What a disgusting and sad tragedy. Some nutjob apparently has killed several people, including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. [fingers crossed, apparently she’s still alive and the NPR report was wrong]
My immediate impulse is that I want the killer to suffer a similar fate. That’s an emotional reaction, I realize, so here are some quick pro-and-con thoughts.
I am very skeptical about the integrity of prosecutors, particularly those that have political ambitions and think high conviction rates make them look tough on crime (I’d much rather they appeal to people based on their pursuit of justice). So I don’t need to be convinced that it’s possible for innocent people to get convicted because of deliberate evil or run-of-the-mill incompetence by government.
But in situation like this Arizona tragedy, where there is zero ambiguity about the identity of the gunman, I fail to see any reason why capital punishment is not an appropriate penalty. I’ve looked over the academic literature and I think the deterrence argument has some merit, but I also think there’s a pure justice argument for the death penalty.
Addendum: I should add that I hope the gunman was a random idiot without a political agenda like global warming, immigration, or healthcare. It is nauseating when the political types in Washington seek to exploit tragedies.
Another addendum: A couple of friends have said I shouldn’t have posted anything related to the shooting, other than an expression of sadness. Maybe that’s true. I don’t pretend to be overly astute on such matters. Here’s what I sent, as my explanation, in an email after getting chided: “I’m not attacking anybody or making a political point. There have been several spirited debates by commenters about this issue over the past two years, and I got several emails asking about this issue after the news broke. So I did a post describing my own internal thoughts.”
[…] I’m much more uncomfortable about the death penalty. As I explained in my post about the shooting of Congresswoman Giffords, I’ve become more distrustful about the integrity of prosecutors. I think some of these […]
[…] You may have followed on the news that the state of Texas just executed a child rapist/murderer. This caused some consternation on the left, and not just from those who are against the death penalty (which is a very defensible position, as I have acknowledged). […]
In theory, theory and practice are the same. In practice they are not.
In theory, it is ‘easy’ to *know* that someone is guilty, and therefore properly deserving of the death penalty. In practice, the poor bastard may have been railroaded by a slimebag (sorry for the use of the technical legal term) like Mike Nifong, or a monomaniac narcissist like Nancy Lamb (Little Rascals Daycare). Other examples are available: just read some of Radley Balko’s columns.
The REAL problem is that there ARE bad prosecutors out there. And they are never punished for their errors, even when those errors come to light. The innocent may be released 30 years later, but the DA is never punished. In any just society, sending a man to prison for 20 years by concealing exculpatory evidence, or lying about the facts in closing argument, ought to earn the same punishment.
What is needed is the abrogation of the (judge-made) policy of immunity.
I disagree on the death penalty. Ben Franklin said, “it is better [one hundred] guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer.” I would extend that; “It is better 1,000 deserving death be commuted to life in prison than one innocent be killed.”
And do you think the government, when dolling out death, will not make a 1-in-1,000 mistake? Just read some your own articles on government incompetence and it should be very clear that they really have no business in making irreversible decisions.
Quote source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackstone's_formulation
Well yeah. Killing the mentally ill when they murder is entirely appropriate. Mens rea not withstanding.
I could care less about the fate of real murderers once they’re sentenced. But I do care quite strongly about the ‘zero ambiguity’ part. Errors, lies, mistaken witnesses etc can all play their part in identifying a killer beyond all doubt. And how do we the public know there was no doubt? Because some guy on TV said so? Sorry, but even in my most eye-for-eye moments (and I have them) I can’t support a state-sanctioned death penalty. Even a prisoner released after 30 years of prison after exoneration on new evidence makes me a little queasy.
Don’t listen to the whiners Dan. You should express your opinion about this as with anything else. Of course everyone is sorry to hear about it, sympathies to their families, yadda, yadda, yadda. But you could say the same about the victim in almost every news story – what’s so special about this one? Something of this nature could happen to any of us, anytime, and regular people die everyday. We’re not a bunch of kids. We can talk about the politics of transfat bans, but people dying is off the table sometimes? Pfft!
If anything we probably should be talking about this right now lest the same bleeding-hearts giving the blubbering speeches use it as an excuse to walk all over everyone’s rights. They can whine that it’s being politicised all they want, but you and I know precisely what every latte-sipping anti-gun douche and anti-liberty idiot on the planet is doing right now. Why should a Libertarian of all people shut up?
And at the very least everyone should be consistent. Where’s the same concern over the guy shot in the recent SWAT raid? … oh I’m sorry, is it “too soon” to talk about that?
And that’s a very relevant example, because it illustrates the absurdity of one comment I read condemning violence as being “[any part of] a peaceful society” in relation to Tucson. This guy is allegedly a mentally unstable random nutball, what was the excuse of the cop and the people making these violently-enforced drug laws again?
Like Obama, Giffords is pro choice (which means she thinks its ok for millions of babies to be slaughtered before they are born). She is also pro illegal alien (which means she thinks taxpayers should pay for medical and educational expenses of illegal aliens who are not supposed to be here), and should continue to victimize Americans daily by allowing them to stay here.
I think the most practical way to allow for the death penalty to be used only in cases in which there is no doubt, reasonable or otherwise, as to guilt is the following procedure:
The oath below has to be taken by:
* every attorney arguing for the prosecution
* every individual who testifies for the prosecution
* every member of the jury
* the judge hearing the case
“I recognize that this is a case that could result in the defendant being executed. If the defendant is found guilty, subsequently executed, and later exonerated, I forfeit any and all right to life that I may have.”
If any of the parties above refuses to take that oath (or make that affirmation, if they happen to be Quaker…), then the death penalty cannot be given.
If after taking that oath and sending an innocent person to his death, any of the individuals who took that oath would now be outside of the law. It would be an affirmative defense to any civil or criminal charge of murder or manslaughter or malpractice that the individual had voluntarily given up their right to life.
Sorry to hear of this tragedy but I will bet that the killer is a LEFTY LUNATIC.
Like every other wingnut killer, the gunman is almost certainly leftist, progressive, marxist, socialist, communist, etc. Rabid foaming at the mouth types fed all day long on lies by Media Matters and the Huff Po, angry at the world and ready to kill.
http://www.smashabanana.blogspot.com
Dan, my fear is that if this lunatic does have a political agenda, it will be hushed up if it’s pro Left wing, and shouted from the rooftops if it’s pro Right wing.
And of course, the anti-gun lobby will more than likely have a heyday over this, because a Congresswoman was shot.