http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070611/ap_on_...alty_deterrence

Several studies over the past decade claim that the Death Penalty does deter criminals from committing murder.
I support the death penalty for the worst of the worst murderers but I don't think that the death penalty would deter the most wicked men from becoming serial killers. One example is Ted Bundy who eventually got executed. In Bundy's case, he killed over 30 women over a 10 year period before getting arrested for kidnapping in Utah. In Jeffrey Dahmer's case, he cannibalized over 10 boys and it took the police 2 visits to his apartment before they suspected anything was wrong. If we really want to deter evil people from committing murder, then we have to catch those monsters sooner.

Now, some people may say that most murderers are simply common criminals who fired a gun in anger. But the Death Penalty laws are written for the worst murderers like child rapists and terrorists.

So, the question for debate is
Does the Death penalty deter people from committing murder?

Unfortunately, the article talks about several studies, but doesn't reference them, and cites their conclusions without providing any information on the study methodology. So, there isn't much to debate. Personally, on a macro scale I can see where you'd think death penalties would have an impact on reducing crime (higher deterrent), but it seems on a micro scale there's no impact .. those people that commit death penalty crimes don't seem to consider getting caught at all, much less the potential punishment, when they commit the crimes. The difference may be that such information is gathered from interviews of people that did the crime and got caught -- you never see stories from people who decided not to commit a crime because of the increased punishment.

I would like to see the journals it is published in before making an educated and wise responses

Of course. People whom receive the death penalty are permanently deterred.

For those that are considering murder, I doubt it has a significant impact. Rationally, the criminal must already know that getting caught means the end of their life, whether thats a sentence behind bars or the death penalty. While fear of death is indeed a powerful motivator; if you think about it, dying just doesn't add that much extra punishment onto a life sentence.

I don't think that any sentencing policy has a deterrant effect prior to the commission of a crime. the very idea that it could have is a kind of fallacy - let me explain.

I have always thought that criminals fall into two categories. The first category are those who commit a crime (especially a crime of violence, including murder) in the heat of some type of moment - anger, fear, frustration, the influence of drink or drugs, etc.

They are really thinking about what they are doing at all before they do it, and if they did, they probably would stop short. Therefore, any kind of rational analysis of what might happen to them afterwards is nowhere near their decision making process, because no such process consciously exists.

In such circumstances of an "impulse" crime, there is no possibility of ANY deterrant to the comission of the crime, though often such criminals calm down enough afterwards to attempt to evade detection (hiding or removing evidence, intimidating witnesses, etc.)

The other sort of criminal is one that does pre-plan their crime, and have the time to consider possible consequences - any deterrant effect can only take place in such circumstances, I would argue.

In weighing up the pros and cons, I would think that the most important deterrant to the commission of a serious crime is not the possible sentence, but the likelihood of detection. It then escalates from there, with the possible sentence being the last thing you'd consider.

This is especially ture of so-called "professional" criminals in "serious" crimes - for a minor theft, they might view jail time as an occupational hazard, and consider it worth the risk even if they are caught stealing to do a couple of years. If they are planning to kill someone, they will know that they could be killed themselves or spend decades in jail, and I don't think any criminal will think of decades in jail as an easy option. (Unless of course they just don't care what happens to them, in which case the deterrant effect is again lost.)

Being caught is much more of a deterrant to murder than being sentenced to death if you're caught AND tried AND found guilty AND your appeals are all rejected.

If you think you have done enough to avoid being questioned in the first place, you don't have to think about what might happen if you are arrested. If you think you have done enough to avoid being arrested (e.g. given a plausible enough alibi) you won't worry about what might happen if you're prosecuted. If you think you have done, or can do, enough to bargain your plea down to a lesser offence or sentence, you don't worry about what will happen IF you get convicted by a jury.

