Death Penalty Poll

[elwoodblues]

Do you favor the death penalty in the following situations:

[elwoodblues]

I read a study once (way in the back of my mind) that made the assertion that when faced with the 3 choices in the poll the number of people who favor or strongly favor the death penalty decreases as you move from question 1 (which has HUGE support) to question 3 (which drops below 50%.) This suggests to me that at least part of the reason people support the death penalty is a general frustration with the criminal justice system and the perception that people are getting out too easily. Any thoughts?

[ThaSaltCracka]

I think people that support the death penalty are vengeful bastards.

[jakethebake]

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I think people that support the death penalty are vengeful bastards.

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You're right. We are.

[Toro]

The problem with death penalty is the finality. This year we have heard about numerous cases where people were cleared by DNA testing that didn't exist 20 years ago.

So I could never support the death penalty for someone convicted of murder on circumstantial evidence.

[ThaSaltCracka]

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I think people that support the death penalty are vengeful bastards.

[/ QUOTE ]
You're right. We are.

[/ QUOTE ]LMAO [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[Beavis68]

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The problem with death penalty is the finality. This year we have heard about numerous cases where people were cleared by DNA testing that didn't exist 20 years ago.

So I could never support the death penalty for someone convicted of murder on circumstantial evidence.

[/ QUOTE ]

But you are ok with them sitting in jail for the rest of their lives? At least death penalty cases get a high level of scrutiny. If these people were wasting away for life in prison, no one would care to look into their cases.

[ThaSaltCracka]

This is one of the main reasons I oppose it. I remember about a year ago O'Reilly had Mark Furhman on his show plugging his new book, which was about Oklahoma's death row inmates. Basically through his research, and with the help of several lawyers, they reviewed all of the cases for each current death row inmate and found that an obscene number of people were wrongly convicted, or with faulty evidence. Because of his research, OK stopped doing capital punishment(not sure if thats changed).

To me, the mere thought that an innocent man might be put to death scares the crap out of me, and because of the death penalty, and the finality of it, this has more than likely happened.

[ThaSaltCracka]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The problem with death penalty is the finality. This year we have heard about numerous cases where people were cleared by DNA testing that didn't exist 20 years ago.

So I could never support the death penalty for someone convicted of murder on circumstantial evidence.

[/ QUOTE ]

But you are ok with them sitting in jail for the rest of their lives? At least death penalty cases get a high level of scrutiny. If these people were wasting away for life in prison, no one would care to look into their cases.

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If they were innocent, people would take a look at the case. Basically, in our society, if someone gets locked up for a crime they didn't commit, and they get out, they sue.

[Toro]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The problem with death penalty is the finality. This year we have heard about numerous cases where people were cleared by DNA testing that didn't exist 20 years ago.

So I could never support the death penalty for someone convicted of murder on circumstantial evidence.

[/ QUOTE ]

But you are ok with them sitting in jail for the rest of their lives? At least death penalty cases get a high level of scrutiny. If these people were wasting away for life in prison, no one would care to look into their cases.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, who said I was Ok with them wasting away in prison? But, at least if you don't put them to death, there's a chance that the injustice can be rectified. I'm surprised by your reply as this is pretty obvious stuff.