Do You Support Capital Punishment? (Death For Certain Crimes)

The issues of sentencing and punishment have to do with establishing expectable standards of justice in our society.

That is the purview of the government.

The level of hate a specific victim might have is an irrelevancy.

We show that in other areas, too. We have amnesty for just about every crime on the books (statutes of limitation) and for debt as well.

As an individual, I might hate that those who robbed me can not be arrested, as they weren't found fast enough.

But, every state in the union believes these various amnesties are important. For one thing, they reduce the number of citizens who are in constant state of running from the law - allowing them to get jobs, get their financial lives in order, etc.

 

I started a similar thread in Human Rights....I wasn't quite as wordy

I am against the death penalty and here is why. I'll keep it short.

Most who receive the death penalty probably deserve it and their lives are judged valueless by society. Their right to life has been denied for the actions they have taken according to the rules put forth by society. Can we agree on that?

But the problem is errors occur. Innocents are convicted using the same rules that convicted the guilty. These lives are worth as much as yours or mine. Their lives are worth more than the sum of the guilty, therefore in the name of preventing an innocent person from mistakenly being put to death no one should be given the death sentence.

 

Don't forget, the Jewish Babylonian Talmud approves of child molestation and baby raping. That is current behavior.

 

Sorry to say, but my honest literal mental reaction to this post is a mental exclamation of "Jesus F-ing Christ.:

 

I'm okay with replacing the death penalty with life in prison in solitary confinement without parole.

 

Definitely agreed.

We also have to weigh possibility, though. A significant population hits rock bottom somehow (alcohol, drugs, etc.). Those that do could be fully acceptable before and/or after rock bottom.

I have trouble punishing their worst case with punishment so final as having the state kill them - even if our system were flawless (which it certainly is not).

The Bible has Jesus directing Christians to search out the poor, those in hospitals and those in prison to help them in their time of need. This isn't a mere golden rule type thing - which is based on what I want. The penalty for Christians failing this duty is for them to be outcast from those meriting salvation as per Matthew 25.

 

I think age and suffering has a lot to do with our becoming more empathetic and sympathetic
to the sadness of the human condition.

Those who come to know from experience what it means to suffer and hurt due to personal
failures can better empathize with others who have also failed to measure up to moral
expectations.

If you don't mind telling me. Why did you select "Lucifer" for a screen name?

I know you know that some Christians think "Lucifer" is another name for
Satan --- even though I think many reputable Christian scholars do NOT
think "Lucifer" is another name for Satan.

Wait . .

'Course "Lucifer" has other meanings:
"Lucifer is a Latin name for the planet Venus"

Also the television series. Ah that's probably it? The television series.

Agreed.

I had never considered that before -- thanks for mentioning it.

That's an interesting perspective. The convicted murderer gets to decide which he
prefers . . . I guess a choice between a life sentence and execution. Or a very lengthy
prison sentence, say, 50 years or longer.

Lucifer, I do not know if you are a Christian or not, nonetheless you might be interested in
reading the following that I wrote for this thread. Or if not you, maybe some other readers
will find the following interesting and helpful.

"I think God knew His business better than we do when He instituted the death penalty for certain crimes."__A Christian Supporter Of The Death Penalty

My view is that God has not instituted the Death Penalty for we who are now living under the guidelines and truths of the New Testament.

Here are some of my reasons for holding this position.

New Testament:
(1) To the best of my knowledge the New Testament does not command the Death Penalty for any crime. There is no verse in the New Testament that specifically says that the Death Penalty is either right or wrong, or should or should not be instituted.

Romans 13 says that the authorities (the government) have been established by God and that the authorities do not "bear the sword for nothing." (Romans 13:4) Paul does NOT explain what he means when he said they do not "bear the sword for nothing."

My view is that it is impossible to demonstrate with certainty that Paul was saying that the authorities have God's approval to impose the Death Penalty merely because Paul said that the authorities did not "bear the sword for nothing."

They do not "bear the sword for nothing" can easily mean ONLY that the authorities have God's approval to punish evil-doers. The text does NOT say what kind of punishment they have God's approval to inflict upon evil-doers. One can speculate about this, but there is NOT a clear and certain word from God on this issue in Romans chapter 13. Its all going to be merely personal speculation and personal opinions.

So if you interpret they do not "bear the sword for nothing" to be a specific reference to applying the Death Penalty you do that without any clear and certain Biblical warrant for that interpretation. Also, to be consistent, you would have to hold that the authorities had to use an actual sword when they applied the Death Penalty. The text says "sword" it does NOT say "lethal injection" or "gas chamber" or "hanging" etc.

So the question is raised. What does Romans 13 say about what killing method the authorities all allowed by God to use when they kill a person convicted of a Capital Crime? My view is that Romans 13 says nothing about the method to be used and therefore says nothing about the Death Penalty.