In short, people only commit crimes if they think they can get away with them, or if they don't think about them at all. In neither case does the possible sentence deter anyone. Now, in reality, the distribution of IQs among criminals is about the same as the general population, if even a little lower, so most murderers do get caught. Even very smart criminals have the disadvantage that there's only one of them and many more people in law enforcement. (The very smartest criminals are never caught or even detected.)

But where does the fallacy kick in? Well, for law abiding citizens, the death penalty (and prison itself) is a deterrant. We might sometimes get angry enough to want to kill someone, but instantly dismiss the notion. I don't believe we do that because of the possible consequences, we do it because it's just plain wrong.

In the worldview of a law-abiding person, the penalty (be it death or "life") may be a deterrant, because it is an outcome that the law-abiding rationale not only foresees but expects.

My argument is that, in the worldview of a criminal, the whole justice system is either something that is ignored completely - because the criminal is behaving irrationally anyway - or something that can be mitigated or avoided altogether - in which case it doesn't much matter what happens IF it isn't.

Any other explanation seems to view every single human being as a would-be criminal who only refrains from murder and all manner of other crimes from fear of what might happen if he did got caught for it, and I refuse to believe that we are all so venal. (The thought experiment of "if you were completely alone in a God-proof room, with someone you hate, and knew you could get away scot free if you killed them, would you do it?" springs to mind.)

The death penalty is no deterrant even o those on death row - they simply don't have the opportunities to kill someone that the general prison population does, let alone people on the outside. It's not deterrance, it's physical prevention, and the ultimate physical prevention is death.

The other reasons usually given for any kind of sentence are as an example to others (which is effectively the same as the deterrant argument I believe is so flawed), rehabilitation (clearly, for the death penalty, this does not apply, barring reincarnation ), and punishment. I don't believe the dead can suffer, and nobody knows that they do, so this is a weak basis for a system of justice.

Which only leaves revenge, which I believe is the only real reason the death penalty exists.

In a small number of cases, I would support the death penalty, if only I could be sure that no wrongly-convicted men and women would ever be executed. Since I know from the number of posthumous pardons this is not the case(the UK, when it had the death penalty, didn't have the ponderous multiple appeals system you have in the USA, and even with that you get it wrong sometimes), I cannot and will not support the death penalty.

So, the question for debate is
Does the Death penalty deter people from committing murder?

No, I personally do not believe that the death penalty deters murder. It does not seem to have put a dent in the state I live in, VA, and Texas, which lately seems to be the most publicized death penalty state appears to be doing a thriving business utilizing the death penalty.

I'm gonna say, Yes. The Death Penalty does deter people from committing murder. Some people. Not all.

I'm an advocate of the Death Penalty but I am opposed to it as it exists in today's society. I don't think we do it right. I think it ought to be swift. It ought to be severe and it ought to be public.

Don't get me wrong. I think there's such a thing as "justifiable homicide". There are two-legged wolves amongst US and it is our duty to arm ourselves and defend each other against 'em. If it happens that a citizen puts an end to one of 'em, Good for Ya! We ought to give him/her a medal.

But if some yeahwho drugs up little girls and rapes 'em in his basement, we ought to drag him out into the street and shoot him in the head. Tonight. No Appeals. No Plea Bargins. No Insanity Defense. No if's, and's or but's about it. "You're a Scumbag. You're Gone."

Same for repeat offenders. If you're a thief and you've been to jail two or three times and you can't/won't be rehabilitated. I'm for giving you a long drop on a short rope. Saturday at High Noon in the County Square.

If justice were more swift, more severe and more public, we'd have less trouble in society. IMHO.

No, of course the death penalty does not act as a deterrent; people do not commit crimes with the intention of getting caught. Crimes of passion of happenstance are performed just because of that, and the punishment is irrelevant, and crimes of forethought are done without the intent of getting caught.

The idea that a criminal would think to themselves: "See yesterday I would spent 25 years in prison subject to the rigours and horors of prison life while my entire youth vanishes, and THAT would be fine, but now I stand to be executed? Well then consider me deterred!" is just silly.


