Texas execution: How much is a death worth?

Texas execution: How much is a death worth?

www.bbc.co.uk

The cost of lethal injection drugs used in the US to kill criminals on death row has risen dramatically over the past year. The increase comes as their manufacturers move to prevent them being used in executions.

(visit the link for the full news article)

I abhore the death sentence and detest those that seek to uphold it's barbaric punishment. It is good to see that the companies supplying lethal injection drugs to death penalty states in the US are taking a proactive stance against their product being used for execution. Combine this with the evidence that executions cost far more than life imprisonment and we are well on our way to making positive change.

While it is not enough to stop the death penalty being carried out for the time being, to me it signals a fundamental change in the way people view punishment by execution - one can only hope that eventually the death penalty will be realised by one and all as the barbaric throwback to the Dark Ages that it is.

An interesting list of statistics was also placed at the bottom of the article, I will place it here as food for thought:

[color=gold]Executions in 2010

* 96 countries have abolished the death penalty for all crimes
* 23 countries carried out executions
* China: 1,000s (lethal injection)
* Iran: 252+ (hanging)
* North Korea: 60+ (hanging)
* Yemen: 53+ (shooting)
* US: 46 (lethal injection, electrocution)
* Saudi Arabia: 27+ (beheading)
* Libya: 18+
* Syria: 17+ (hanging)
* Bangladesh: 9+ (hanging)
* Somalia: 8+ (shooting)

The US is keeping some great company there methinks.

Please read the entire article for more detailed information.


www.bbc.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

reply to post by Kryties


Well it could be done a lot cheaper a good .30 Cal round costs.about $1 each and 1 will definately do the job. They also need to stop the trend of letting convicted killers sit on deathrow for years while awaiting execution. It costs upwards of 250k a year to house and feed a deathrow inmate. When their appeal is done take them to the town square and put a bullet in them. It would be cheaper all around plus then you don't have the hardworking taxpayers supporting a Lowlife killer.

A bullet from a firing squad of guards who are on the clock anyway is about $0.50. A rope is even less, since it's even reusable. You could even call it a green solution, if one wants to seek a silver lining.

Now I will be the first in line to say that the way it's administered in our nation is just flat wrong. It's not one or two anymore...it's been a steady flow over the years of men exonerated by DNA evidence. Not technicality, but as close to absolute proven innocent as it comes..and from death row. So reform in how the whole system works where the Death Penalty can even be applied with the charge must come. NO question.


Once it's reformed..and for those caught more or less straight up and red handed, I see absolutely no reason why we need to screw around with complicated drug cocktails. This is so the killer or other form of the worst our species can produce can die in comfort. Pain isn't a bad thing, really. Not given the crimes of the people who face the sentence when the system isn't hopelessly corrupt or just broken.

Deterrence or not....child killers, serial killers and a selection of others need erased from the human experience and I really think it can be done at a minimum of cost. Their comfort is of absolutely no concern to me. Just the mess.

reply to post by Nucleardiver


The reason the convicted sit on death row for so long is to allow for all legal process to be followed through, so as to reduce the chances of killing an innocent person.

Shame that still doesn't work.

You do know your method of execution was used for thousands of years, particularly in the Dark and Middle Ages where it was punishment for having free thought don't you? Thank god people like you aren't in charge of the legal system, or the US would be even more barbaric in it's punishments than it already is.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


I knew it wouldn't take long for the "a bullet is cheaper" crowd to come out from under the woodwork.