Old Testament:
(2) I am reasonably certain that no one would appeal to the Old Testament for their authority to hold that God does approve of the Death Penalty for we who are now living under the guidelines and truths of the New Testament. Why not? Because those Old Testament Death Penalty laws obviously do NOT apply to us today.

Here is why they don't apply to us today:

(A) "Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death" Exodus 21:17

(B) If anyone fails to confine a dangerous bull known to gore and the owner has been warned and fails to keep the bull penned up, then the text says that the owner of the bull "must be put to death." (The passage does allow the man to redeem his life with a money payment under certain conditions.) Exodus 21:28-30

(C) "Whoever does any work on the Sabbath Day must be put to death." Exodus 31:12

Summing up.
(1) The New Testament does NOT have a clear and certain verse where God has instituted the Death Penalty for we who live under the guidelines and truths of the New Testament.

(2) If you appeal to the Old Testament, then to be consistent, you would be forced to advocate the Death Penalty for "anyone who curses his father or mother" Exodus 21:17 and whoever "does any work on the Sabbath Day" Exodus 31:12 Advocating this would be totally irrational.

Death by stoning:

Leviticus 24:16 says that anyone who blasphemes the name of God must be put to death and that the entire assembly must stone him to death.

It would be unthinkable for we Christians here in the 22nd century to advocate and support the United States Government taking people who blaspheme God's name to a place where they would then be stoned to death.

____________

To Those Who DO Support The Death Penalty:
I can and do understand and sympathize with your position on the Death Penalty. I fully understand that your intentions are to uphold and defend your conception of justice.

 

I don't believe that the world is better when a government orders the death of an individual. And it certainly doesn't advance it.

I'm certain that many disagree and I respect their opinions. Mine, however, is that no one individual or government should have the legal right to take a life. And that includes criminals who have violated that right.

 

Hello Dayton,

Don't you think that'd be just a tad to harsh? They say that solitary confinement
is psychological, mental, and emotional torture that will eventually drive the victims
insane.

Are you sure you want to hold that position? Holding that seems to be very difficult
to harmonize with the Principle Of Love which is a core principle of the New Testament.

People who have made serious major sinful mistakes (and haven't we all) need our
help. And anyone in prison needs someone to help them come to know the Lord
Jesus as their Savior and they can't come to do that if they are driven insane
or put in permanent solitary confinement.

l Corinthians 13: 7 says [love] "always protects." So we have to help people who
are in prison. There are several Christian Prison Ministries that do successfully
help prison inmates to come to know the Lord Jesus as their Savior. And they
cannot do that if the prison inmates are driven insane with solitary confinement
or shut off permanently from the prison population.

 

Pants, thanks for your comments.

Consider the following:

Start quote.
More than 4 percent of inmates sentenced to death in the United States are probably
innocent, according to a study published Monday that sent shock waves across the
anti-death penalty community.

What the researchers call a “conservative estimate” about the number of wrongfully
convicted death row inmates is more than double the percentage of capital defendants
who were exonerated during more than three decades that were studied. That means
innocent people are languishing behind bars, according to the study.

“The great majority of innocent people who are sentenced to death are never identified
and freed,” said Samuel Gross, lead author of the study and a University of Michigan Law
School professor, in a statement. “The purpose of our study is to account for the innocent
defendants who are not exonerated.”

The four authors reviewed the outcomes of the 7,482 death sentences handed
down from 1973 to 2004. Of that group, 117, or 1.6 percent, were exonerated.
End quote.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/innocent-death-penalty-study_n_5228854

 

WillReadmore,

Thanks for your excellent post up there --- excellent contributory additions to the thread.

In light of what you said, you may find this below to be informative and helpful:

Start quote.
More than 4 percent of inmates sentenced to death in the United States are probably
innocent, according to a study published Monday that sent shock waves across the
anti-death penalty community.

What the researchers call a “conservative estimate” about the number of wrongfully
convicted death row inmates is more than double the percentage of capital defendants
who were exonerated during more than three decades that were studied. That means
innocent people are languishing behind bars, according to the study.

“The great majority of innocent people who are sentenced to death are never identified
and freed,” said Samuel Gross, lead author of the study and a University of Michigan Law
School professor, in a statement. “The purpose of our study is to account for the innocent
defendants who are not exonerated.”

The four authors reviewed the outcomes of the 7,482 death sentences handed
down from 1973 to 2004. Of that group, 117, or 1.6 percent, were exonerated.
End quote.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/innocent-death-penalty-study_n_5228854

 

I've been using the screen name on message boards since 2003, so it predates the FX show.

I chose it because the term appears only once in the KJV, Isaiah 14:12.

It is a classic example of the mistranslations of the Bible, as Lucifer is a Latin Word, and Isaiah was written in Hebrew.