Those are logical arguments. Add to that that several states have had then abolished then had the death penalty, and there is no causal relationship to the increase or decrease of death-penalty crimes. Nobody has ever been able to show that crimes has dropped due to the presence of the death penalty: an obvious correlary if execution actually did act as a deterrent.

Indeed, 10 of the 12 states without capital punishment have homicide rates below the national average, Federal Bureau of Investigation data shows, while half the states with the death penalty have homicide rates above the national average. In a state-by- state analysis, The Times found that during the last 20 years, the homicide rate in states with the death penalty has been 48 percent to 101 percent higher than in states without the death penalty.

The study by The Times also found that homicide rates had risen and fallen along roughly symmetrical paths in the states with and without the death penalty, suggesting to many experts that the threat of the death penalty rarely deters criminals.
http://www.truthinjustice.org/922death.htm (New York Times article)

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.ph...=12&did=168

That of course, is dealing with the Death penalty in principle. In PRACTICE it is far worse. The main thing you need to be guilty of in the US to be sentenced to death is being guilty of being black: study after study has shown that black defendents are sentenced to death far more frequently than white defendents convicted of the same crime.

While white victims account for approximately one-half of all murder victims, 80% of all Capital cases involve white victims. Furthermore, as of October 2002, 12 people have been executed where the defendant was white and the murder victim black, compared with 178 black defendants executed for murders with white victims. (...) In the fall of 2000, The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) released the results of an initial survey of federal death penalty prosecutions. The report shows that the federal death penalty, like its application in the states, is used disproportionately against people of color. Of the 18 prisoners currently on federal death row, 16 are either African-American, Hispanic or Asian. From 1995-2000, 80% of all the federal capital cases recommended by U.S. Attorneys to the Attorney General seeking the death penalty involved people of color. Even after review by the Attorney General, 72% of the cases approved for death penalty prosecution involved minority defendants.
http://www.aclu.org/capital/unequal/10389pub20030226.html

So why is this relevant considering the thread is about dterrent value of executions? Firstly, white criminals know that the chances of facing the death penalty in practice are in fact extremely small. Secondly, even if a deterrence vale COULD be proven in theory, that does not trump the unequal manner in which the death penalty is applied in practice.


That's not even without going into all the other arguments (DNA exonerations of death row inmates, moral implications, etc) that would draw the debate off topic. As it stands there is no evidence that there is any significant deterrent value of the death penalty, and thats not just in the US. many nations (canada, UK, France) have abolished the death penalty in the last 30 years, and death-penalty advocated carefully watched crime rates looking for a spike, but there was none.

Hard to say – the Governor of NY sure thinks so but the incentives and deterrents for crime are complex. IMO it may effect the “gang violence” killings far more than crimes of passion.
I would not favor the death penalty if it was clear that any crime that would have merited this severe sentence was given life without parole – this is not the case and therefore I favor the death penalty – knowing that few people sentenced to it are ever executed anyway.

“For more than two decades, New York was without the death penalty. During this time, fear of crime was compounded by the fact that, too often, it largely went unpunished.
No more. In New York, the death penalty has turned the tables on fear and put it back where it belongs-in the hearts of criminals. Within just one year, the death penalty helped produce a dramatic drop in violent crime. Just as important, it has restored New Yorkers' confidence in the justice system because they know their government genuinely is committed to their safety.”
http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/Articles/Pataki.htm


http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/DP.html

not according to the folks at the "death penalty information center" (admittedly an anti-capital punishment org). according to these guys, the states WITH the death penalty have consistently shown higher rates of murder than those states which have eschewed capital punishment as a "deterrent"

regards,


Swing

Flaw in this logic is that theses states institute the death penalty because of the high murder rate with the hope it will reduce it.

So you must look and see if that happened in those states.

Well it certainly deters the people already executed.

Snark aside, who cares if the Death Penalty deters anyone from anything? I mean, putting criminals in jail hardly deters them from committing crime!

