At one time I was in complete agreement death penalty was justified for many murderers,
 rapes by force, and all adult, child raping molesters, as long as they were found guilty beyond any shadow of doubt.  

   After reading of numerous  innocent people incarcerated for years on end, on trumped up charges, some on death row, I've changed my mind.

    Now I  feel  substantiated, thoroughly verified  DNA evidence, or numerous credible, non criminal  witnesses, must be presented, without any shadow of doubt of guilt,  before snuffing out a cold blooded murderer, a  forceful rapist or adult, child rapist molester's  life.
   
      I would like to see laws stipulating any prosecutor/ mayor/LE who knowingly allows an innocent person to go to prison for a crime they did not commit, serve the same amount of time the innocent person was forced to endure.  

  Cases like the one below have caused me to soften my view on the death penalty.  
             How about you?

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/11/21/conviction-reversed-witness-recants/19351961/

http://dailycaller.com/2015/03/20/innocent-man-wrongly-jailed-for-39-years-becomes-clevelands-newest-millionaire-video/

Google, Bing or Baidu  :  innocent man freed thirty nine years  

 

 

 

-- Modified on 4/15/2015 10:41:16 AM

It has nothing to do with sympathy for killers. My ideology is conservative/libertarian and I know the Constitution protects the individual from the state,not the other way around. We have one of the best criminal justice systems in the world but it's impossible to be perfect. Innocent people have been convicted. If they are dead it is too late.

I have always supported the death penalty when the guilt of certain offenders is not in question, and that position of mine has not changed.

I also have objected to the death penalty when it's possible the person "proven" guilty beyond a reasonable doubt could in fact be innocent. That position of mine has not changed either.

I agree about the hypocrisy of the "sanctity of life" crowd.

I don't agree with China on a lot of issues, but they have this death penalty shit down pat. Once guilt is no longer at issue, bang, one right in the head, game set and match.

It's almost like beating your dog two days after he shits in the house, by the time we finally execute the perpetrators of these heinous crmes, he's usually outlived the families of his victim/s

...devout Catholic, he is staunchly pro-life and anti death penalty.  However, I've heard him get carried away by some heinous criminal acts and wish the perpetrator would be eliminated.

Also, O'Reilly doesn't show off that he went for ashes on Ash Wednesday like others I've seen on TV.

Every social policy can cause accidental death.  Raise the speed limit 5 MPH and people will die.  Hell, allow cars and 50,000 per year will die

The number of innocents killed because of the death penalty pale in comparison to the numbers of innocents who die beause repeat murderers are allowed to kill again;.  (I have had 6 of them, 4 of whom killed people in prison, but were innocent in terms of being murdered.)

But the thing that convinced me to most was how I see how totally non-repentant any of the murderers I ever met have been.  The number who feel sorry for having killed someone's son or mother is so low I can't estimate it.  And they will live 50 years at tax payer expense.

I mean this in refernce to both capital and non-capital cases.  Out of over 400 criminal cases that i have had, I think that there were 10 that I had questions about, and 3 that I thought the client was innocent.  (On was a 3-defendant case where they were convicted of murder and i think all three were innocent, but only one was my client.)

95% of cases that are reversed are not reversed because of "innocence."  The fact that the jury got an incorectly worded instruction does not mean the defendant was innocent.  Likewise, the fact that evidence was improperly admitted doesn't equate with innocence.  (In fact, when the subject of a search is incorrectly admitted, it actually proves guilt, but the conviction is reversed for other reasons.)

In CA with the resources given to capital defendants, the odds of an innocent person being executed are too small to calculate.

As bad as drunk drivers are, it is an accident, in the sense they didn't mean to kill and often partly an illness if they are alcoholics.

My clients intend to kill.  They often plan in advance, walk down the street and see someone, and fire 3 bullets.  Or they kidnap someone, hold them hostage, raping her for 2 days before strangling her (one case in particular) to death.

It is no regret, planned, and intended.

FAR FAR worse than drunk driving.  (also there are very few drunk drivers who killed on more than one time.}

I can think of very few cases where there was a question of "planted evidence."  

In 90%, it would be hard to plant evidence.  Shooting on street.  Cops don't have gun because killer took it with him.  Found in his house. Cops never had a chance to get it.

Four wits describe Defendant and the car he was in.  It turns out ot be the car of D's girlfriend, and D's celll phone pinged of the tower 2 blocks from robbery.  

Person's DNA found in Vic's Vagina.  Vic's blood found on D's shoes.;  They can't just drop the DNA.

Trust me. I have handled over 400 cases, including over 150 homicides  The scenario where they could plant evidence is to rare.

Having handled very few cases you shout that cops plant evidence all the time.  

Having read 10,000 and handled hundreds, I can't believe it.

Well, who had more cred?

Exonerations and counting. That is mainly over the last 20 years. Care to extrapolate that number over the last 100 years?

I love how you say something that is opinion and that is it, "Period.

First, I have to say that I lost a sister to a drunk driver in 1971 (SHIT - How did I beome so old)

You don't understand what I was saying.  An accident is when you don't intend the result.  You may do something really stupid.  You may create a substantial risk of injury or death.  But the fact  is that thousands and thousands of people get behind a wheel every night while drunk and out of the thousands and thousands who do it, a handful of people die.  It called negligence, or even "gross negligence," if the risk is very high.  

This is not to minimize the situation, but the risk is one in thousands.  It is an accident.  You did not intend to do that.  You had bad luck.  When I was in college, everybody used to drink too much, and there but for the grace of God (or "god") if you will, would have gone I or my 10 friends.

On the other hand, you see someone wearing a blue shirt and you are a Blood and he shouldn't be wearing it.  You go up to him point a gun at his head and blow his brains out.  

Or you see a girl on the street and kidnap her, sodomize her, and strangle her to death.  You are holding a piece of rope while she chokes and turns blue and the little veins in her eyes burst, and you keep pulling the rope.  

And you think that a drunk drive is worse than those people.  

Period.  End of story.

But you started this by saying those are the people who should be on death row.

Also, and accident "an incidental and unplanned event or circumstance, often with lack of intention."

Drunk driving is not intending to kill. It is an accident.  The wine incident is an accident, but with less serious reprecusions.  Create a Rube Goldbert situation where the spilled wine results in someone's death.  (Woman seeing family heirloom rug runs to get towel, slips, smashes head.)

You may have been really drunk, making the chance of spilling wine greater.  But the death was unintended.

Look at any definition of accident, and you will find a lack of intent.  

Accidents do not deserve death row.  Intentional killings do