Life Without Parole is No Substitute For Death

Townhall.com ^ | July 16, 2015 | Jeff Jacoby

[Kaslin]

AN ARGUMENT regularly advanced by opponents of the death penalty is that incapacitation doesn't require execution. Life imprisonment without parole is sufficient, they say: Put the most dangerous murderers behind bars and keep them there forever.

But "lock 'em up and throw away the key" is a delusion. Life without parole is no replacement for the death penalty when it comes to protecting innocent lives.

Understandably, many find it reassuring to believe that there is a way to protect the public from the worst killers without requiring the state to kill.National surveys find a preference for locking up murderers for life. In the most recent, a Quinnipiac University poll released in June, 48 percent of respondents said a person convicted of murder should be sentenced to life without parole; only 43 percent preferred death. But the last few weeks have provided vivid reminders that life sentences and high-security cells are no guarantee that deadly criminals have been removed from society for good.

When Richard Matt and David Sweat escaped from the Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, N.Y., on June 6, they triggered one of the most intense domestic manhunts in years. "Little Siberia," as Dannemora is nicknamed, is the largest maximum-security prison in New York — just the sort of impregnable vault intended to neutralize any possible future threat from remorseless sociopaths. Sweat had been sentenced to life without parole for the 2002 murder of Sheriff's Deputy Kevin Tarsia, whom he shot 22 times and ran over twice with his car. Matt got 25-to-life for torturing to death an elderly businessman, William Rickerson, then cutting up his body with a hacksaw.

By grace and good fortune, the fugitives were found before they could hurt or kill any new victims. But residents of northern New York had spent three nightmarish weeks on edge. They had reason to be unnerved: A startling number of murders are committed by criminals previously convicted of homicide. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1 out of every 11 killers now on death row had already been found guilty of one or more killings beforecommitting the murder for which they were sentenced to die. At least 30 of the 3,000 current death-row inmates were prison escapees when they committed capital murder. We can lock our most vicious killers behind bars, but some will find a way to get out — and some of them will kill again.

This week came word of an even more brazen jailbreak: Drug mobster Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, one of the world's most notorious criminals, broke out of Mexico's Altiplano, a "supermax" prison from which escape wasconsidered impossible. Shockingly, this was the second time that Guzman, a narcotrafficker charged with numerous assassinations and acts of torture, had escaped a maximum-security prison. Perhaps he too will be captured or killed before he strikes again, but the last time he broke out he evaded arrest for 13 years.

Even behind the bars of an ultrasecure facility, convicted murderers can pose a lethal danger. Matt, Sweat, and Guzman had helpers on the inside and outside who facilitated their escape. Lifers may have followers prepared to carry out their orders and kill on their behalf. They may convince a governor or president to grant them clemency, or persuade some judge, someday, to order their release.

And, of course, they may kill behind bars. Massachusetts murderer Joseph Druce was already serving a life term in a maximum-security prison when he murdered fellow inmate John Geoghan, a former priest imprisoned for sexually molesting a child.

No living murderer is ever irrevocably incapacitated. Justice may not always require a killer's execution. But when it does, life without parole is an inadequate, and dangerous, substitute.

[Dilbert San Diego]

Some crimes are so heinous and some people so evil, that the criminals should be put down, as Atticus Finch put down a rabid dog in To Kill A Mockingbird.

[newfreep]

Massachusetts murderer Joseph Druce was already serving a life term in a maximum-security prison when he murdered fellow inmate John Geoghan, a former priest imprisoned for sexually molesting a child.

Now THAT'S a well deserved death execution.

[painter]

I remember that story. The former priest was a repeat offender.

[dfwgator]

Death Penalty - 0% Recidivism Rate.

[umgud]

Back in the 80’s in CA, Rose Byrd, the CA supreme court justice ruled execution unconstitutional and every one on death row had their sentence converted to life WITH parole. Many were paroled and some killed again. Rose Byrd was recalled and run out of office.

Kill while you can or some lib will try to release them.

[Fido969]

Mass was probably p-o’d because the kid was a homophobe.

[Oatka]

Death Penalty - 0% Recidivism Rate.

Indeed. You read of prison escapes, but never any from the grave - zombie movies notwithstanding.

[CommerceComet]

It is often argued that a life sentence without the possibility of parole is as bad or worse than a death sentence. You often see death row inmates pleading for their lives, often through their attorneys, families, advocacy groups, etc. How often do you see a prisoner begging for a death sentence rather than life in prison?

That question ends that dumb argument every time it is raised.

[arthurus]

I am all for life sentences- short ones- no more than 30 days or 90 days with extenuating circumstances, on bread and water in order to save expenses.

[DuncanWaring]

Life without parole could work, as long as it’s served welded into a steel box, 6’ on a side, with a hole in the side for food/water, and a hole in the bottom for waste.

To be departed only on assuming room temperature.

[DPMD]

1)Life without parole, in the absence of the death penalty, is a license to kill, usually within the confines of the prison, but it also jeopardizes the lives of the employees.

2) Once the death penalty is universally abolished, the prison reformers will target life without parole. Then life. Then prison. The insane attacks on marriage, Christians, churches and Confederate flags, just to name a few, should be instructive as to the voracious appetites humans have for pushing the boundaries ad infinitum.

[vette6387]

“Rose Byrd was recalled and run out of office.”

The only good news was that the bitch died of cancer! Seemed like poetic justice to me at the time. She was a Jerry Brown appointee. He’s done so much damage to California. Before he showed up, California was the best place in the country to live. Brown, his father, and his chief of staff and governor Gray Davis all had a hand in ruining this state.

[Taxman]

The idiots who elected the Browns and Gray Davis are really to blame!