Killing off the death penalty
Lawyers Move to Kill Death Penalty
American Bar Association Says ‘Serious Flaws’ Warrant Stay of Executions
By CHRISTINE BROUWERUnderfunded, understaffed and plagued by racial bias, the nation’s system for executing inmates is deeply flawed, and should be stopped until improvements are made, the American Bar Association said in a report released Sunday.
The report, which was based on research conducted in eight states, including Alabama, Georgia, Florida and Ohio, examined the “fairness and accuracy” of death penalty systems, and found “serious flaws in every state,” according to the authors.
“We just do not have confidence in the capital justice system after studying it,” Stephen Hanlon, chairman of the ABA’s Death Penalty Moratorium Project, told ABC News. “Capital defense systems are being underfunded, and unqualified and underresourced lawyers are defending death row inmates.”
“In determining who gets the death penalty,” Hanlon added, “all too frequently, it seems to be not the person who has committed the worst crime, but the person who has the worst lawyer.”
Sunday’s report, compiled by former judges, prosecutors, defense counsels, and other legal experts over a period of three years, detailed 13 separate sets of problems, including sloppy gathering and testing of DNA evidence, underfunded forensics labs, false confessions leading to convictions, and unreliable eyewitness testimony. (more…)
While I am a supporter of the death penalty, I am also for a defendant’s right to a fair due process. I have even heard that some of these DNA labs aren’t even certified not to mention cases where the defendant was given an ill-prepared attorney.
Here is a case in Indiana where the cost for just trying it is astronomical.
“The cost of trying to put Daniel Ray Wilkes to death in a triple murder case is approaching $300,000.
If convicted, Wilkes, 39, faces the death penalty in the April 2006 deaths of an Evansville mother and her two young daughters.”
[SNIP]
“…the average defense cost for a death penalty case in Indiana is about $375,000. She said that accounts for expenses through trial.” (source)
I don’t know if I am totally on board with a complete moratorium on the death penalty considering all the attention each execution is given these days, but I do agree that some serious and forceful reform is needed.
October 31st, 2007 at 10:53 am
1. What is gained from the death penalty?
October 31st, 2007 at 11:20 am
1. A guaranteed spending cap on taxpayer money if prosecuted correctly and swiftly.
2. Equal justice (the pendulum that swings both ways).
October 31st, 2007 at 9:10 pm
I would say that “reform is needed” is an understatement considering that in Illinois more people were set free because of DNA evidence than were actually executed before a moratorium was placed on it. And it wasn’t the “system” that worked to get these people off death row. It was activists. No one can convince me that an innocent man has never been executed. If you believe that then I have a bridge to sell you.
November 1st, 2007 at 9:41 am
How do you get a spending cap? and what is just about killing another human being. We condemn other countries for their mistreatment of human beings but we continue to use the death penalty when we know clearly that it is biased. I guess that is justice.
November 1st, 2007 at 10:50 am
How do you get a spending cap?
Inmate gone=less money
and what is just about killing another human being.
Ask the person who did the initial killing.
November 1st, 2007 at 10:56 am
1st and foremost the cost is nearly twice to house an inmate on death row than it does to keep them in a maximum security prison for the remainder of their life. Very few people are psychopaths and kill for the sake of killing. For most murders there is a mitigating circumstance. What makes person who gets drunk and drives and kills a family of four any more or less worse than a person who snaps and kills his wife and kids. They both killed someone but the drunk driver is likely to one day get out. Where is the justice there?
The death penalty has no place in a civilized society.
November 1st, 2007 at 11:24 am
1st and foremost the cost is nearly twice to house an inmate on death row than it does to keep them in a maximum security prison for the remainder of their life.
Which is why you execute them if it has been thoroughly proven that they are guilty of the crime.
What makes person who gets drunk and drives and kills a family of four any more or less worse than a person who snaps and kills his wife and kids.
The difference here is voluntary versus involuntary manslaughter. A person found guilty of involuntary manslaughter (as you described) has a much better chance getting his sentence reduced than someone who purposely took the life of another individual.
The death penalty has no place in a civilized society.
On the contrary, people who take the lives of innocent individuals are the ones that are UNcivilized. If found guilty of such a crime, KILL THEM!!! By doing so keeps society civil.
November 2nd, 2007 at 6:32 am
Can a system created and run by man ever be perfect? If not then there are going to be innocent people who are killed by the state/society. So then does that make society UNcivilized?
Lets just say for the sake of argument that in the whole history of the death penalty in the U.S. that only one innocent man has ever been executed. How much is that man’s life worth? Is it worth this person’s life to maintain a broken non-perfect system that will surely kill other innocent people. Where is the civility in that?
And I’m not a very religious man but what happened to though shall not kill… Aren’t these suppose to be direct words from GOD himself? It doesn’t say, thou shall not kill EXCEPT for when you think it is justified for justice or revenge.
November 2nd, 2007 at 8:57 am
What I find so amazing about the both of you guys comments is that NOT ONE TIME have you mentioned the pain and grief of the real victims here. The convicted murder has become the sacrificial lamb.
And I’m not a very religious man but what happened to though shall not kill… Aren’t these suppose to be direct words from GOD himself? It doesn’t say, thou shall not kill EXCEPT for when you think it is justified for justice or revenge.
