Originally posted by no time
reply to post by Wrabbit2000
For sure innocent people have died after being wrongfully convicted. But this sounds awfully like an argument that if your child doesn't do well in
school then there should be no school. A free ride for the rest of their life, turns out, is not a very good deterrent to violent crime.
I'm not sure where the 'if your child doesn't do well in school then there should be no school.' idea comes into this. It's a question of whether
murdering innocent citizens is acceptable in pursuit of executing guilty ones. The answer to that HAS to be a resounding NO or what is it we're
trying to save in the American system?
I was brought up to believe to my core that it's better for 10 guilty men to walk than 1 innocent man to be convicted. I must say that picturing
myself in the position of the innocent man, I can't fault the logic.
Reform of evidence and trial rules would go a long way toward rectifying our
problems....but the slaughter of people that MAY OR MAY NOT BE guilty is simply abhorrent until that system can be brought into a condition where
we're SURE we aren't killing innocent citizens.
Deterrence? Well... I'll be the first to be honest here, despite the fact few seem to be on this issue. Deterrence went clear out the window as a
real thing the day after hanging in the public square became taboo. If a potential criminal has never seen an execution, rarely hears about one and
OFTEN hears about people 'beating' the death penalty on true technical issues, not a quilt or innocence issue, then deterrence is absolutely
worthless. I can't help but think those who still use that argument to support Capital Punishment just make fools of everyone who supports it for the
right reasons.
We might as well just come right out and be 100% straight about it. Death has two purposes. One is to remove the threat to society by physical means
so they can never victimize an innocent citizen again. Second is pure and simple revenge by society, and I have NO problem with that. Revenge is as
good a reason as any with what Capital Murderers have usually done to earn their room on Death Row. Let's just make SURE we stop sending people to
their deaths who didn't do what they are dying for. That's all.