People are still being executed when they are actually innocent, despite the years of legal processes involved. Imagine what would happen if you removed all those processes and just took them out back and blew their heads off? How many more innocent people would die just to satisfy the bloodlust of those who salivate at the thought of watching somebody die?

instead of letting them rot in a cell just make them work sewing mailbags or some other crappy repetitive task like breaking rocks for 12 hours a day then atleast you wont have to say sorry we killed the wrong man and it could turn them from being a cost to the state into perhaps a profit or atleast subsidise the costs of keeping them locked up

reply to post by Maxatoria


Exactly. There are plenty of other ways to punish a person for a crime other than execution. Most of them just don't live up to the 'standards' of the death penalty advocates though - there's not enough blood and death to salivate at methinks.

reply to post by Kryties

You notice I gave a paragraph to the very important work the Innocence Project has done over the years. I wasn't sure what to make of them at first, and I suspected their results in the first few. Now it's been so many, there is no arguing our Capital Punishment system is broken.

You'll have no argument from me there and 1 innocent executed is too many. Period. Given how many have walked straight out of prison as free men, not just had sentences commuted to life or something, I wouldn't mind seeing a moratorium across the board for a review of them all. Again, 1 innocent dead is too many. Our whole system was founded on that concept, and we agree there. Completely


Where we disagree is that I do believe there are human beings who are completely and totally without hope of rehabilitation or redemption of any kind. There aren't many, but they absolutely exist. Dahmer, Bundy, Gacy, Ramirez and others.......are stealing valuable oxygen by their mere existence and thievery isn't nice. It must be stopped. Why spend any more than necessary in putting a halt to the theft?

To that small segment of "humanity", if we must call them that, that is about as much emotion as I have about it. My sympathy rests on the victim side. We just have to reform this system to insure those who get the ultimate penalty were convicted with the ultimate level of proof and evidence.

Originally posted by Kryties
reply to post by Nucleardiver

 

The reason the convicted sit on death row for so long is to allow for all legal process to be extinguished, so as to reduce the chances of killing an innocent person.

Shame that still doesn't work.

You do know your method of execution was used for thousands of years, particularly in the Dark and Middle Ages where it was punishment for having free thought don't you? Thank god people like you aren't in charge of the legal system, or the US would be even more barbaric in it's punishments than it already is.

The only legal process they are.entitled to after.conviction is the right to appeal to the higher court, that's it, and they only get 1. 2 if of goes to the USSC.

Really???? They have used firing squads for thousands of years? I didn't realize the firearms had been around for thousands of years. I was under the assumption that the Chinese didn't invent gunpowder until the Tang Dynasty in the 9th century.

I really had no clue that it was used during the dark ages. I thought it took several centuries for it to make its way to.Europe along the silk highway and wasn't used there until the mid 17th century. I was under the assumption that most European executions were beheadings by the much feared guillotine. Remember Marie Antoinette?

Want to talk about barbaric? Forcing a law abiding populace to pay for every aspect.of supporting a criminal that has done nothing for society and has taken an innocent life. That is barbaric.

ETA: I am not for the execution of innocent people, but once their guilt is proven then get it over with and make it cheap.

"It is better that a hundred guilty men go free than to have one innocent man punished under law without the full constraints and protections of the law." Thomas Jefferson

Originally posted by Kryties
reply to post by Maxatoria

 

Exactly. There are plenty of other ways to punish a person for a crime other than execution. Most of them just don't live up to the 'standards' of the death penalty advocates though - there's not enough blood and death to salivate at methinks.

Exactly. Keeping them locked up for 50 years wasting our money is a much better solution, especially when we (the U.S.A.) have so much extra cash to spare.

I agree with the death penalty but we need to fix methodology before we do anything else. As it stands it costs too much money to keep people in prison, carry out the execution, and sends too many innocents to their deaths.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


I can think of far worse punishments than execution for those 'worst of the worst' mate. Life imprisonment with hard labour is one. Make them work on something productive that will help them pay back the cost of their incarceration. Why sink to their level and murder them back?

Killing somebody for killing somebody in order to deter somebody killing someone is the most ridiculous logic I have ever heard to be honest.

reply to post by Nucleardiver


You can 'fire' arrows too you know.

reply to post by Holodomor


You must have missed the part where it was suggested the inmate be put to work on something productive in order to help pay the cost of keeping them there.

