A good friend asked if I could support the death penalty and I am not sure I ever responded. Yes, in many cases I can and would. However, I have also argued against it in many cases in this country due to poor representation and cases where the adversarial, win-lose nature of our "justice" system does not bother trying to find the truth but instead becomes who has better lawyers.
Of course, attendant to that thought comes the heartfelt desire to see every prosecutor who has ever withheld evidence or convicted someone they knew was innocent or any other unethical behavior they so often participate in...I would like to see those prosecutors jailed for double the length of time their victims get. That is just as illegal and possibly more harmful to our society. When the good people of the nation lose faith in the people charged with upholding the law then great harm has been done to all.
However, when there is ANY doubt, any legitimate question...no, you don't do something irreversable. And as Mark Warner and Kenneth Starr have shown, offing Robin Lovitt would be the wrong thing to do. Not because of his protestations of innocence. Not because supporters argue he has changed his life around. Not because they don't want the "milestone" (?) happening in their state.
No, they did the right thing because the legal officials did not do their job properly. Disposing of evidence, using inconclusive evidence, etc... the fact Kenneth Starr was involved sort of argues this was not an incompetent court appointed attorney, and that is a good thing. The fact that some guy will spend the rest of his life incarcerated in the same situation...is that really better?
I am thinking a life in prison is in many ways a fate worth than death. Maybe you remember the guy in The Shawshank Redemption who hangs himself after being released because he is unable to adapt to the outside world. The fact the life within is so difficult...the indignities suffered, the pain, the separation, the hopelessness...
But that comes back to the question of what our justice system is designed to do. Is it an eye for an eye vengeance thing where the perpetrator must suffer a penalty commensurate with the crime committed? Is it simply a removal of danger from the midst of law-abiding people? Is it something to rehabilitate people?
Nobody knows. And not many care. But we should. We should. Because there is a lot at stake. More than someone we may or may not know dying too soon. More than an individual spending time in incarceration. The very morality, purpose, and nature of our society is affected by the decisions we make.
This time, however, I think they got it right.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110AP_1000th_Execution.html
4 years ago
2 comments:
I'm impressed - Warner is usually a partisan shit.
How can anyone say that Kenneth Boyd didn't deserve to die? The guy murdered(sp?) his wife and father-in-law in cold blood and then called the cops to tell them he did it. (Incidentally, with a .357 Magnum at close range it isn't unlikely he could have killed the child who was underneath the woman when he shot her.) The guy obviously has no remorse for his crime, so even if you think that the prison system is supposed to be for rehabilitation, you can't use that as an excuse. Any hack... er I mean psychiatrist will tell you that you can't change someone that doesn't want to change.
Post a Comment