TCBF said:
"If we had the death penalty, we would undoubtedly have as lengthy a process as the US given our left-leaning justice system. It costs more to imprison someone on death row and execute them than it does to imprison them in general population for life. Your support for the death penalty is actually support for wasting more money, not saving it."
Not at all. Just take the money wasted on the gun registry and put it into death sentences.
Whether you're wasting money that would have been wasted elsewhere or wasting fresh money that wasn't budgeted for something else, you're still wasting money.
"So "an eye for an eye" should be the basis of our entire justice system? "
Isn't it now? If not - remove the threat - permanently.
No, it's not. We stopped living by Hammurabi's code quite some time ago. We don't use the "two wrongs make a right" principle to govern a system of law which regulates 35 million people. As for the threat, you can remove the threat just as easily by sticking it in prison. There is absolutely no necessity or call for killing.
Killing, in Canada at least, is something reserved as a last option - like when a guy pulls a gun on a cop or Canadian Forces troops are at war. We don't arrest people, imprison them (thus removing their threat to society) and then kill them when there's no cause. That's sadistic and sick - it's killing for the sake of killing, not for any legitimate purpose.
"I seriously doubt it. Do you really think that the lack of deterrence in the death penalty is because accomplices aren't being executed? "
I believe the data on deterence is flawed. The death penalty deters less than it could because very few convicted killers ever are put to death ANYWHERE (USA, China, Japan).
Ah, so it's an issue of volume. We're not killing enough people to generate deterrence? Texas executes three times more people than any other state but has a higher murder rate than the national average. More police officers are killed in Florida, Texas, and California than any other state and all of them have the death penalty. The south, which accounts for 80% of all executions, has the highest murder rate. The Northeast, which accounts for roughly 1% of executions, has a lower murder rate (the lowest in 2001). Canada's murder rate is three times lower than that of the US and doesn't execute anyone.
Take a look: http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=12&did=167
As well, I think the death penalty for serious asault - where lack of timely medical intervension would have resulted in death - as well as attempted murder is correct.
That's a pretty vague basis on which to execute people. Establishing that "lack of timely medical intervension would have resulted in death", legally, would be difficult. Why don't we just execute people for every felony? Tax evasion - kill them, drug trafficking - kill them, armed robbery - kill them. It's draconian to say the least.
What criminals fear is death - at the time of the crime and at the hands of their victim mostly, as a result of a long legal process eventually.
Apparently not, judging by the data.
As for repeat offenders - yes, some do kill again. No sucessful lawsuits against their parole boards so far, unfortunately.
What this argues for is enforcement of life sentences, not execution.
kcdist said:
As for all the naysayers....how would you react to the murderer of your mother being released after a mere 15 years in prison (less actually, after receiving double time served for pre-trial custody). That's the litmus test.
Not really - there's a reason we use a dispassionate justice system for trying, convicting, and punishing offenders. We shouldn't rely on "how would you feel" as the basis for determining the legitimacy or length of punishment. Regardless, what you're arguing is for longer sentences/no parole, not executions.
Some simply deserve to die.
Yes, well I guess this is really a normative point that no one can effectively argue either way. Whether or not someone "deserves to die" is a subjective judgement.
Infanteer said:
Retribution serves to appeal to our most basic instinct of lex talionis. You say that justice isn't about retribution; what it is about then? We fear the fickle nature of vigilantism and people taking "justice into their own hands" so we create a system at the communal level that is perceived to be fair and consistent; this doesn't change the nature of why we have the system. Justice is the communities retaliation for transgressions against its norms and rules.
I think our justice system is geared more towards punishment (in a deterrent capacity) and behaviour correction (hence "Correctional Services Canada")than retribution. Revenge rarely serves any useful function, regardless of whether it feels good or not. There is, undoubtedly, a "payment of debt" aspect to sentencing but I don't think that really establishes a case for the death penalty nor should it be the primary concern of our justice system.
I support the death penalty because it is the most simple and efficient way of dealing with the most serious criminal offenders.
Not really - it costs more. As for simplicity, I'm hesitant to use the KISS principle when considering someone's life.
The community grants the state the right to use violence when the situation warrants it - military action, police conducting there duties, etc.
Yes, and our society views killing as something done in self-defence or defence of others where a threat is imminent or during times of war. Executing criminals fits neither - the murderer has been arrested, is incarcerated, and thus there is no imminent threat. The murderer is not a combatant and we are not at war. Even if he was a combatant, his disarmed and incarcerated status would make killing him a chargeable offence by our rules of war.
Impostion of capital punishment is another circumstance where I can see this as justified. Of course, an alternative like banishment to a penal colony in the high arctic is another possibility. The bottom line is if you rape and murder 40-some-odd women and feed them to your pigs, I don't want you in my society; not even writing books in a public-provided facility.
Yes, well we're don't really have a very strong Gulag tradition and incarceration, for all intents and purposes, effectively removes the person from society (as it is one of its purposes).
We put down homeless animals for different reasons then we put rabid dogs, so that analogy sucks. As well, the death penalty is given for a crime committed, not on the basis of danger posed, so don't attempt to throw this off topic. If an inbred, violent dog rips the face off of a 4 year old, we don't give it 25 years with chance of parole for a reason.
We don't treat people as animals, that was my point, so such analogies suck.
Ghost778 said:
Why does it cost more to imprison them on death row than just in prison them for like? because of the appeal process? Don't people imprisoned for life (which in Canada is what, 25 years? dumb) still get to do the appeal thing?
The appeals process for capital crimes and regular crimes is different - there are special appeals processes. The cost of death row itself is also higher - the extremely high segregation and security levels in death row are more expensive than general population.
If it's true then that's a good point. We really need to speed up the process and not play around with this appeal for 20 years bullshit. Give them a year to come up with something. Even then it's 365 more days than they gave their victim.
Given the burden on the courts, it takes far longer than a year to expend the proper avenues of appeal. Heck, it often takes 6 months just to get to trial, and that's in Canada.
I don't really care whether or not the death penalty is a deterant though
Well, some people do. Again, I guess it's a normative thing and people will feel how they feel.
Might be a little graphic.
I read an article once about a guy who , if memory serves me right, raped and killed a mother while the daughter was forced to watch. Then took the daughter and made her crawl through a barbwire fence, put a shotgun up between her legs, fired, and waited and watched for 15 minutes while she died.
I don't want these people in my society.
That's fine, but it hardly substantiates an argument for the death penalty as it operates completely on subjective, normative feelings.
Justice IS about retribution.
A criminal takes something away from society so society takes something away from them. takes away their money, privileges, freedom and in extreme cases their life.
We don't do the "eye for an eye" thing in Canada - rapists aren't raped, etc. It only serves to lower the society in which it is practiced. There exists a necessity for punishment and security for society - incarceration meets that necessity.
kincanucks said:
parallel those expressed by parliament when capital punishment was abolished and that decision reaffirmed later (both in free votes).
Please don't equate a vote in Parliament as either a 'free vote' or a true expression of what Canadians want as a whole. Perhaps the decision of whether Canada should bring back Capital Punishment should be made by a Canada-wide referendum in which all Canadians could be heard.
There's a consultation of the public at least every 5 years (often sooner) and the fact that the death penalty has been a generally non-existent issue would suggest that Canadians are happy with our abstention from its use.
