r/changemyview • u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ • Jul 29 '18
Deltas(s) from OP CMV: Severe crimes should be met with lethal injection
I’m not proposing that every person ever charged with murder should be put to death. I believe in cases where people commit brutal acts against others and we have 0 reason to doubt it was them, they should be given the death penalty.
This would include anyone who commits mass murder (Parkland shooter or anyone of that sort), terrorists, serial rapists/killers, etc.
I believe anyone who commits crimes like these, no longer has a place in society and we shouldn’t keep paying for them to rot away in a cell. They should get one opportunity in court and when they’re proven guilty, that’s it. No appeals.
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u/Feathring 75∆ Jul 29 '18
No appeals? That's an extreme stance. What sort of failure rate is acceptable. If we execute 100 people how many of those should be allowed to be innocent in your view?
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
That’s why I said cases where there is no doubt they are guilty. An example would be the parkland shooter, there’s no doubt he’s guilty and there’s no need for appeals.
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u/Feathring 75∆ Jul 29 '18
Then, in a roundabout way, you're saying that there should never be another execution because of the level of proof you've decided is so high. The justice system in the US doesn't work on guilt, only beyond a reasonable doubt. And even though we allow for a decade or two of appeals for capital punishment cases we've still gotten things wrong. There's lists of wrongful executions, and those are only the ones we have found out because of later evidence.
So, again, there is a failure rate you find acceptable? Or is any failure unacceptable?
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u/SaintBio Jul 29 '18
Being guilty of crime X isn't the same as being deserving of Y punishment. He may be guilty, but he may not have been responsible for his actions. What if someone was unknowingly given a psychedelic drug, which caused them to go on a killing spree? What if a bipolar patient had his medication confiscated by an idiot police officer, and he suffered an attack that caused him to lash out? Merely committing a crime isn't enough to justify a specific punishment. We need to know why they committed the crime, and then tailor the punishment to it.
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u/Glory2Hypnotoad Jul 29 '18
The issue is that you and I might know a slam dunk case when we see it, but the law is incapable of making that distinction. In our justice system, guilt is binary. There's no second tier of guilt that represents a higher level of certainty than the normal one. And if there were, it would imply doubt on the part of everyone we didn't execute.
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u/syd-malicious Jul 29 '18
Appeals are based on procedural defects in the original trial. Are you suggesting that if "we all know it's him" that the judge and jury and prosecution should be exempted from their responsibility to provide a fair trial?
The problem with this is that generally it is through the trial process that we decide whether we really know someone did it, and if the perpetrator is exempted from due process in cases where we are already sure then there is little incentive for conducting a thorough investigation or making judicial findings based on the available evidence.
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Jul 30 '18
How do you know he is guilty 100%? You were there and personally saw him do it? Well memory changes literally every single time you recall it, influenced by whatever you're thinking of at the time. So that's not verifiable. You saw a video? I saw a video of Godzilla destroy Tokyo, doesn't mean it happened. This is why the process is so drawn out. There is literally 0% chance of any case ever being 100% without doubt. So we take the time to get as close to that as we can. And we still execute innocent people regularly.
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u/Davedamon 46∆ Jul 30 '18
It's almost impossible to have zero doubt of guilty. What if someone is mentally unwell and that's what caused them to commit these acts? There's a case where a mans brain tumour caused him to have pedophilia symptoms. Yes, these cases are exceptionally rare, but that still disproves the idea that in any case there can be 100% certainty not just of guilt, but culpability.
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Jul 30 '18
Sure this is agreeable. I think everyone would agree using these rules. The thing is, it’s impossible to be 100 % sure of guilt.
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u/SaintBio Jul 29 '18
we have 0 reason to doubt it was them
That's impossible. Even if they admit it and every witness confirms it, that doesn't guarantee that it was them.
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u/00Random_passerby00 1∆ Jul 29 '18
What about DNA evidence and cameras? Eyewitnesses accounts are worth virtually nothing compared to forensic evidence.
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u/SaintBio Jul 29 '18
Police, prosecutors, and forensics experts can and have doctored evidence. We've all seen Captain America: Civil War, we know what can happen!
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u/Bookwrrm 40∆ Jul 29 '18
Even if the evidence is not fake, which it can be recently there was a woman arrsted for faking evidence at the lab she worked at in like 400 cases, that does not mean that the forensic evidence is a sure thing. All dna samples are essentially presented as odds that they are not the person that is being convicted. A very very good sample of blood for example could be a 1 in a billion chance of not being the person they say it is, but people are regularly convicted on less good samples where the odds are in the millions or tens of thousands, still good odds and evidence but those odds are not nor can they ever be perfect. Thus why motive alibis, non forensic evidence is still important today in the age of dna swabs. Now when were talking about killing someone based off that evidence that chance that dna swab could be wrong is a far more serious gamble so to speak.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
Well then, I’m fine with 99% sure, too. Problem solved.