It's the Death Penalty not the Murder Deterrent. It's a penalty. As in the penalty for being a murderous person is the loss of your life.

Julian- I think your argument that it is revenge s absoluely true- but what is wrong with revenge for the ultimate crime? Why should the criminal get to live and the victim die?

IF the verdict is infallible- then, by all means, kill them, why bother keeping them alive? Thier right to breath and cry have been revoked by thier actions.

I am, in philosophy, okay with the life for a life- what is the problem for me is this:

1) IT is only the poor that get the death penalty-
2) It IS fallible- and if the goverment can't be trusted to send me the correct income tax forms, why is it now competant to decide innocence or guilt?
3) Corruption- just look at the Duke Lacrosse case to see how a system can ruin someone that is totally free of any guilt.


I am, in fact, for EXPANDING the death penalty for:

1) Any crime involving theft/fraud of over 100k dollars- and the penalty for hidiing/destroying documents to prevent conviction of fraud/theft- should be the death penalty- there is an area that would deter crime- these aren't commited in "the heat of the moment" but thought and executed- so to speak - we should kill the ken lay's in the US.

2) Third felony- violent or otherwise.

3) Anybody convicted of pedophillia- this is the easiest one to prove, easiest one to define, and a clear, permanent, threat to society.

Death for any of these is a harsh punishment. None of these even fit your "eye for an eye" criteria, though harsher penalties might be justified.

I agree with Julian that increasing the odds of getting caught would do more to curtail murder rather than a death penalty.

I think death is not harsh enough for those listed- ESPECIALLY for the corporate fraud folks- the payoff is just too big for bad behavior. I would advocate torture in these cases, seriously. To lose everything you have worked for in 30 years to someone like Ken Lay, to have him walk free during his trial, is a travesty of justice. Caning, waterboarding, castration should be the slow start for Ken Lay, and then REALLY get mad at him and get the ball rolling, so to speak.

Same with pedophiles- though for them, I advocate human medical experiment testing- real science though, such as brain mapping etc- to see if there can be a cure for this in the future.

3 time felons- they are simply a waste of oxygen, and should just be put to death quickly.

3 time felons and pedophiles, you can get the wrongful conviction rate to 20 decimal places from Zero. I don't even think there is a wrongful conviction in the US in those cases. The criminals make it too easy for us.

In the cases of fraud- once again- a few million dollars missing means wrongful convictions approach 0 to 20 decimal places or so

Besides, for the money a CFO or CEO earns- there SHOULD be some risk.

I agree with the death penalty for 1st Degree Murders and child rapist but you want to put people to death for crimes involving money. That is just wrong.

Also I agree with BA on the idea that the death penalty is not there for a deterrent. It is there as a penalty, hence the name.

Anyone who makes the argument you should not have the death penalty because the idea of worse punishment will not prohibit the crime is living in an ivory tower fantasy land. If that logic is true, then why have any punishment at all, because it's obvious they would commit crimes anyway.

Well, while having Ken Lay walk free during (and after for sevral months) his trial was a travesty of justice, that had nothing to do with the death penalty or lack thereof, it was simply America's tendency to show enormous leniency to rich defendents in any case. Advocating he be executed for raud is simply wrong, there is no basis for this.

As for the death penalty for pedophilia or other victim crimes, I explained at length why the death penalty does not exist for non-murder personal crimes anywhere in the first world: because you significantly lower the chances of survival of the victim. If child rape carries the death penalty, why not execute the child after you are done? reduce the number of witnesses and no further harm involved...

Death penalty for three-time felons is equally absurd, you want to execute a ked who stole three cars? How is that anything resembling justice?




Based on what do you assert that? How on earth can you claim that pedophiles and felons have a zero (or near zero) false conviction rate? Same with Fraud?

Would you wish that THIS pedophile had been put to death?
http://wrongfulconvictions.blogspot.com/20...conviction.html

Or this one?
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/15/...in2809576.shtml


---------------------------------------



Which would be 100% true, if anyone were arguing that penalties have no effect on crimes. Since absolutely nobody IS arguing that, then it becomes 100% false.