In Latin it means "bringer of light", hence why the planet Venus is the heralder of the sun, but it is that dogmatic association many Christians have with the term that always intrigued me, and hence my choice for a screen name.

And NO, I am not a Christian, but I grew up as one.

I believe any human being should be allowed to determine his or her eventual fate. There is a teleological inconsistency in believing god gives life, but man can take it away in the name of justice on behalf of god. That just doesn't make sense.

 

No. I don't consider it too harsh.

And you can offer inmates a chance to choose to confess and repent before they start serving their life sentence in solitary confinement.

As long as you give them that chance my conscience is clean.

 

Murderers?

Every day that a person lives is another chance to change their ways. We do not need to let murderers out of prison to give them a 2nd or 3rd chance to change and repent. That sounds like giving them a chance at a 2nd and 3rd victim.

I support the death penalty in certain cases. I support it for those cases where it is richly deserved, such as the case mentioned in this thread where the bank robbers executed the bank tellers. By the same token, I don't want to execute an innocent person any more than you do. To that end, I do believe that a death penalty should only be imposed for First Degree Murder and when there is irrefutable physical evidence definitively linking the specific suspect to the crime. The death penalty should not be imposed in cases that depend on circumstantial evidence, eyewitness identification, or even confession. Circumstantial evidence, eyewitness testimony, and confession may be parts of a case against someone, but, to impose the death penalty, there must be that irrefutable physical evidence. Lacking that physical evidence, the penalty should be life in prison.

Furthermore, I am not a fan of parole for murderers. I see it as a slap in the face to the memory of the victim and to the victim's family.

My

 

There are benefits of parole. Almost every single prisoner comes out of prison. But challenge at that point is huge. We want that person to live a different life, to not fall in with others who contributed, to be gainfully employed, etc.

But, prison pushes in the opposite direction - in makes employment harder, it breaks contact with the real world, it makes them more dependent on prior aquintenances, it starts them out nearly penniless and without posessions or a living situation. They are let out where the prison happens to be - which could be remote to anything they know.

I taught math in a state pen for a short time. People there came out with $50 and a light jacket at that time. A common strategy was for them to walk their $50 down to the red light district.

One can claim that's part of the punishment, but the more important point is that we need them to be successful.

Not having the monitoring of parole is just one more decision oriented to something dramatically different than success.

We used to have "half way houses" where prisoners would live in transition with significant monitoring and some of the pressures of the tansition relieved.

My father, a woman whose husband had been murdered and a couple others opened their own halfway house when the government ended that program. The house included city residents as well as excons from the state prison. It had a house manager carefully chosen from that prison. They were amazingly successful in moving prisoners to new and productive lives.

There is a LOT we can do to improve outcomes if we choose to have any interest in that.

 

If killing is wrong, don't do it.

Here in Maine, we don't.

 

Will, I'm not against supervised parole per se for most offenders. What I said was that I was not a fan of paroling murderers. I'm also not a fan of letting predatory child sex abusers out. To my mind, the rights of potential victims outweighs the rights of these kinds of offenders. Society has a right to protect itself from these sorts of offenders.

 

RE: Do You Support Capital Punishment? (Death For Certain Crimes)
⁜→ WillReadmore et al,

BLUF: Yes, I have to agree, the post-Incarceration Phase is a dismal failure; as recidivism patterns statistic show.

(COMMENT)

There have been any number of test programs to improve the outcome and reduce recidivism.

Some incarcerations systems are nothing more than a post-secondary education in criminal activity. Certainly, part of the problem is the impact the incarceration has on the offender while institutionalized.

Part of the problem is the accepted theories we tech Corrections Professionals which have been shown implementation failures. While I know I'm not a Corrections Professional, I don't have to be one to know when the accepted practices are NOT working.

We need an entirely new approach for separating those that can be salvaged and eventually returned to society from those that are are unrecoverable (hardened and unchangeable). We have to find a way of separating those that can be salvaged from the hostile environment of the penal system itself.

But all this costs money. And American society is not willing to make that sacrifice yet. And, most of all, it requires brain-power that is not commonly found in the functional government.


Most Respectfully,
R

 

I get the concern. Having someone come out of prison and then commit another violent crime is serious.

This link incudes a relatively informal study of what has happened over a 20 year period in California:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/once-a-criminal-always-a-criminal/#app

It points out that during that time 988 of those convicted of some level of murder were released after serving time (long time). After their release, they were never again arrested in a murder case. In fact, they were almost never rearrested for anything. And, none spent jail time or were convicted for an act subsequent to their release.

Obviously, we need to be careful with release criteria. There are some folks who really do need to be kept from the public forever. And, there is more than one reason for prison.