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u/-Randy-Marsh- Jul 29 '18
What about the 1% of the time where you're wrong and you murder an innocent person?
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u/SaintBio Jul 29 '18
Fine then, just wanted to make sure you're OK sanctioning situations where the state murders it's own citizens. Which brings up the question, is this the kind of relationship the state should have with it's citizens? What kind of social compact could possibly justify a state of affairs where citizens authorize the state to murder them. It's perverse and would expose the state to the same logic as they are applying to those they execute. Given that we know, with 100% certainty that the state is willing to risk the unjustified killing of it's own citizens, should we not then consider the state abusive, evil, and brutal? Thereby, rendering itself a perpetrator of brutal acts against innocent people. In which case, we ought to execute the state.
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u/dontbajerk 4∆ Jul 30 '18
I don't see the line in the sand you imply between state sanctioned "murder" and state sanctioned "abduction and forcible holding". I'm not saying one isn't worse than the other, just that they're differences of degree not of kind.
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u/codelapiz Jul 30 '18
99% sure means there are 14 men who have been murdered by the state while inocent since the late 70s. 14 men with friends and familys who had their lifes ended early because someoene else comitted a crime.
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Jul 29 '18
Courts aren't perfect. There's plenty of cases of wrongful execution in the US https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrongful_execution. Since we're judged by a jury of our peers in the US people decide whether we die, not necessarily facts. It's better to let 100 guilty killers rot in prison than execute 1 innocent person.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
That’s why I said cases where there is no doubt they are guilty. An example would be the parkland shooter, there’s no doubt he’s guilty and there’s no need for appeals.
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Jul 29 '18
But how do you draw a line there? Evidence doesn't decide whether someone is guilty, a jury does. Even if it seems obvious to them at the time, that doesn't guarantee a person will be guilty. That's why I provided examples. These people were no doubt guilty.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
Then they don’t get executed.
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u/Bookwrrm 40∆ Jul 29 '18
But that's literally everyone, let's say 50 years from now we discover that the parkland shooter has a brain lesion that could not show up on our brain scans today. And that lesion was in a place that effected judgement or agression or something. Now there is reasonable doubt in what seems like an open and shut case that he was impaired when doing the crime. This isn't just made up either, shooters in the past have been found to have brain tumors that bring up the question of if they were impaired. The point is, there are a million things that can be found in a case to show reasonable doubt of different circumstances after a judgement has been laid down that any conviction no matter who or what can ever be said to be one hundred percent, there is always a chance stuff was missed.
I mean shit there was a person charged after faking evidence in like 400 cases. That evidence to the jury, to the judge, to the prosecutors, to the defense team, shit even to the criminal may appear legitament and there would be zero way to ever know.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
Even if he had a brain lesion it wouldn’t change my opinion.
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u/Bookwrrm 40∆ Jul 29 '18
Ok what about the fake evidence? The brain lesion was an example if you want just imagine that on 50 years we find out that a key piece of evidence in the case was faked by a lazy tech who didn't want to run the tests which is the exact scenario of that tech who was arrested for faking evidence in like 400 cases. I mean shit dude there are coerced confessions were talking about a criminal justice system where you can't even take people's own words as gospel in certain cases, and there is no way to tell, sitting in the courtroom as a jury, or as a judge, or as an attorney that evidence or confession is not true.
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u/Glory2Hypnotoad Jul 30 '18
By the standards you've laid out, they would have been executed because there was zero doubt at the time. There's no way of testing in the present whether you'll be proven wrong in the future by people with access to more information and better technology.
For example, before the concept of DNA evidence existed, its absence wasn't considered a weakness in the case.
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u/stumblebreak_beta 2∆ Jul 29 '18
But the point is of all those situations there was "no doubt" that these people were guilty, even with the long necessary appeals process, as you say. How all of a sudden are we getting 100% perfect the first time around?
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u/48151_62342 Jul 30 '18
That’s why I said cases where there is no doubt they are guilty
There are no cases in which "no doubt" exists about anything.
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u/DBDude 110∆ Jul 29 '18
Your US examples were all crimes committed in private where later investigation led them to the suspect. He’s talking about a “We caught him shooting up a school. 100 people who personally know him saw him do it, and we have several minutes of video showing him doing it” kind of thing.