The issue is whether the death penalty serves as an additional deterrent over the sentence of life imprisonment. The issue is weither ratcheting up punishment to death penalty has any effect on spontanious crimes or crims of passion.

Why did the murder rate in Canada DROP when the death penalty was abolished? Same with the UK and Australia? Why can nobody point to a surge in murders in the many US states which dropped the Death penalty, as soon as it happened?


Look, reality check: if the Death panalty acted as a proper, actual, realistic deterrent to murderers, they would be cut and dry data to back it up. We would be able to look at charts of murder rates and see the drop or rise when the death penalty was adopted or abolished: yet we can't. How can those who still advocate the deterrence value thus make that argument?

Vermillion- that is why I added the caveat of CLEARLY defining what a pedophile is- a sexual offfender is not neccesarily a pedophile- pedophile can be defined legally and medically much more clearly without too much guess work- a real pedophile, the kind that doesn't have sexual urges towards anyone but children, has tons of child porn stuffed everywhere, and actively grooms children is much different than the "sexual offender of opportunity"- i.e.- gets drunk and rapes someone, whoever is closest by- a scumbag to be sure, but easily define-able from the pedophile. opportunistic sexual offenders CAN be rehabilitated- often by just getting off the drugs and alcohol.

A pedophile can't be cured- major difference- while he/she lives and breaths- they are a threat to society- and there is the chance they can get out of jail again, at any age- society is much better served by killing pedophiles to take away ANY possibility of re-offending, while a murderer may be a once in a lifetime thing.

All that being said- I am all for revenge and a loss of life for the murderer- including drunk drivers that kill.

I don't give a rat's fanny about rehabilitation or any of that crap for those that take a life for any reason other than IMMINENT self defense. I don't want to see the "he/she abused me for years so I killed him/her in thier sleep" types get off either- you had the opportunity to leave- you didn't, so you die too. No big deal, the planet is better off without them.

Just because the "first world" thinks the same way as you DOES NOT make it right or good either- I love Europe, Canada, etc, and agree with a great deal of thier philosophies- I find this one very wrong though, and the "chop thier head off" crowd a much better ideal than the western idea of rehabilitation.

I think it a fundamental flaw in law for the western world- same as the idea of "diminished capacity" as a defense- utterly wrong thing to do.

Sentences for doing things "under the influence" or "while mentally ill" should be MORE harsh- not less.

Like I said- you are probably right, that in murder crimes, I doubt very, very seriously if the death penalty has ANY deterent at all- it seems counter-intuitive-

however- what is so wrong with taking the life of a killer? Really? Why SHOULD the murderer have the opportunity to breath again when the victim's opportunities be removed forever?

In the crime of money, however- I see this as a MAJOR deterent- because they are ALL cerebral crimes- you have to plan out a fraud very carefully, do a cost-benefit analysis, when your life enters into the spreadsheet, I have no doubt that there is little benefit to the crime!

I really don't care if the death penalty is a deterrent or not, heinous crimes need to be punished with harsh penalties. Although I was wondering, can you prove to us that the death penalty has not deterred a single crime?

As someone who has a relatively nice tax sheltered annuity, I detest the people who take money from the elderly and leave them holding the bag. Yet I don’t think this merits the death penalty.

Many years ago, when I was growing up in a church oriented, “Bible Belt” environment, I came to know a man named Gerry Craft. He was a student at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and youth minister at the largest Baptist church in Fort Worth. In about 1963, Bill Glass – a former Baylor and Cleveland Browns – football player, got Craft a tryout with the Browns. A week later Craft was back in Fort Worth, having been cut by the Browns. His excuse or explanation was that Blanton Collier, or one of his assistants, told him “he had the ability to play professional football, but that they had to go with their guys hat were ready.” It was early in preseason. Craft claimed he had a pulled hamstring, but if he indeed had any ability to play football, I think the Browns would have kept him a little longer.

