Are people who believe in the Death Penalty by definition Evil?

[Agathon]

Originally posted by notyoueither


Tailoring?

No. Justice is not a suit off the rack that you have cut to fit.

Rather, judges should take into account the impact of sentences on victims and their families. They do, as we speak. Only death has been taken off the table.

In what way? Why is the justice system supposed to make people feel better? I can't think of anything that anyone could do that would compensate for the death of a family member.

In fact, other than protecting them from further predations, I don't think that the victims interests should count at all. But you don't need the death penalty to protect people from further predations.

Indeed. And that is why our judges take into account impact on victims, but do not give victims, or their families, a blank cheque in sentencing.

I don't agree. Insofar as the degree of the crime matters in sentencing a criminal it's fine (some crimes are obviously more horrible than others), but apart from crimes where restorative justice is appropriate (i.e. not murder), looking to what the victims want to determine a sentence has no justification I can think of. There's a difference between looking at the impact on the victim in determining the severity of the crime, and allowing the wishes of the victim to affect the sentence.

First there is the case of the parents of murdered children not being tortured by tid bits of the details of their childrens' deaths.

By whom? By authors who write about the crime, or by the criminal himself? I stated above that criminals like that should be held incommunicado.

Second, a cop or child murderer being brought to real justice is not a weak justification.

This is just sloganeering. What makes it "real justice" as opposed to "fake justice"? I want to see more on this point... real arguments... I'm interested to see what you come up with.

Nice try, but no dice.

I am talking about people who are the surviving victims of the worst sorts of crimes.

That Clifford Olsen is alive to taunt the parents with details of the deaths of their children from the safety of the federal prison system is an injustice of the worst sort.

Far from the victims wishing him dead for sadistic reasons, his victims are dead and can wish no harm to him. What reasonable people would seek is that an end be put to an existance that only Satan could love.

Should read: "That Clifford Olsen is able to taunt the parents with details of the deaths of their children from the safety of the federal prison system is an injustice of the worst sort."

The death penalty is not the only means of rendering him unable to do this. Ergo, this fails as an argument for the death penalty.

[Berzerker]

Nope, it doesn´t reward him if he spends the rest of his whole life locked up in prison.

As opposed to death? Yes, that is rewarding a murderer for his success at committing murder. He should be dead but the victim's loved ones get to feed him for the rest of his life.

[Proteus_MST]

Originally posted by Berzerker

As opposed to death? Yes, that is rewarding a murderer for his success at committing murder. He should be dead but the victim's loved ones get to feed him for the rest of his life.

Not if you let these people work.
Send them to the spice mines of Kessel or the Dilithium mines uf Rura pente

But really,
I see no reason why prisoners (especially those who are sentenced for life) shouldn´t have to do some work (aside from things like doing the laundry or serving in the prison canteen, which AFAIK is already implemented in american prisons).
They could earn money for doing the work, but would get much less than a worker outside of prison would get for the same work [after all they don´t have to pay for rent and food ]
You could ensure the proper motivation of these prisoners to do the work by having those who really work get rewarded (better cells or food) or those who don´t want to work get punished (less food, worse cells )

It should be some kind of work where you have got a labor shortage (maybe because most people don´t want to do the job ) but where you can still have maximum security so that the prisoners aren´t able to use the job to plan their escape from prison.
This way they wouldn´t be a burden to society but serve the common good

[Sandman]

If you use prisoners as a labour force, it'll create an incentive to find people guilty.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Originally posted by Berzerker


As opposed to death? Yes, that is rewarding a murderer for his success at committing murder. He should be dead but the victim's loved ones get to feed him for the rest of his life.

And as opposed to liberty? Or as opposed to not getting bum-raped in prison?

[Proteus_MST]

Originally posted by Sandman
If you use prisoners as a labour force, it'll create an incentive to find people guilty.

Which would be a good reason to use all means of independent control a democracy has at its hands to keep the state from abusing this system.

If you can prevent misuse of this system by the state,
it would be much better than the current system with death penalty.
It would be better for the state (prisoners who work)
it would be better for the prisoners themselves (if not sentenced to life they might learn skills due to their work, which they can use for jobs after they are released from prison, if sentenced to life [former DP] but innocent they might live till the day when there are enough evidences to prove that they didn´t commit the crime)
and it would be better from a moral standpoint

[Sandman]

You can argue for all sorts of things if you add 'but be careful' to the end. Most countries have community service for minor offenses, but using murderers and hardened criminals as a labour force strikes me as a waste of time. What useful work do you expect them to do?