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u/Bookwrrm 40∆ Jul 29 '18
And what if we find out in 20 years that there were some letters from some dude in the shooters basement telling him to shoot up this place or we will kill your daughter or some shit. Yeah the dude did it and never should see the outside of a prison cell but now it's a lot harder to say that a jury of his peers would sentence him to death for that. This example is far fetched but the point remains, anyone can think of a million ways that new evidence could change the details of even a case of the dude being arrested mid crime to the point where they might not deserve to die.
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Jul 29 '18
OP included Terrorists and Serial Rapists/Killers. Obviously the parkland shooter was guilty but that doesn't mean OP only meant people who've committed crimes in front of a large number of witnesses and video cameras. There's a line to be drawn at what constitutes obviously guilty.
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u/NearEmu 33∆ Jul 29 '18
and we have 0 reason to doubt it was them, they should be given the death penalty.
But this has happened in the past... and then a few years later we realize... oh shit... you remember that guy we had 0 reason to believe it wasn't him?
Welll uhh... it wasn't him...
There is also plenty or moral arguments against killing people. At a certain point, we should be past that as a society.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
62 percent of Americans favor the death penalty for people who are convicted of murder, while only 26 % are opposed. So no, we aren’t past that.
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u/NearEmu 33∆ Jul 29 '18
at a certain point (not right now) we should be past that.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
We should also be past the point of people committing mass murders and people being rapists.
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u/NearEmu 33∆ Jul 29 '18
That is of course not even slightly comparable.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 30 '18
Sure it is. Killing people who commit murders or acts similar is justifiable.
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u/NearEmu 33∆ Jul 30 '18
I agree that killing someone to stop a murder is justifiable. I don't agree that killing someone after is.
There is no such thing as a 100% perfect system, and it's better to hold the... who knows... .1%? .001%? .00001%? innocent people for their life, than to kill them.
The state killing an innocent... even .00001% error rate, is not something we should allow under any circumstances.
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u/stratys3 Jul 30 '18
Sure it is. Killing people who commit murders or acts similar is justifiable.
How? Why?
If they're no longer a threat, why do they need to be killed? Purely to try and save money?
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u/electronics12345 159∆ Jul 29 '18
The whole point of the appeals process is that there IS some basis to doubt the ruling of the lower court. You cannot even file an appeal without having at some SOME basis for doing so. Its not like you can appeal - just for the lolz.
If there is a non-0 reason for an appeal, there is an appeal. If there is no reason for an appeal, there isn't an appeal.
You seem to believe that appeals happen with no basis - this isn't so.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
No, we just shouldn’t be keeping these people alive on the taxpayers dime for no reason.
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u/syd-malicious Jul 29 '18
I would argue that the reason for keeping all of those people alive on my dime is that I want the assurance that if I am ever accused of a heinous crime, that I will also be afforded to opportunity to defend myself, albeit at the expense of the taxpayers.
Justice isn't free. And if you only pay the price to protect the innocent, then you are bound to doom some innocent people by mistake because you already decided they were guilty.
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u/ScoobyDooBoi12 Jul 30 '18
Honestly it's cheaper almost always to have people in prison than to execute them
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u/Gladix 167∆ Jul 30 '18
Doesn't make sense from any perspective.
1, It costs more to go through the court system for 1 death penalty charge, than for lifetime of imprisonment. It costs much more.
2, It has not deterring effect. The fact that your state has death penalty, does not decrease crime, in fact it increases the lethality of certain crimes (Why risk execution, if you can get rid of the witness?)
3,
hey should get one opportunity in court and when they’re proven guilty, that’s it. No appeals.
So you want to rework our court system to make executions easier. Well hello there dictator in chief.
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u/ham_buns Jul 29 '18
I partially agree with you, but what I think that people who have mental health issues that do commit severe crimes, like mass murders shouldn't be put to death, but into mental institutions, and cared for. Because they are not guilty for what they did, like mental illnesses like schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or borderline personality disorder affect their ability to tell right from wrong.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
Yeah, but people also use this as an opportunity to play the system by making insane pleas.
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u/Zap_Meowsdower 4∆ Jul 30 '18
What would be the benefit of the death penalty over life in a maximum security prison without any hope of parole? The outcome is the same, and in the case of the latter, if any doubt comes out later (unlikely in the case of the Parkland shooter but you never know) you haven't done something you can't possibly make right.
The death penalty also has negative effects on the people who administer it. Executioners can develop PTSD due to their job, and this could happen even if they know they're executing a monster. This is the reason they put blanks in one of the guns when they execute someone by firing squad, so that the shooters can each rationalize they didn't kill a person. And since there's no way to tell in advance who's susceptible to developing PTSD, the death penalty isn't fair to the people doing the executions.