But, the murderers who do eventually get freed do not represent any fraction of the threat of murder we all face.
If we want to make people safer from murder, we need to address the large percentage of murders that we never even get to prosecution, let alone conviction, and take other steps oriented to the sources of these crimes.

Conviction and punishment isn't a deterrent if the chances of being convicted are as low as they are in many places and for many crimes today.

 

I fully believe those data.

However, they are an aggregate of all crime, not a study of murder recidivisim.

Plus, they are a measure of our system more than an argument for the number of permanently flawed human beings living here. No other first world nation incarcerates so many as we do.

 

Cops lie, people die.

 

Seth,

You totally misunderstood what I said. I did NOT say we should
"let murderers out of prison." We should not do that. The main
point and main purpose of my Opening Post and follow-up
posts is to help those who are in prison --- NOT to let them out
of prison.

For example I said this up-thread:

JAG Previously Wrote:
l Corinthians 13: 7 says [love] "always protects." So we have to help people who
are in prison. There are several Christian Prison Ministries that do successfully
help prison inmates to come to know the Lord Jesus as their Savior. (They have
to be alive if they are to be helped and given a 2nd and 3rd chance to change
and repent.

So?

■ So keep murderers in prison.

■ Do NOT let them out.

■ Help them while they are in prison.

■ Help them change and repent.

■ Help them to become good people so they can make a positive contribution to
the other prisoners.

■ All this is reasonable.

■ There is nothing crazy or bad about wanting to help fallen human beings and give
them an opportunity to redeem themselves.

Seth,

I can understand your views on that. However there is another way to look
at those truly evil men that went back and killed the bank tellers after they
already had the money. What they did was horrible and 100% evil -- but
humans can change and repent. Why not give them an opportunity to do
that? Life in prison without parole would at least give them an opportunity
to change an repent.

I repeat:
l Corinthians 13: 7 says [love] "always protects." So we have to help people who
are in prison. There are several Christian Prison Ministries that do successfully
help prison inmates to come to know the Lord Jesus as their Savior

I hear you.
Start quote.
1. Cameron Todd Willingham—In 1992, Willingham was convicted of arson murder in
Texas. He was believed to have intentionally set a fire that killed his three kids. In 2004,
he was put to death. Unfortunately, the Texas Forensic Science Commission later
found that the evidence was misinterpreted, and they concluded that none of the
evidence used against Willingham was valid. As it turns out, the fire really was
accidental.

Ruben Cantu—Cantu was 17 at the time the crime he was alleged of committing
took place. Cantu was convicted of capital murder, and in 1993, the Texas teen
was executed. About 12 years after his death, investigations show that Cantu
likely didn’t commit the murder. The lone eyewitness recanted his testimony,
and Cantu’s co-defendant later admitted he allowed his friend to be falsely
accused. He says Cantu wasn’t even there the night of the murder.
https://stories.avvo.com/crime/murder/8-people-who-were-executed-and-later-found-innocent.html
End quote


.

Seth, you make very good points up there. You hold very reasonable views.
And what you say is helpful and contributory and adds to the discussion.
Thanks for taking the time to respond and thanks again for your comments.

 

Lucifer,

Ah that makes good sense. And thanks for answering my question.

Agreed. Lucifer does not refer to Satan.

Just for your information, here is Isaiah 14:12 in the New International Version:
(considered by many to be the best English translation of the Bible.)

"How you have fallen from Heaven,
O morning star, son of the dawn
You have been cast down to the earth
you who once laid low the nations."
Isaiah 14:12

Where there is life there is hope. Maybe you will return to the Christian faith.

We have a moral obligation to help them make the best decision possible with
regard to determining their fate. The Principle Of Love in the New Testament
requires that we do all we can, to help all the people we can, all the time we can.

For example most suicides could have been prevented if there had been caring
people present to offer help to those overcome by problems causing them to conclude
that suicide was their best option. Therefore we have Suicide Prevention Call Centers.

I guess that means you believe that life in prison without parole for certain horrible crimes
is better than the state killing them. If so. agreed.

 

Its reasonable to believe "cops lie, people die" has happened
a significant number of times in the administration of the
American justice system.

The following is also reasonable:

The Principle Of Love in the New Testament requires
that we do all we can, to help all the people we can,
all the time we can.

Love "always protects" 1 Corinthians 13:7

Its always better to light one candle than to just settle in
and allow oneself to become comfortably adjusted to the
bad behavior and evil that haunts humanity.

 

WillReadmore,

"Additionally, 4,751,400 adults in 2013 (1 in 51) were on probation or on
parole.[2] In total, 6,899,000 adults were under correctional supervision
(probation, parole, jail, or prison) in 2013 – about 2.8% of adults
(1 in 35) in the U.S. resident population.[2] In 2014, the total number
of persons in the adult correctional systems had fallen to 6,851,000"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_States