That however is not the end of the story. Craft had plans to open a religiously oriented “youth ranch." He had a fundraising event at will Rogers Memorial Auditorium and Roy Rogers and Dale Evans actually attended the meeting. The ranch never materialized and I have no idea what happened to the money raised. Although Craft didn’t get caught until the early years of the 21st century, he had always been a crook. When the Fort Worth Star Telegram ran the story on the fundraiser, we learned that Craft claimed to be former professional football ****star**** with the Cleveland Browns – despite the fact that he never played a single down.

Even as a twenty-two year old stallion, I loved to ambush people - an early example of BoFishness. I went over to Craft’s headquarters and asked him about the professional football claim. His answer was “Why is that important?” I didn’t answer, even then he was too far gone to understand or even care. It’s honesty you dope.

The following is from Find Law. It’s Craft and his henchmen’s appeal. I don’t know where the Dr. before Craft's name came from. He may have an honorary doctor’s degree, but I doubt he earned it.

.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getc...e&no=036187

Note: This link is a bit quirky. Once you open it puts a cookie on the machine that prevents opening a second time. The work-around is clearing cookies.

Here’s the conclusion:



http://www.bop.gov/iloc2/InmateFinderServl...p;x=29&y=16

I have always been fascinated by this case and not just because I knew Craft. When this story first broke in the Daily Oklahoman, one victim, who lost $200,000 from his retirement account, believed Craft because he "prayed" and "read the Bible" at his meetings. Craft billed himself as a "Christian" businessman" with special knowledge of overseas investments. His spiel was that he could get someone a 30% return on an investment within month. That's 360% in a year, If it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn' true. Victim greed propagated and enabled criminal fraud and embezzlement. Ah, a perfect storm, as they say.

There is no parole in federal cases. With good time, Craft will be released in February, 2016 (assuming he’s still alive). He’ll be about 80, a convicted felon and possibly broke (if he doesn't have something stashed away) when he gets out.

That’s enough punishment to satisfy me. He deserves every day of it, but not death.

I hear you- as my grandpa said "you can't con an honest man"- but that was those times, this is now- with Enron, they were convinced that thier company was doing well, and it showed loyalty to the company etc etc- but the depth and breadth and amount of unwitting victims is too large- in Ken Lay's case, or Michael Milken- there are hundreds of thousands of victims- and the person that did it should have faced the ultimate penalty- 100 thousand deaths!

In this area- I am more than conservative, I understand this- English common law, which US law is based on, has some fundamental flaws that we have continued forward- one of them being "not guilty by reason of insanity"- which is part of the very flawed "I am a victim, really" defense and the idea of "rehabilitation"-

all of Europe may be going to death penalty free zones- but this still doesn't make it correct or more civilized-

once again- why SHOULD ANY country allow someone to live that has killed others, outside of eminent self defense? It boggles the mind that a murderer should have a "second chance" at life when they have removed all chances from the victim.

Of course not, apart from being impossible to prove a negative (as you well know) it is impossible to prove a causality of absence, which I assume you know just as well. So what was the point of your post, really?




Well I'm not sure that a pedophile 'cannot be cured'. I'm not disagreeing, I just don't know, I've seen arguments both ways. I certainly know a pedophile can be taught to not act on his desires... Free will and all that.

But even so, what exactly are we talking about here? Executing child rapists and murderers? How is that worse than locking them away forever? I just don't see the pressing need to kill.

(By the way, I have always been puzzled by this passionate hatred of child sex attackers. Don't get me wrong, its a heinous crime and worthy of serious punishment, I have just never understood how sexually assaulting a 13 year old girl should be punished SO much worse than sexually assaulting an 19 year old girl. Once people cross the magic age of 18, does sexual assault of them suddenly become less serious somehow? - total aside, I know...)



