Posted on 12/13/2004 5:04:17 PM PST by BJungNan
What will death row be like for Peterson?
A considerable amount of mail flows into my cell from people out there in the world asking what it's really like living day-to-day on San Quentin's Death Row. I'm always tempted to quip, its's a hell f a lot better than dying here. But then I really don't know if that's true -- yet.
I answer every letter even if the writer is rapidly pro-death penalty. It's easy for me to understand their attraction to the concept of killing convicted murderers. In the abstract, the death penalty has an elegant Newtonian -- for every action there is an opposite reaction -- symmetry that easy harmonizes with the Old Testament -- eye for an eye -- overtone which strikes a reassuring resonance within a majority of citizens.
(Excerpt) Read more at gogov.com ...
If I am going to score debate points by naming one, then I guess I don't get any points. I don't have the names chronicled. And doing a Google search yeilds an "everyone is innocent" list of results from every con whose family has access to a web site.
But, certainly if you watch the news you have seen accounts of innocent people being let out of prision - even death row - after it became quite certain they had not done it.
The most recent is a gentleman recently released from Texas death row after 17 years there. He was interviewed on one of the major networks, - may have been Foxnews (that is what I watch).
The State executed 35,000 innocent people? Where do you get your data?
I'm very curious as to what he was like growing up and in the usual course of a day. His best man was on the Today show this a.m. talking about how he was always "slightly distant and off to himself". I guess I'm interested because this makes you wonder how many other "functioning sociopaths" we come across--and are even charmed by--every day in our lives.
I wonder what else he's been guilty of before.....wasn't he from the same town as Chandra Levy?
I'm a big reader, and I read many many books of all kinds--so many that they have to be really good to stand out in my memory--but, every time I look at Scott Peterson, I'm reminded of the Junior Cain character in Dean Koontz's "From the Corner of His Eye." In that book, Junior's "cryptonite weakness" is a digestive type of symptom that occurs after he commits murder. I couldn't help but remember that when I heard that Viagra had been removed from the Peterson house. I highly recommend the read for anyone interested in this case.
I'm sure this didn't go unnoticed by the jury, either.
I noticed.
?I'll grant you that one. This is an emotional, not rational, issue and there are many sides to the argument for and against cap. punishment. There will always be disagreement between pro baby killers and pro lifers and the same must be said about pro death supporters and those against it. I don't know who is right, I only know how I feel.
But there are guilty people, people who have committed cold blooded murder - in this case of those they pledged their lives to protect, their own family. Thus - the death penalty.
You still have a problem with that? I remember some 'beach bum' wild-eye (he really was) outside the courthouse, yesterday, approached that chubby gal handing out the free Examiner issue (with the DEATH headline that all the reporters and pundits showed for the camera). He said loudly - I'm OPPOSED to the death penalty. She had about four cameramen surrounding her, trying to get the newsie holding up the headline shot for background. I'm OPPOSED to the death penalty. And some other heavier guy walked right past him and said - Well, I'm in FAVOR of the death penalty, and took his free copy from the gal. It was funny.
I thought all these camera guys, and still-shot guys, who were told to 'mingle' and pick up background that the other guys WEREN'T shooting (I literally overheard one of the producers tell his guys that) would chase after the beach-bum. But he just faded into the crowd. That was it. There was a woman seeking petitions for a parental notification measure, I believe, on the other side of the 'media tents'. But no other I'm OPPPOSED sorts. The local crowd, generally, was not all that opposed, believe me.
As to how many innocent people the state has executed, I have no idea. That is an impossible number to arrive at. Every once in a while we get confirmation, though, that it is more than we know - details of a case come out that show someone was wrongly convicted.
It's like having faith. Not always but sometimes you get the evidence you need to support your position. In my thinking, news of an innocent person wrongly put to death or released from death row.
The only other way to argue the death penalty is one of two ways:
1). Our system of justice is infallable, especially now with DNA testing. We could never make a mistake and condem an innocent person.
2). If one or two innoncent people are executed for crimes they did not commit, well, that is a price that must be paid. Society needs the death penalty.
Do you see it any other way?
