death penalty is wrong. who are we to judge another person and say they deserve to die?

i think death row inmates still need some sort of appeal or something to ensure they aren't innocent...

AHAHAHAHAHA!

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Yeah, they're only sentenced by judge and jury. Who are they to decide a murderer's fate?

"There are only 23 cited instances where an innocent may have been wrongly executed since 1900."

- USA Death Penalty Developments in 1996 by Amnesty International.

Of these, none have been proven. I'd say with the clean track record of both our forensic science and capital punishment programs, allowing appeals due to the possibility of executing an innocent person, and then allowing a madman like Ken McDuff to parole out of jail and murder 5 more people is absolutely unacceptable.

clean track record of our forensic teams?

is this the FBI labs you're talking about? or the local police labs?
the forensic teams do NOT have a clean track record.

there are documented incidents where a senior lab manager in the FBI read DNA results that conviced a man off of a blank piece of paper.

two new hires saw him. they were told to ignore it.

and unfortunatly, mess ups, mix ups, and screw ups are common in forensic labs.

how about the lab that took DNA collected from the suspect and switched it with the DNA from the crime scene?

forensics are getting better. but they do NOT have a clean track record.

that being said, there have been many incidents where an innocent on death row was released because of new evidence.

so don't let death row immates have a posibility of parole. just let them be able to have the evidence looked over, to appeals the decision, to question the evidence that put them in death row. no appealing the sentence, just the verdict.

Well, you're just impossible to please, then.

You whine about something there's no solution to?

Well, we shouldn't capitally punish someone because that's more costly than locking them up for 60 years, just because of appeals.

But then, oh no! You can't take appeals away because then that's unfair!

But I don't like paying high taxes to feed, and shelter mass murderers!

But, oh wait, if we try and kill them off (the most logical thing to do) then they might appeal and cost us money!

But wait, we need appeals!

It's never ending madness!

an eye for an eye..a life for a life...

the old 'eye for an eye' strikes again... i'm getting sick of hearing this quote Please read ALL posts.

an eye for an eye..a life for a life...

it's bibical and it's how things should be, in my land. You do the crime, you do the time. there are a ton of little says that'll go with this.

Back to the death penalty, it should be allowed.

i think the death penalty might be a little more tolerable if it was toned down a bit..i don't think letting people watch and laugh as someone is dying is very good..and the whole thing about people maybe being innocent just bugs me. =/ it just doesn't seem like the best deterrent.

the perfect solution:

penal colonies. in antarctica.

i will establish an international jail there. i will accept for-life prisoners only. there is nothing preventing them from escaping. except that it's hundreds of miles through negitave 150 degree weather and frozen ocean to reach south america.

instead of the death sentence, people can be sent to antarctica, where they will live and die.

it's the perfect solution.

Yes because it rings out a message of fear for the criminals. If you get caught stealing you should hve your fingers cut off so you can't steal again!

Well.... I'm against death penalty.

First of all, I think we have to understand what punishments are for. I believe that punishments are there so that people do not commit a crime because they are too scared of being punished. I believe that everyone has the right to live. And as long as they lives, there's a chance for them to redeem themselves on what they've done.

Why, don't you do a pool on this?

They could 'redeem' themselves or they could also murder/rape some more people because they can get away with murder with a slap on the wrist (i.e jailed with cable TV and free food), which is what serial killers have done in the past.

Agreed 100%. Things happen. It could've been self-defense, a sudden impulse, on accident; whatever the case, your life shouldn't end because of a mistake you made. Death is such a complicating and deep thing and I don't think the Supreme Court or the Police should have any power to end your life short.
^ That's true too, but I think the world can come up with a better solution than a death sentence.

disagree... i alot of innocent people have been put to death. Let them suffer in jail the rest of their lives.

What's a better solution? It's nice to hear you say it, but give an example.

Well, rapists shouldn't have the power to end my short life either, but they do it anyway, illegally.

You're like the best debater here, so I know you'll probably find some way to prove me wrong again.

I think that penalties in prison are enough. A death sentence is going too far. Even if someone took another's life, they deserve another chance. Once they're let out of prison, if they act again, they get put back. It's as simple as that and you may do that until that person dies. It was their own fault to be doing wrong things and if they want to live their whole life in prison, so be it. It's their choice, but if you kill someone just once and you're not given a chance, then you're dead for good and that's that. Which I personally don't think is fair at all.