If you really want to start injecting the Bible into this, you can start by understanding the full context of random quotes.
“Kill” in “Thou shall not kill” actually refers to murder. If this was not the case, then God would not have given the Israelites instructions on how to kill animals for various sacrifices.
If your comment was a true and legitimate question about the Biblical view on capital punishment, may I direct you to the following link:
http://4simpsons.wordpress.com/2006/10/31/bad-biblical-arguments-against-capital-punishment/
Here you will find biblical responses to arguments like:
# Jesus would forgive
# We might be eliminating the condemned killer’s opportunity to place his trust in Christ and thus causing him/her to miss out on eternal salvation.
# Jesus is against capital punishment / Jesus reversed the Old Testament teaching on capital punishment
# We might be killing someone who is innocent
# Capital punishment is not a deterrent
# The Bible says, ‘Thou shall not kill’
I would copy the whole thing here, but it is just too long.
After you finish reading this, I can give you case after case in the bible where God made the distinction between killing and murder. But again, based on the tone of your comment, I’m not quite sure you wanted to go down that path.
November 2nd, 2007 at 10:10 am
What I find so amazing about the both of you guys comments is that NOT ONE TIME have you mentioned the pain and grief of the real victims here.
And I don’t understand how you can just dismiss innocent people on death row. Aren’t they a victims too? What about THEIR families? You don’t come back from DEAD. You can’t appeal DEAD. Are you saying you would place someone’s grief at a higher level of importance than the life of an innocent man? I don’t understand that. And I could care less about the ones we KNOW are guilty. Manson.. Kill em. DC Snipers.. Kill em. I could care less. But all cases are not that cut and dry.
I read your link and I will accept your argument that “Thou shall not kill” means murder.. In Illinois I believe the numbers since the death penalty was re-instated was 11 killed and 13 released from death row because of DNA evidence. If activists had not stepped in and done those DNA tests then those 13 people would either be dead or on their way to being dead. Killing an innocent man is MURDER. In these cases murder by the state. Should they have stayed on death row in order to satisfy some other families grief?
November 2nd, 2007 at 10:48 am
And I don’t understand how you can just dismiss innocent people on death row. Aren’t they a victims too?
If you go back to the original post, I have already made the argument that the ABA does have a valid point(s) for wanting to kill the death penalty. I also made it very clear that the current system is rife with loose policies that do not give a significant numbers of these folks their fair day in court. This is why I am 110% for DNA testing as you have pointed out has been successful in some cases.
What I do not agree with here is this general assumption that every person on death row is more innocent than the person(s) they murdered. When the then pending execution of “Tookie” Williams was the hot topic, there were many folks who were calling for not just a stay of his execution, but a complete release. This after his case was tried numerous times and he was still found guilty of those murders.
If a person has been tried numerous times and it has been proven that he/she was given fair due process (with DNA testing), that person should be eliminated from our society. Money keeping these individuals alive AFTER IT HAS BEEN PROVEN OVER AND OVER AGAIN THAT THEY ARE GUILTY could go to much better use like poverty and homelessness. Otherwise, keep that convict alive until he/she is given due process.
Folks tried to justify keeping “Tookie” around by pointing to a book he did for children warning them about the dangers of gang life. Trust me, if kids will not listen to folks who left the game and are not in prison, “Tookie’s” message is just another boring infomercial.
November 2nd, 2007 at 11:32 am
I think we mostly agree except it sounds like you lean more towards keeping the death penalty and I lean more towards getting rid or it. I think I am making the argument that you normally make on this site though. You don’t trust the government to run health care or any number of other industries/agencies but it seems like you are fine with putting government in charge of killing people. Sure, in a perfect world with perfect people the death penalty is a great idea. But in the real world a group of politicians will NEVER be able to come up with a perfect system that everyone would agree is perfect. So in the real world innocent people will be murdered by the state. There is no way around it..
Nice debate though…. Peace Bro.
November 2nd, 2007 at 11:45 am
You don’t trust the government to run health care or any number of other industries/agencies but it seems like you are fine with putting government in charge of killing people.
Again, as long as there is thorough reform, I have no problem with the government doing what it supposed to do.
Yeah, it was a good debate. Take care.
November 2nd, 2007 at 1:20 pm
Well I know that we don’t agree.
Let’s start with your DNA proposal. There is not always DNA evidence. Even then just because a persons DNA was present doesn’t mean that they committed the crime.
In the entire history of the death penalty no family was ever made whole by seeing a human being die.
That manslaughter verses involuntary manslaughter is a bunch of crap. If guilt could be measured the person that knowingly gets behind the wheel of car and drives after a night a drinking is far more guilty than the person that snaps and has a lost of reality.
November 3rd, 2007 at 3:25 am
Interesting debate…and I don’t mean to be rude by throwing in this comment. But isn’t it sad that some of the very people that so vehemently speak against the death penalty for the act of murder are the same ones that believe in and support a woman’s right for abortion: to kill a human being. Please let it be noted that I am not looking for an argument on: It’s the woman’s own body or who says when life begins. Let’s just say that those children (fetuses, “tissue” as some say) were humans, then there are a whole lot of murderers, pre- meditated murderers still walking around…free.