So true....They are called sociopaths.....Can fool you, turn around, commit another crime, and fool you again.....

so very true

In 1993 or 1994 Jeremy Sheet and Adam Barnett, two guys that grew up in my neighborhood, whom at one time I was friends with, raped and murdered a North High School student named Kenyata Bush,(I'm not sure on the spelling). Her body was found in a local park decapitated. After there arrest Adam hung himself in jail, Jeremy went to trial and was convicted of 1st degree murder and sentenced to death, he spent 3 years on death row and them was granted a mistrial, something to do with the right to face your accouser, which just happened to be Adam. Jeremy now is walking the streets around Denver, Co. the last I heard. I say, from the court room to the firing squad is a way more effective means of dealing justice.

for those that we would noramlly agree to let out after so long (like habitual shoplifters) put them to work in a chaingang. Pu them on one coast, and they have to work their way (by foot) to the opposite coast. This is done as a group. They start aat point a and in each city along the way, they work for som any hours, days, weeks, whatever then they WALK to the next city and do it again until they get to the opposite coast.

For those who are too dangerous to ever let out again? parachute them to a deserted island, or chain of islands. Make sea patrol of the islands part of the navy or coast guard to ensure they dont do a gilligan adn build a raft to float back to the mainland (btw this islnd would be at least several days away from mainland). The only human contact on these islands will be from the inmates themselves. No gaurds, no shipments no nothing. let them forage for themselves and learn to live together on their own without costing us anything more than the fuel to fly them over and drop them off.

AGAINST:((

Danny they tried the Island thing before called it australia, they turned their life around and now are a great member of the world. How about trying this if they are too dangerous to let out---- capital punishment that fits the crime, you know castration for rapist, cut off some hands for assault, bullet for murders etc etc you get the idea.

oh yeah- live from the mid east armydoc says hi to all the lost liberals, Im back where I belong, helping the tired sick and wounded and shooting up the little twirps that wish to make their meeting with allah so see you around the threads sometime!!!!!

I'm for it and they should let me pull the switch.

The traditional argument would be that solitary confinement is too expensive for the government to justify not just executing someone. However, there have been multiple studies which show it's actually cheaper to keep someone in solitary confinement for years and years than it is to prepare and complete an execution (presumably because of how complicated executions are these days amidst worries of an 8th amendment cruel and unusual claim).

I am so glad to see (not) so many neandrathals still living today in our society. Come on people, we should be too intelligent for the avenging, revenging thought processes that made the death penalty a law. I just have to believe we can evolve, although these kinds of responses bring me down a little I still have faith in the intelligence of us humans to over come the animal in all of us.

If you want to see an example of un-evolved neanderthals, simply take a look at the crime that happens these days. Not just the quantity of it, but the type. Gruesome, horrific, and unimaginable things happen every day...things that no sane human being would do. It's for this reason that it's imperative to at least seriously consider retaining the death penalty. If a rapist who kills a girl afterwards gets life in prison, then what punishment can we give to a rapist who does other horrific things to a girl then kills her, and then does other horrific things to/with the body? [Details left out for the squeamish]. He'll get the same penalty, although for a much worse crime. The death penalty is an end-all that can account for that lack of reasonable extrapolation on the scale of crime committed vs. punishment received.

It costs Americans an average of 50 dollars a day to take care of one single inmate.

It costs 32 cents to execute one, thats the cost of one single small caliber bullet.

So what you are saying is two wrongs make it right? Or if they are neandrathals we should then be? Come on, I expect more from us then this. Are my expectations too high of my human brethren?

Oh yea this is soooo exceptional thinking here.....not

First of all, I'm not personally arguing either way here, I'm just fleshing out the points.

Secondly, you argue that two wrongs don't make a right. That argument is based on relativity though. And who can decide where the relative spot should be settled?
It has to be agreed that the government has the obligation to punish criminals. This has to be assumed...if you don't assume this then civilization falls apart, so I don't think there's an argument there. So, to punish these criminals, the government must do something to them which would be otherwise illegal. They may choose to whip them, detain them, strap them into a straight jacket, or other forms of punishment throughout the years. Ordinarily, taking a human being and trapping them in a building against their will is wrong. But no one argues that this constitutes a "two wrongs don't make a right" situation. In the context of punishment, execution can't necessarily be quickly categorized as a "wrong".
And even if we ultimately conclude that it is "wrong" in the traditional sense, but unavoidable in the punishment sense, it would be better phrased as: "Two wrongs don't make a right, but they do present the only failsafe way to ensure that an inhuman perpetrator is never again free and receives his/her just punishment."

I understand that the punishment system was created a long time ago and it poses a problem to restructure. But, death dealing legally should not even be a consideration of an intelligent society. Our brains have grown from this philosophy. We now know we can do other "punishments" and acheive the same goal of them never harming another civilian. We have evolved this far. Why not evolve the rest of the way to institute the knowledge? Plus I believe the study of these sociopaths would serve us well in the long run. We cannot study them and determine why they are the way they are if we kill them off, right?

I just really think we should be past this, intellectually.

Do we?

Of course we do. Our judicial system is not perfect by a long shot but we can do what is needed with it. Because of this inperfection we cannot be death dealers, death cannot be corrected if the judicial system fails. It is that simple.

Well it's one thing to argue that the flaws and inconsistencies of our judicial system weigh against the death penalty, but I still don't understand how you can claim that we've found other ways besides the death penalty to assuredly "achieve the same goal of them never harming another civilian."

We have a death row here in Colorado. Our death penalty has been determined unconstitutional here but the inmates are on death row. There has been no civilian deaths from these inmates. So that proves it, right?

Correlation doesn't prove causation (or in this case, lack of causation). I've been roaming the planet free for 23 years and I've never killed anyone. That doesn't mean that everyone who is free for 23 years won't ever kill someone. Some criminals who have killed people and later been released from prison have never killed anyone again. Does this mean that it is an effective rehabilitation and guarantee that NO criminal will do it again? No, and that is shown by the fact that some released criminals do kill again.
As for the inmates on death row...while they are incarcerated they obviously cannot kill civilians (besides potentially prison guards, but that's not the issue here). But the point is that incarceration is not a 100% failsafe system...sometimes prisoners escape, or errors cause them to be released early or put on probation, etc. Some people feel that this is an acceptable risk to take in order to abolish the death penalty, others feel that it is too big of a risk. I think that's where the difference of opinion lies.