If you're being sarcastic, let me know. " "



Alright, lets read a part of "Justice for Samantha", an article from People magazine, shall we? It's true and rather morbid, but it's everyday life and more believable than anything I could make up.

"On July 15, 2002, as she played with her best friend outside her family's Staton, Calif., condo, 5-year-old Samantha Runnion was snatched, kicking and screaming, by a stranger who had said he was looking for a lost puppy. Twenty hours later her nude and brutalized body was found by a pair of hikers on a remote mountain trail 40 miles away, plunging her mother, Erin, and family, including Erin's longtime fiance, Kenneth Donnelly, into the blackest grief... Finally, last month Erin watched a Santa Ana, Calif., jury sentence Alejandro Avila, 30, to death for her daughter's kidnap, sexual assault and murder. Sitting in the front row, she sobbed quitely as the verdict was read. 'She is missing so much--I cannot forgive him for that,' says Runnion...

Samatha's tears were found on the car door lock--he had a childproof lock on it. She could pull and pull on it all she wanted, but she could not get out. It's ironic that by crying and scratching him she identified her killer. I'm proud of her that by struggling--by leaving her tears and fingernales with his DNA under them--she solved the crime. She was her own hero.

I haven't gone for counseling. I can get morbid, but I won't ignore the pain. I don't sleep a lot. When I put the kids to bed, I lie there thinking. I go to bad places because I have to. I think about how I would hurt him if I could. But when I have those fantasies, I make myself sick. I've had to think through the 'what ifs...' What if I hadn't been late leaving work? What if I could have saved her? You peel grief back layer after layer.

It was hard for Connor at first. he and Samantha were so close. He was just 10 months younger. I didn't realize until after she died that he didn't know how to button his shirt or tie his shoes; she had been doing those tasks for him. For a long time, Connor was terrified that the man would come and get us all..."

Anyway, you get the idea. Now then, tell me if this guy deserved a second chance. if so, why?

I'm sure you've heard about serial killers. Do you think they deserve 'second chances', too?

No, I wasn't being sarcastic. I just like that face for some reason. I voted you "Best Female Debater" for the yearbook thing .

That was a pretty sad story and it almost made me change my mind, but if I'm going to read a story about a victim, I could read a story about the killer from his perspective and he may have an excuse that would make me change my mind again.

I think he deserves another chance. Everyone does. Of course this is just my opinion. He's made a terrible mistake, but at least he'd be in prison for a long while and maybe after he was released, he'd rethink about his actions and pursue a better life. Maybe he won't, and then he'd go back into prison again. Life is survival of the fittest and if you can't defend yourself or your parents aren't smart enough to protect you, then that's your fault for leaving yourself out in the open.

About your serial killer question, I'm replying to that with the same answer I did for your story. They should be jailed. That's punishment enough.

It depends on how and why they kill the person... jurys don't slap on the death penalty too often, life in prison is the normal..... there is a huge difference between someone planning to rob soeone and accidentally hitting them too hard over the head, and a person who decide to walk anoud with a chainsaw and kill people for fun. the robber would most likely go to jail and you would be right, that would be punishment enough. Jail would not be punishment enough for the sycopath walking around with a chainsaw.... The death penalty is not the automatic for killing someone and it never should be, but i don't believe it should be eliminated all together so yes I am for the death penalty


I agree, start a penal colony in antarctica.....

I see, thank you.



I understand that there are murderers who may have a tragedy of their own that contributed to the main reason for their crime. If I were Samantha's mother and the courts did not put him on death roll, I might have taken a vigilante action and killed him with my own bare hands. That would be the tragedy that gave me the motive to kill. You understand right? If there was no death sentence, a lot of people, would take vengeance into their own hands as I would.

How would any of us be sure that he will not kill again once he is released? Why allow him the chance to bring more death and more grief into the lives of others when, he can be stopped?

You do know that that there have been killers in the past who were paroled only to kill again? Such a person was Eddie Wein. Instead of being executed he was allowed parole. Months after that, he attacked and killed women in the area he resided in. Had he been executed, those women could have a chance to live. To take care of their children, husbands. To have the chance to live the life they deserved.