If we are losing 35,000 people a year to murder but executing 1 innocent person every 5 years, I say that is acceptable. That's why I support the death penalty. It is the ONLY way you can guarantee that a murderer doesn't kill again.
If we can be certain, then I could be for it. But because we can not always be certain, I can not be for it, even in the obvious cases of guilt. We are not always smart enough to discern those obvious cases. If we are not able to discern every obvious case, then we leave ourselves open to committing a mistake, putting an innocent person to death. I am not willing to take that risk.
To answer your question more directly, no matter how much the death penalty may seem deserved or how much satisfaction might be derived from putting a murderer to death, that justice or satisfaction is not worth the risk of one innoncent person being put to death. So, in my view, society gives up on execution of even the most guilty in the name of never putting an innocent person to death.
The only other way I see it is if someone wants to argue that our system of justice is infallable or that they think it is okay if innoncent people end up being put to death in the name of condeming true murderers.
Then your thinking on this issue is more in keeping with the thinking in China's system of justice. And having seen what can happen in that system, in any system really, that is a very dangerous position you take.
That's why I support the death penalty. It is the ONLY way you can guarantee that a murderer doesn't kill again.
There is a hole in your reasoning here. Does the premeditated killing an innocent person make you are murderer? And while I think it is a stretch to liken a government wrongly killing an innocent person to a murderer, my thinking is certainly opposite of yours. Ending the death penalty is the ONLY way you can guarantee that an innocent person is never killed again by the state.
Even if you don't buy into that one, your thinking is still flawed. Certainly a murderer can be kept from killing again - at least those on the outside of the prison wall. It is called life without the possibility of parole.
Yes, apparently Scott took Viagra for recreational purposes. Apparently, alot of younger men are doing that.
I must admit that I agree with you.
You equate Justice with revenge. Those are not the same.
Speaking of holes in logic. What if the prisoner kills a guard? What if he kills a person in jail who is innocent of murder? Is that acceptable in your eyes?
Face it. Both of us are dealing with acceptable risk. I say executing innocents is an acceptable risk and you say allowing a killer to kill again is an acceptable risk.
I am a born again Christian also. The Lord was the One who instituted capital punishment for 2 reasons:
1. Purge sin and protect society
2.Justice
In addition every human knows murder is wrong and makes the free will choice to suffer the consequences of that choice. Our system, with the automatic appeal allows the murderer to choose to repent and our Savior extends His grace.
Wasn’t the thief crucified along with Christ told he would be with Jesus in heaven?
And if capitol punishment was unscriptural wouldn’t Jesus condemned the punishment (death) of this repented sinner?
Ex. 13 Thou shalt not kill.(kill=Hebrew word for murder)
Deuteronomy 13:6 (New International Version)
……………You must purge the evil from among you.
Revelations 21:
6 He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. 7He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8 But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars–their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.”
I'm not even sure that we should be that nice to him! A little pain will do him good!
What you said.
Geragos was so thoroughly unimpressive that the Petersons should demand their money back. Do you know how embarrassed a public defender is when a client gets the death penalty? It is a blackmark of incredible shame and disgrace, even for a public defender.
Geragos must be afraid to show his face.
He will certainly not be making the cocktail party circuit anytime soon.
And his fee just went down dramatically.
You are absolutely right on that. Too bad people can't follow that logic and apply it to the infanticide that occurs every day at aborturaiums nationwide. Murder is murder whther it is in the womb our after birth, and as disgustingly painful and tortuous to the victims in both cases.
The doctors performing these procedures should be arrested and thrown in prison...in a sane world where wrong is wrong and right it right.
I am thinking that there is a shiv with Peterson's name on it just waiting for him at San Quentin. I am sure he will be quite popular.
Time is ripe to start sueing lawyers. For the fun, if I was Scott Peterson I would sue his lawyer just for the hell of it. Protray him as a media hound who only wanted the case for media exposure and therefore did not take it seriously other then how he looked to others. Accuse him of "incompentence" like lawyer trash does when they sue Doctors who work 80 hours a week for the good of humanity.
Make that crook cough up all that dough and let Peterson's parents have there money back.
John
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