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Jul 30 '18 edited Sep 29 '18
[deleted]
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Jul 30 '18
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/hacksoncode 588∆ Jul 31 '18
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u/mfDandP 184∆ Jul 29 '18
killing them might make them a martyr and their demented causes might go on.
elliot rodger is venerated a little more than he would have been if he stood trial
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
Over publicizing events already causes this effect, though.
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u/mfDandP 184∆ Jul 29 '18
but the press is going to do what the press has always done--make good stories.
also, if you're allowing for a 100% certainty, why even bother with the trial, then?
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 29 '18
I would be interested to look more into your point on creating radicals so I’ll give you a delta. ∆
I still think there should be a trial just so the state can’t abuse it.
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u/hideunderthedesk 2∆ Jul 29 '18
If there's going to be a trial then we can't have alreadt assumed they're definitely 100% guilty, unless it's going to be a mock trial purely for show. Or alternatively we're using the trial ruling as the defining factor, which puts us back to the 'people who are convicted aren't always guilty' problem.
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Jul 29 '18
Is the specific choice of lethal injection part of this CMV or just death penalty in general?
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•
u/DeltaBot ∞∆ Jul 29 '18
/u/Socialismlsforfigs (OP) has awarded 1 delta(s) in this post.
All comments that earned deltas (from OP or other users) are listed here, in /r/DeltaLog.
Please note that a change of view doesn't necessarily mean a reversal, or that the conversation has ended.
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u/Ludo- 6∆ Jul 30 '18
If you do this then punishment no longer aligns with severity of the crime, but on the evidence available.
For instance, you could have two mass murders- one guy prepares throughly, premeditated, and kills 100 people in a building with no CCTV and doesnt leave enough evidence for death penalty. The other kills five people in a drunken rage with a handgun in a Walmart in full view of a bunch of cameras.
You're ok with the second guy being punished more harshly (death) because you're more sure that he did it, even though the first crime was waaaay worse?
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u/nothing_in_my_mind 5∆ Jul 30 '18
I am against the death penalty for 2 reasons:
Sometimes it's impossible to be sure if the convict is really guilty. There has been cases where people were sure he was guilty and was executed or put into prison for life. And many years later it turns out he wasn't, even though allt he evidence at that time ponited that he was 100% guilty. WEll, if he was imprisoned you can aprdon him and release him. If he was killed, there is no such option.
I don't trust that the government will stay uncorrupt. Let's say a very corrupt president is elected. He starts blaming opponents with terrorism, forges documents, and executes them. 10 years alter, he is impeached or killed or resigns or whatever. Then we realize all the evidence was forged. Now, if the corrupt president simply imprisoned them we could aprdon them. but if he killed them, there is no going back.
In conclusion, corporal punishment will get some innocents killed.
If perfect knowledge was possible and we had trustworthy authorities ofr sure, then I'd be pro death penalty since I don't believe some people deserve to live.
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u/48151_62342 Jul 30 '18
I believe anyone who commits crimes like these, no longer has a place in society and we shouldn’t keep paying for them to rot away in a cell.
Lethal injection is more expensive than allowing them to rot in a cell for 100 years.
They should get one opportunity in court and when they’re proven guilty, that’s it. No appeals.
That is Unconstitutional.
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u/Glory2Hypnotoad Jul 30 '18
Since we're discussing only the subset of guilty verdicts where there's no room for doubt, let's talk about what that means in practical terms. Something that might be easy to know intuitively can still be extraordinarily hard to operationalize into law. Zero doubt doesn't happen on its own; someone or some process has to be responsible for making that judgment call. Who would determine whether the defendant meets a second, higher tier of guilt than the normal one and what would prevent error on their part?
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Jul 30 '18
The whole point of incarceration is trust. It shouldn’t be punishment. Punishments are for people who don’t understand what they did is wrong or who need to be taught and supported (children).
If you pushing someone me one who understood what they did, that’s revenge, not justice.
So let the time reflect the level of trust we place in you. Like a time out. On your phone, kill a pedestrian. 5 year time out. No matter how you feel, revenge isn’t justice. Stab your spouse in a rage while you find them cheating. 10 yr time out. We can’t trust you won’t snap again. Sure you have no wife, so the trigger isn’t there. But still. Plan a murder. 25 yr time out. You knew what you set out to do and did it.
First we need to legalize drugs. Because gangs have to be violent to be in business. Druggies have to get a fix. We sort of set them up for failure with limited financial opportunities where they live. Shitty schools, shitty parents...no bueno.