What does a criminal learn when he commits a crime, he only gets put into a place with cable television? What does he learn when he commits the crime again and gets put into the same place? What will others, killers like him, learn? The answer: that they can get away with murder UNSCATHED.



We are no longer lawless barbarians. We live in a society where punishment for crimes must be uphold with the highest justice possible. Survival of the fittest does not mean humans hunting humans as convenience because that places us at the same level as species we call 'animal', 'beast', and oftimes labled as evil. It does mean that as a society, we must destroy those who harms our existence. That is how modern day 'survival of the fittest' should work.

I don't quite get why you would say that if I am killed, it would be my own fault for leaving myself unprotected. Killers find me, I don't find them. How am I to know I am a target? How is a 5-year-old girl to know she is a target? How is a mother of a 5-year-old to know a killer is stalking her child that day, that time, with the intent of rape and murder?

As for serial killers, like you, my answer is the same: jailing them teach them what? Jailing them will teach others, killers like them, what?

I highly doubt anyone would go and kill people for revenge like that and if this ever happened, it would be a rare incident. Something like what you showed me isn't common because you're showing me a story which means it has at least some significance from everything else. You act like people don't know the concequences (sp?), but the whole point of jailing someone is to teach them not to do it again. It's hard to determine a punishment depending on the severity of the case. I think that if someone has committed a crime more than once and the people in court could fairly assume that he'd act again, would it be a necessary time to execute a death penalty.

I know I might sound like I'm contradicting myself from before, but you've brought up a lot of good points.



We aren't lawless barbarians and I never said we were in complete anarchy or anything, but if a 5-year old is left unattended to actually be able to get raped and murdered without anyone being able to do something about it is the parent's fault. I'm not saying that the killer should go without punishment; I'm just saying that people could be more cautious and things like this wouldn't happen.


Jailing them will teach them not to do it again because they'll get jailed again. Or from my theory in my first paragraph, they could be sentenced to death. Somehow though, I think that process would be a bit complicated, so what do you think would be the best way of handling something like this? Just automatically sentencing them to death if they kill one other person?

It's nice to have so much faith in fellow man. I have a lot of faith and love for humanity, but I cannot spare sympathy for those who have no humanity in them.



You do not need to doubt the chance that someone would kill for revenge. I would. I promise you that if anyone harms my any of my immediate family in that way, I would kill them if the law does not stand by me. I am not one to initiate violence, but I will not turn away when I am forced to face it. The point I was making is that there ARE people who do not know, or even they are not afraid of consequences for evil deeds. That is why they kill so many again and again.

As for Samantha, why would someone sexually abuse a 5-year-old and kill her? Because he is sane? Because he knows that it's wrong? Because he's a sweet human being? If he can rape and kill an innocent child, God knows what else he is capable of if he is not stopped now.

Jailing Eddie Wein didn't teach him to stop killing women once he was loose. Also, Thomas Silverstein, someone who was on death row, killed his correctional officer by stabbing him about 40 times with a homemade knife. Being jailed simply doesn't stop these people from killing.


So instead of ridding the world of rapists and murderers like we should, we will hide all our children in our homes where they will be attended to at all times, and thus, believe that we are safe? Lest you forget, there are people who are killed and murdered in their own homes, where they often feels the most secured. Had it not been Samantha, it would have been another little girl. Perhaps another little girl who was sleeping peacefully in her own bed. Again, we do not seek the killers, they seek us. Will we hide?

How should we be cautious? Should we be cautious every moment in our life and never let our guards down? Should I never get married because the guy I'm dating might be an abusive drunkard who will kill me in a fit of anger one day? Should I never allow my children freedom to go to their friends' houses because their friends' parents could be child killers?

We should be cautious though, but you know, killers are smart enough to attack when your guards are down. Should we build a barrier between us and everyone else? From our neighbors and our children's school teachers?



So you do believe in the death penalty?

What do I think? Putting Samantha's killer on death row is fair. Even though she was most likely his first kill, he has simply no sanity, no humanity in him.

i think the way texas does things is awsum thare law is if 2 credible eyewitnesses testify against you you go to tha chair or lethal injection