Well, perhaps you should. nations with rehabilative justice systems, like most of Scandinavia, France, Japan, etc routinely have FAR lower recidivism rates than nations with punitary justice systems, like the US: for all levels of crime. It's not some lily-livered leftist thing, its simple statistics.




Why? Why is taking the life of felons (guilty of a wide range of crimes in your proposal) somehow 'better'? How does that help anyone or improve anything? How on earth is state sanctioned killing a 'better ideal'? Given that you have accepted the lack of deterrent value, then what exactly is gained by getting the state into the business of ending lives, especially if it ends the occasional innocent life along the way? Doesn't that make the state guilty of murder?




Again, you are attacking a huge area of the legal system here. There is nothing wrong with the diminished capacity defence in principle, it exists for a very good reason. However there is no question that the USE of this defence has been overtaxed, and one might even say abused in some cases. No argument there. But that does not invalidate the sound reasoning behind why every first world nation on earth has a 'diminished capacity' exemption for certain criminal behaviour.

As for 'under the influence' 9I assume you mean drugs or alcohol) that isn't an acceptable defence.


As for executions for financial crimes, there have traditionally been no executions for crimes which do not directly affect the body of the individual, nor the body of the state, that has ben an absolute for centuries since the rule of law took over the first world. If you want to execute people for crimes of finance, even high finance, then you become China: killing smugglers, embezzlers, frauds and corrupted with a bullet to the back of the head. And what does that get you? After the body hits the ground spurting blood from the .38 caliber hole in the base of the neck, how is society 'better' for this bloodletting? How have you helped anyone? You have taken a life for a crime in which nobody was physically injured. If it were an individual acting instead of the state, that would be first degree murder.


Don't get me wrong CR, you make some good points and I agree there needs to be a review of the way high-finance white collar crime is judged. When a poor black man routinely draws a FAR larger sentence for stealing a car than a rich white man does for stealing several hundred million dollars, there is a gargantual flaw in the system. I'm just not seeing how executions solves that problem.

Does the Death penalty deter people from committing murder?

I would say yes, it does. To what degree could be argued. Look at it this way, many people don't steal because of the fear of getting caught. Some of us are very careful about speeding or disobeying traffic laws because we do not want the consequences that will occur if we get caught. I'm quite sure there are men and women who would kill their exes if there was no prison time (or possilble death penalty) involved.

Of course, there are exceptions to the rule. Some people lose their sanity and do the unthinkable and some are so psychotic that no law will hinder their potential actions. Unfortunately those are the sickest, usually.

Simply put, the death penalty does deter some. There is no way gauge to measure a negative. We cannot count all the people who opted not to murder.

(I edited your post to add numbers so I can answer them in a bit less confused manner.)

1) I think you are confusing statuatory rape wth pedophilia here- a pedophile is going after non-sexually mature children- not hitting on young sexually active girls that are easy targets- once again, a scumbag, but a different animal than the pedophile- a real pedophile, the incurable type, are going after very young children, NOT tweeners or teeners- typically anywhere from 2 years to 10 years old. They are baby-rapers. This is permanent trauma to the kid, and they are more likely to have sexual dysfunction themselves. Killing pedophiles reduces the number of pedophiles in the world- a very, very good thing. Anything short of a death sentence gives a chance that they will be let out of prison by snafu or legal loophole- I don't want to see them ever have that chance. The chance to re-offend or be let out of jail on a technicality is 0 when they are dead.

2)Do they really Vermillion? Or do they play with the numbers a bit like they do here in America? For instance- do they simply deport or move around criminals, then, since they are not in the country- do they simply fall out of the stats?

and once again- as far as murderers go- why SHOULD they be allowed t breath and go free again? why SHOULD they give a second chance when thier victim has no such choice? The very fact that they have an opportunity to start over is an injustice.

