 since 1973- so (just maybe) it would make sense to compare it to the number of people who have been sent to death row since 1973 and not just the number who were on death row on a particular date.

If we compare the 372 to the number on your referenced site, you're even further off:

http://deathpenaltyinfo.msu.edu/c/about/arguments/argument3a.htm

Since 1973, at least 121 people have been released from death row after evidence of their innocence emerged

121, 372, 125. Even when trying to compare numbers in a meaningless way you can't keep the straight.

Do you feel good about that number? Knowing what it means?

I feel better knowing that you feel your arguments are so weak that you have to manipulate and exaggerate the numbers to make them look worse than they are.

 

[Bob Klase]

Yeah sorry, 1 in 9. I was just making the point that 1 person in 9 on death row found to be innocent is not the same as 1 person in 9 executed wrongly.

That's exactly the problem with CL's numbers. He's comparing the number of wrongful convictions with the number of executed. If he did the sensible thing and compared the number of wrongful convictions to the total number of convictions (or the wrongful number of executions to the total number of executions) the numbers would be much less supportive of his argument.

 

[wollery]

The numbers are irrelevant.

1 wrongful execution is too many.

 

[Darth Rotor]

The numbers are irrelevant.

1 wrongful execution is too many.

So you assert. Subjective judgment. I am never impressed by the zero defects standard: no one is willing to bear the cost.

Your expressed sentiment of not considering a wrongful execution desireable is agreed completely.

DR

 

[Bob Klase]

The numbers are irrelevant.

The ones given by CL certainly are anyway.

 

[wollery]

So you assert. Subjective judgment. I am never impressed by the zero defects standard: no one is willing to bear the cost.

What cost? Demonstrate that removing the death penalty increases the number of crimes, or that it costs more money to keep a prisoner in jail for life than to execute them.

 

[Matteo Martini]

Since the OP title claims you can prove to all of us the death penalty is wrong, why do you restrict your attention to just the subset who think the husband's hypothetical act was moral?

I feel so left out.

If you think that the jury could send the man ( burglar ) to death, but the husband should not have killed the burglar, you have to explain to me why, a man who has all the info in his hands, can not kill another man ( being sure he is guilty ) , while a group of men, who have not all the info in their hands, can morally send the burglar
to die.

 

[Matteo Martini]

I'm having a hard time applying "moral" to collective actions of the state.

I wouldn't sentence the guy to death, but if that is the normal penalty for revenge killing in the society in which he lives, I would have a hard time calling the sentence immoral.

I can tell you that in America, the probability of sentencing the man to death is fairly low, and would depend on the extent to which the jury believed his story that the man killed his wife and son. For example, if Mr. Goldman (father of Ron Goldman, who was killed by OJ Simpson) had gone out and killed OJ after OJ was acquitted, I doubt he would have been given the death penalty.

Ron Goldman, by the U.S. law, was not killed by O.J. Simpson.
And, I think that, if you perform an intentional, premeditated, not-under-menace murder of a guy who. by the law, is 100% innocent, you can be sent to death ( by the law )

 

[Matteo Martini]

So you assert. Subjective judgment. I am never impressed by the zero defects standard: no one is willing to bear the cost.

If the state kills an innocent, then, he state too, becomes a murderer.
By which standard, then, a murderer can judge another murderer?

 

[Matteo Martini]

What cost? Demonstrate that removing the death penalty increases the number of crimes, or that it costs more money to keep a prisoner in jail for life than to execute them.

I am impressed that the cost issue is even taken into consideration, when discussing if a person should live or die.
Please, consider that we are speaking about 1000 people, in a nation with 300 million people.

 

[Matteo Martini]

121, 372, 125. Even when trying to compare numbers in a meaningless way you can't keep the straight.

All the sources say more than 100, though..
Worth some research

 

[Matteo Martini]

No idea, as I didn't read it. But if someone planned to kill someone and executed the plan, I have no problem with this person being killed by the state.

So, the husband could be sent to death, in your opinion.
But, was not he just behaving like the state should have behaved with the burglar?
That is my question.
If it was Ok for the state to kill the burglar, why was it not OK for the husband?