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| The executioner |
The jury selection for the Casey Anthony murder trial and my upcoming selection for jury duty in Federal court have me thinking about crime and punishment the past couple of days.
I have been in a few jury pools in my time, but never had to serve yet. My wife was on a jury in a murder trial here in Indy a few years ago. We didn’t talk about the case until it was over, the defendant was found guilty and it was interesting to hear the details of the case.
Watching Court TV during the jury selection of Casey Anthony, the judge and lawyers on both sides of the aisle, are asking many questions of the prospective jurors concerning their personal views on the death penalty due to the fact that this is a capitol case. It always makes me cringe when I see protestors who show up at an execution in support of a murderer who is about to meet the ultimate judge.
I think there can be legitimate feelings by some, that one human being does not posses the right to end the life of another human being. People who object on purely religious grounds can make a good case for opposing such an opinion.
There are others who are of the political left persuasion that feel like everyone behind bars is there for arbitrary reasons. It is the epitome of irony that most of this group cheerfully supports a women’s right to have her unborn baby dismembered and discarded in the cruelest manner imaginable. You can reduce their belief system to this: it is a wonderful victory of feminism to slaughter a human whose only offence is that their existence would be is an inconvenience to another human. Most in this group however take the opposite stance when it comes to the extermination of a human who has committed an act of murder so heinous that a jury of his peers and a judge weighed the facts of the case and determined the murderer’s punishment warrants his or hers extermination.
Arguments against the death penalty range from the reasonable to the ridiculous. When it is argued that it cost too much money, or it takes too long to carry out the death sentence; that’s not a logical reason to do away with it; IT IS a damn good reason to revamp the appeals process in death penalty cases. It should not take 14, 15 years or cost a millions of taxpayer’s dollars to execute someone. That is just an abuse by defense attorneys and groups who wouldn’t want bin Laden to get the ultimate punishment.
As far as people who are death penalty opponents on religious grounds; I would like to know how many would change their opinions if it were their child or grandchild who were the victim. I am not saying it makes them hypocrites, I just think it makes them put themselves in another’s shoes and makes the crime more personal.
Personally I have always believed that is some cases this punishment is just and allowed by scripture. People who know very little about the bible use the commandment “Thou shall not kill” to prove their point of opposing the death penalty. The more precise translation of the original Hebrew is “ Thou shalt do no murder”. Murder and killing are not the same thing.
Although I support the death penalty, I can respect the position taken by religious objectors and I could opt for an alternative that should suit everyone except the murderers themselves.
For first degree murder the alternative to execution should be: life without the possibility of parole. Your life will consist of living 24/7 in a small cell that would be your home till the day you leave this Earth. The state does not owe you entertainment, a gourmet meal, exercise equipment, medical treatment, human contact, or visitation with your love ones (unless you can think of a way that your victim can visit with theirs).
The length of your life would be determined by nature and the choices you have made in your own life.
Don’t expect mercy when you were not willing to show mercy.
There are too many criminals that kill without the fear of paying the cost, because sitting on death row for 15 years does not have the tone of finality. Now if you knew that upon conviction, your life would end in 60 days, you might take the death penalty a little more seriously.
If my alternative were a reality and you knew that the rest of your life would be spent in a tiny dark cell, without the possibility of ever seeing another human being, you may think twice before you committed murder.
No such alternative exists in this country and never will, can you imagine the hue and cry of the left, how it’s just inhuman to do that to someone and it’s cruel and unusual punishment.
Unusual? to be sure, cruel ? if you grade on a curve and use the act of murder as the baseline, then putting a dangerous animal in a cage the rest of its life is the most humane act one could do.
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| The executed |
2 comments:
I remember reading a story years ago about the abuse one little boy had suffered his entire life, which was a mere six years. The story ran through my head for months and months. He finally died one day when his step-father picked him up and threw him across the room, slamming his against the wall. He never moved again.
But the autopsy amazingly showed he did not die from his injuries. He actually died from starvation. They would lock him in the closet for days at a time without food or water.
I distinctly remember when I read that he died, I simply wondered why God waited so long. The poor baby had suffered from so much neglect and abuse that I'm sure the only point he found peace was upon his death.
Not sure what ever happened to his idiot mother or the man who killed him, but no amount of punishment they received was anywhere close to what that little boy faced every day of his sad short life.
I remember that, they would let him out long enough to wash the dishes and that was about it, the reason the scumbag threw him? he caught him trying to eat a scrap of food. no punishment would satisfy justice for this creep. a bullit to the head would be to quick
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