Now- the ONLY reason I am against the death penalty in PRACTISE- is the killing of innocent poeple- that is where philosophy and reality collide. It is obvious that the American justice system is broken, and innocent men get convicted of crimes they did not commit- so in that area- I am in complete agreement- it is when guilt is NOT in doubt- that I am okay with it- the Jeffery Dahmer scenario- there is no doubt whatsoever he did it.

3) Diminished capacity is a fundamental flaw of the western judicial system that has been retained for centuries "He/she didn't know what she was doing was wrong"- um, so what? That should only be in the case of true accidental death- like a child playing with a gun.

Drunk and stupid IS a defense Vermillion- they call it "second degree murder" or "negligent homicide"- and there should not really be any distinction between the fact that someone got killed outside an accident or eminent self defense.

IT is something we have carried forward from English common law and European law that should have been dropped a couple centuries ago.

Incompetant to stand trial and culpability issues should not even be allowed into our system- it is how lots and lots of very bad poeple get to offend and re-offend several times- but are NEVER counted in stats of "recidivism"- because they never were convicted- I personally know of at least 10 poeple, right here in Anchorage, that have killed more than 2 poeple each, that have never had a conviction- due to "incompetant to stand trial"- same with probably 100 or so pedophiles- never had a single conviction- not on a sex offender list, and no probabtion that makes them accountable for taking meds and what not-

it is a giant hole in the entire western jurisprudence- one created a few centuries ago by the (flawed) idea of "diminished capacity"-

4) ya, under the influence changes it from 1rst degree murder to second degree murder quite often.

5) I am totally with China on this one- and this is the area I believe it WOULD be a deterent- because of the nature of the crime- it is ALWAYS pre-meditated- so therefore- the cost/benefit analysis should include "I may die from this, and most likely will"

Funny you say that, being that technically, in our legal system, nobody should get convicted PERIOD unless there is no doubt whatsover he did it. If there is any reasonable doubt at all, the verdict should be "not guilty. Yet innocent people get convicted all the time. So you suggest that changing the legal standard for death to "really really no doubt with sugar on top" will somehow fix that problem? How would you go about doing that CR? The bottom line is there is NO WAY to accept the death penalty without accepting the risk that someone innocent will be murdered by the state somewhere along the line. I don't know about anyone else, but if I had to live in your Draconian utopia, I would move. Quick.

Quite right, Looms, and I agree with your conclusion, though I don't know that I agree with your implication (or my inference?) that the justice system is inherently flawed in a malicious way i.e. that people sometimes get convicted when there is reasonable doubt. Many, if not most, of the people previously convicted who are now being exonerated are released on DNA evidence, a technology that, while conceivably, was not a reasonable expectation 15 or 20 years ago.

But even DNA isn't foolproof - standards of evidence handling have to be scrupulous in the extreme to avoid contamination, for example. Human errors are still possible, and it is for the defence to demonstrate them at trial.

This will also be true of The Next Big Thing in "criminalistics" - be that the use of quantum spin detectors, midiclorians to detect disturbances in The Force, time travel to go back and witness or prevent the crime itself, etc. Just as DNA has improved the reliability of current convictions while at the same time exposing previously safe ones as unsafe, so will quantum physics/Jedi powers/Tardises/the generic Next Big Thing.

Also, of course, the defence case itself may be conducted incompetently - not challenging the State's case or presenting the defence case well enough.

In other words, a jury might convict someone in good faith, only for evidence to come to light later which exonerates the convict. That's why the appeals system exists, and it's why the "fry them on the way out of the courtroom" argument espoused by some here is deeply flawed. (Not to mention the "fry them" argument at issue here.)

A justice system which, in its totality, was 100% certain of detecting, prosecuting and trying all crime in a correct and timely manner might just be one in which the nature of the sentences passed could possibly act as a deterrent, and where an argument for the death penalty could sensible exist. But we haven't got one of those yet, so it's probably as well to keep even the nastiest people in prison until such time as they die naturally, or are shown to have been innocent and to have been wrongly (or even maliciously - framings by real perpetrators, and police fit-ups, still happen from time to time) convicted.