The State of Texas v. Jesus Christ

[mike2810]

/sarcasm on
Bring back the electric chair or gas chamber. Then see if the pastor still wants to place a hand on the condemn.
/sarcasm off.

 

[NWRatCon]

/sarcasm on
Bring back the electric chair or gas chamber. Then see if the pastor still wants to place a hand on the condemn.
/sarcasm off.

I'd encourage it. "Here, you hold the sponge..."

 

[mike2810]

I'd encourage it. "Here, you hold the sponge..."

I have little sympathy for those who are found guilty and sentenced to death. I suspect the condemned did not care much about the victim.

 

[NWRatCon]

I have little sympathy for those who are found guilty and sentenced to death. I suspect the condemned did not care much about the victim.

I have some sympathy for any other human's suffering (and animals, for that matter - I'm a real softy). On the other hand, I believe in the righteousness of the death penalty in principle - some people's existence in society cannot be justified and their crimes too depraved to forgive - yet I cannot support it in practicality, because its imposition is so arbitrary (and demonstrably racists) in application (Charles Manson, for example, was never executed). Like abortion, I'd prefer it to be rare but it is justified in principle.

 

[mrjurrs]

There is a difference in rights available when you are a prisoner. The govt has rights to influence the time, place, and manner of the exercise of religion. Preventing someone from touching a prisoner is not limited to the practice of religion.

Having said that, it seems clear to me that the death penalty is a clear violation of the 8th Amendment. Get rid of it.

The govt has that right outside of prison as well. I don't understand is how death isn't a cruel and unusual punishment

 

[mrjurrs]

I have little sympathy for those who are found guilty and sentenced to death. I suspect the condemned did not care much about the victim.

Nice example of humanity...
"Eighteen people have been proven innocent and exonerated by DNA testing in the United States after serving time on death row. They were convicted in 11 states and served a combined 229 years in prison – including 202 years on death row – for crimes they didn’t commit."

The Innocent and the Death Penalty - Innocence Project

innocenceproject.org

 

[mike2810]

Nice example of humanity...
"Eighteen people have been proven innocent and exonerated by DNA testing in the United States after serving time on death row. They were convicted in 11 states and served a combined 229 years in prison – including 202 years on death row – for crimes they didn’t commit."

The Innocent and the Death Penalty - Innocence Project

innocenceproject.org

Our system of justice is not perfect.

Here is some reports of murderers who were freed to kill again

Paroled Murderers Who Were Freed Only to Kill Again

One of the most fundamental concepts in the criminal justice system is that of recidivism, a formally incarcerated person’s relapse into criminal behavior. The rates vary from crime to crime, but the sad truth is that many murderers who were released from jail turned around and committed crimes...

www.ranker.com

 

[bomberfox]

I have some sympathy for any other human's suffering (and animals, for that matter - I'm a real softy). On the other hand, I believe in the righteousness of the death penalty in principle - some people's existence in society cannot be justified and their crimes too depraved to forgive - yet I cannot support it in practicality, because its imposition is so arbitrary (and demonstrably racists) in application (Charles Manson, for example, was never executed). Like abortion, I'd prefer it to be rare but it is justified in principle.

Mh i tend to skip the justify for existing in society, i believe that is shifting the burden of proof in a rather dangerous fashion.

 

[mrjurrs]

Our system of justice is not perfect.

Here is some reports of murderers who were freed to kill again

Paroled Murderers Who Were Freed Only to Kill Again

One of the most fundamental concepts in the criminal justice system is that of recidivism, a formally incarcerated person’s relapse into criminal behavior. The rates vary from crime to crime, but the sad truth is that many murderers who were released from jail turned around and committed crimes...

www.ranker.com

Imo, better to set ten guilty people free than to imprison 1 innocent person.

Nothing is perfect, but the death penalty is final, no fixing mistakes.

 

[mike2810]

Imo, better to set ten guilty people free than to imprison 1 innocent person.

Nothing is perfect, but the death penalty is final, no fixing mistakes.

I suspect the actual number of people who were innocent and then put to death is almost zero.
Your link shows those who were on death row and set free.

So what about those families that the murder was set free and killed again?

 

[mrjurrs]

I suspect the actual number of people who were innocent and then put to death is almost zero.
Your link shows those who were on death row and set free.

So what about those families that the murder was set free and killed again?

Your suspicion is not supported, unless of course you think there is a difference in the number of errors made putting people away is equal to the number of innocent people freed.

Anyone's death is a tragedy. The solution according to you (it seems to me) is just to lock everyone up forever.

 

[mike2810]

Your suspicion is not supported, unless of course you think there is a difference in the number of errors made putting people away is equal to the number of innocent people freed.

Anyone's death is a tragedy. The solution according to you (it seems to me) is just to lock everyone up forever.

Never said lock everyone up forever.

I do believe in the death penalty for those cases in which it is clear cut the person did the murder. I also believe our current prison system does nothing to rehabilitate criminals. Especially those who commit crimes of murder.

 

[mrjurrs]

Never said lock everyone up forever.

I do believe in the death penalty for those cases in which it is clear cut the person did the murder. I also believe our current prison system does nothing to rehabilitate criminals. Especially those who commit crimes of murder.

Then what were you suggesting by making the 'released prisoners commit crimes' meme?