Originally posted by Kryties
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

I can think of far worse punishments than execution for those 'worst of the worst' mate. Life imprisonment with hard labour is one. Make them work on something productive that will help them pay back the cost of their incarceration. Why sink to their level and murder them back?

Killing somebody for killing somebody in order to deter somebody killing someone is the most ridiculous logic I have ever heard to be honest.

That's a fantastic idea! ...However I fear the ACLU and other similar agencies will be all over any prison that institutes forced, hard labor...it wouldn't last a month. When I say hard labor, I don't mean picking strawberries, I mean back-breaking, agonizing, vomit-inducing, borderline torturous labor. Preferably somewhere hot. Of course provide as much support as you can to prevent death to exposure, etc, but keep them as uncomfortable as possible.

Originally posted by Nucleardiver

I really had no clue that it was used during the dark ages. I thought it took several centuries for it to make its way to.Europe along the silk highway and wasn't used there until the mid 17th century. I was under the assumption that most European executions were beheadings by the much feared guillotine. Remember Marie Antoinette?

Actually, of all the ways one can perform an execution, the guillotine is the most humane ever devised. Not that I agree with it's use, or executions at all, but there's some food for thought for you.

Want to talk about barbaric? Forcing a law abiding populace to pay for every aspect.of supporting a criminal that has done nothing for society and has taken an innocent life. That is barbaric.

You, too, must have missed the clearly written parts of the above posts where the prisoner is forced to work productively in order to help pay his/her incarceration. I understand that through all the salivating over watching somebody die that it must be hard to see, but it's there I promise you.

reply to post by Kryties

Well now it's probably important to distinguish something in what I'm saying. Under our current system there are a myriad of crimes that can qualify for the Death Penalty. It's absurd..and a facet of a broken system.

There are criminals, there are lifers that are just sadly hopeless and then there are two legged monsters. Rehab and try to work with the criminals. Warehouse and put the lifers to hard labor...in a separate facility from the criminals we're still willing to try with. However, the monsters need slain, to use a quaint term for it.

What is the point of even trying to come up with ways or reasons for how else we can handle the monsters? Just remove them. As efficiently as possible. There are only a handful that qualify as true multiple murderers with no soul or psychopaths with absolutely no sense of humanity as we all know it. Maybe a few thousand across the world. I really think the people that are dangerous beyond all hope of reaching are rare. They ARE why the Death Penalty exists, at least in part though.

Originally posted by Kryties
reply to post by Nucleardiver

 

You can 'fire' arrows to you know.

I never said "fire" I said "a good .30 Cal bullet". Nowhere in my post did I say fire. And even giving you the benefit of the doubt, arrows were not used very often, if ever for execution in the dark ages. It was either guillotine, beheading by axe, drawn and quartered, or disembowelled.

Usually I enjoy a good battle of the wits but I must leave this post now as I make it a rule not to go up against unarmed opponents.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
reply to post by Kryties

 

What is the point of even trying to come up with ways or reasons for how else we can handle the monsters? Just remove them. As efficiently as possible.

Because it's the right thing to do, and prevents humanity sinking to the level of the monster in order to punish them? Precisely how does it punish the person anyway? They are dead. They don't know they are dead, they do not know they have been killed as a punishment....so who does the death penalty serve then? It can only serve to provide a sense of vengeance and revenge from the victims families and others involved.

Originally posted by Nucleardiver

Usually I enjoy a good battle of the wits but I must leave this post now as I make it a rule not to go up against unarmed opponents.

LOL, whatever you say mate. I knew exactly what you meant, regardless of the projectile fired.

The fact is, mate, that just shooting someone is even worse than imprisoning them for years them lethally injecting/electrocuting then. Hell, lets remove the right to appeals and the chance for bad evidence/prosecutors to be shown up......lets just drag them out back and pop a cap in their head eh?

It's absolutely barbaric.