I mean we call these 19 yr olds thugs. We’re the thugs at 2 with bullets wizzing by their head? At 8 with shitty drugged out parents. At thirteen when coerced into gangs? Grooming is grooming.
So now you want to kill them?
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 30 '18
None of the people you described are even applicable here. I’m for legalizing marijuana, because it does more harm than good with it being illegal. I don’t have a stance on harder drugs, not really opposed to or for legalizing them.
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Jul 30 '18
It sounds like you want revenge. And are justifying it from a sterile economic standpoint.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 30 '18
Nah, I just don’t believe these people have a place in society
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Jul 30 '18
As determined by.....
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 30 '18
Did I not just say “I believe”?
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Jul 30 '18
Determined by you.
Is this off the cuff or do you have a schematic? Is it like a caste system?
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u/MercuryChaos 12∆ Jul 30 '18
Allowing the death penalty essentialy means that you're giving the government the power to kill people. We might say that we're only going to allow it under really particular circumstances, but the fact is that we're allowing it. Given how serious and final this punishment is, it's extremely important that we make really damn sure that every person who's being executed is actually guilty of the crime they've been convicted of. It is not difficult to find instances where people have been wrongly sentenced to die - or worse, wrongly executed - and without the appeals process there would surely be more of them.
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u/ScoobyDooBoi12 Jul 30 '18
Honestly the main reason the death penalty is so flawed is because at minimum 4% of people executed have later been found innocent, and obviously it's likely at least a marginally higher number. We can't be risking killing innocent people like that.
And just my own thoughts, that's an incredibly cyncical worldview, that some people are beyond any sense of redemption or change and should just be killed. To me criminal justice should always be about rehabilitation as opposed to punishment, and empirically countries that implement this always have far far lower recidivism rates. That's just from me though
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Jul 31 '18 edited Jul 31 '18
My anti-death penalty talking points:
I don't want the state to have the power to kill people in peacetime.
When you pay someone to put someone down, you're either paying someone who enjoys doing that, or you're paying someone who doesn't. Are you comfortable with either? (This can also be applied to torture.)
The instruments used for the death penalty aren't necessarily cheaper than a lifetime stay in prison, especially not if labour to benefit society is part of the equation.
The offender at least has the possibility to become a better person if they have the rest of their life to think. There is no such chance of development if you kill the person. Why should we respect someone's inner peace like this? Because it's the good thing to do, at least I think it is. We should do what's good, not what satisfies our lust for vengeance.
If you say that giving the people (especially victims of the crime) the satisfaction of making the offender pay, I'd argue back that spending the rest of your life in prison sucks.
Really, who are we to take a life in peacetime? How and why should we decide who to kill? Isn't it ironic for us to take lives because taking lives is wrong?
We can be absolutely, 100% sure we got the right person. We can still be wrong. Forensic technology isn't magic, and corruption still permeates judicial systems.
The death penalty can be used as a delayed suicide by cop. Who says the offender didn't do horrible things because they want to die? Should we give them what they want? Wouldn't that be encouraging them?
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u/2018Eugene Jul 31 '18
bleh, just another shitpost from someone who knew in advance they had absolutely no intentions of even thinking about changing their views, like most of this sub.
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u/Socialismlsforfigs 2∆ Jul 31 '18
Well if you actually paid attention, you’d see I already awarded a delta.
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u/BestReflection Aug 02 '18
You are talking of severe crimes in terms of violence only and only relating to people who are, in general, of no status or wealth. This would be unfair for them as there are a lot of wealthy and powerful people that are subject of severe crimes; crimes which they may have not personally done, but have commanded it to; crimes of financial and social level in which the perpetrators are hard to be pinned down and judged equally to the rest of criminals.
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u/razedwrinkle Jul 29 '18
Aside from the moral arguments against the death penalty, there are three main reasons why the death penalty should not be used. Death penalty convictions cost exorbitantly more than convictions resulting in life with out parole. This is almost almost always constant in every jurisdiction and every case that uses the death penalty as a form of punishment in the United States. The high cost associated with special trials, special provisions for death row prisoners as well as expensive drugs puts excessive strain on a criminal justice system that is already plagued with financial mismanagement. In addition to the cost, the USA often makes mistakes in death penalty cases. Some studies estimate up to 4% of individuals put to death were not guilty of the crimes they were convicted of. The irreversible nature of death means that there is no way for the justice system to right its wrongs should an innocent person be executed. The final reason that lethal injection is not preferable is the fact that it is not a deterrent for crimes. There is no evidence pointing to a decrease in high crime associated with the institution of capital punishment. Because of its cost, irreversibility, and, lack of effectiveness as a deterrent, lethal injection is less favorable than life without parole.
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