 

[Lycanthrope]

Some people claim to have no trust in government, and regularly decry its corruption and incompetence.

And yet they happily and willingly concede to it the power to execute.

 

[mike2810]

Then what were you suggesting by making the 'released prisoners commit crimes' meme?

sigh.
really. you going to ask that.
You posted a link to the Innocent and death penalty.
I posted a link showing some convicted murders who were released committed the same crime again.

You said " better to set ten guilty people free than to imprison 1 innocent person."
You favor letting murders back out in public.

I don't.

 

[mrjurrs]

sigh.
really. you going to ask that.
You posted a link to the Innocent and death penalty.
I posted a link showing some convicted murders who were released committed the same crime again.

You said " better to set ten guilty people free than to imprison 1 innocent person."
You favor letting murders back out in public.

I don't.

Okay, so you favor imprisoning innocent people. Which stance do you suppose will get you thru St. Peter's gateway?

 

[mike2810]

Okay, so you favor imprisoning innocent people. Which stance do you suppose will get you thru St. Peter's gateway?

People who were found guilty at the time by a jury of their peers.

So you are in favor of murderers allowed to murder again. Which do you think will get you through the gateway?

 

[mrjurrs]

People who were found guilty at the time by a jury of their peers.

So you are in favor of murderers allowed to murder again. Which do you think will get you through the gateway?

Easy, not imprisoning innocents.

Redemption is a universal tenet of religion.

 

[mike2810]

Easy, not imprisoning innocents.

Redemption is a universal tenet of religion.

easy, don't let convicted murders out of jail

What changes would you propose in the judicial system to stop "imprisoning innocents".?

The link you provided earlier was about cases of people being convicted of a crime before DNA evidence existed. The jury looked at the available evidence and convicted. They may have had a different conclusion if DNA was available back then.

 

[weaver2]

...“The state of Texas is wrong,” says Russell Moore, the director of Christianity Today’s Public Theology Project and a longtime Christian ethicist with special expertise in Baptist and other American Low Church traditions. “The Book of James calls upon Christians … to lay hands on those who are sick, and quite often those who are dying … to be with them to help them to pray—which is one of the things that their pastors do, is to help people to pray in moments in which it is very difficult to pray. And the execution chamber would certainly be one of those moments.”

When the director of a Public Theology Project asks to lay hands on and pray aloud over condemned prisoners at their execution it sounds like a demand for free advertising not a ministering to a prisoner.

 

[Loulit01]

I'm against the death penalty.

But if we're going to have it, tie the man's hands behind his back, make him get on his knees and put a a .22 slug in his skull from behind. Quick, clean, painless, cheap.

 

[NWRatCon]

easy, don't let convicted murders out of jail

What changes would you propose in the judicial system to stop "imprisoning innocents".?

The link you provided earlier was about cases of people being convicted of a crime before DNA evidence existed. The jury looked at the available evidence and convicted. They may have had a different conclusion if DNA was available back then.

I'm seriously curious about this: do you think this is an actual argument? I'm a great believer in the jury system as a system of justice, but the rate of error is incredibly high. (That's why we have an appeals process.) There are myriad reasons for this, even after the invention of DNA testing, which itself is of variable accuracy, and applicable in limited circumstances. The False Promise of DNA Testing (Atlantic, Subscription).

“Ironically, you have a technology that was meant to help eliminate subjectivity in forensics,” Erin Murphy, a law professor at NYU, told me recently. “But when you start to drill down deeper into the way crime laboratories operate today, you see that the subjectivity is still there: Standards vary, training levels vary, quality varies.”

Last year, Murphy published a book called Inside the Cell: The Dark Side of Forensic DNA, which recounts dozens of cases of DNA typing gone terribly wrong. Some veer close to farce, such as the 15-year hunt for the Phantom of Heilbronn, whose DNA had been found at more than 40 crime scenes in Europe in the 1990s and early 2000s. The DNA in question turned out to belong not to a serial killer, but to an Austrian factory worker who made testing swabs used by police throughout the region. And some are tragic, like the tale of Dwayne Jackson, an African American teenager who pleaded guilty to robbery in 2003 after being presented with damning DNA evidence, and was exonerated years later, in 2011, after a police department in Nevada admitted that its lab had accidentally swapped Jackson’s DNA with the real culprit’s.

Your argument, simply put, is the equivalent of putting a revolver, loaded with a single bullet, to a person's head. Maybe it won't go off; maybe it will. How might that affect the cause of justice?

I used to be a specialist in forensic evidence for both prosecution and defense. I was appalled at the level of outright incompetence and dishonesty at some forensic labs. In one particular case, I was literally in the prosecutor's office when a fax from the government lab came in containing a falsified document. We compared the document with our files and collectively realized what the lab had done (copying the results of a positive test and falsely identifying it as my client's). Fortunately, the prosecutor was an outstandingly ethical lawyer. Not only did he immediately dismiss the case (it was a drug case, and the evidence was a proveably false positive), he reported it to the IG. The resulting investigation shut the lab down, got the lab head fired and more than a dozen cases overturned or dismissed. What if that prosecutor were not as ethical? (I've dealt with them, too. One continued to insist on a guilty plea to a lesser charge even though video evidence positively exonerated my client. "He must have been guilty of something.")

That's the problem with faith. It causes people to turn off their rational processes. It's true in science, the law, politics and in everyday life. If you believe it is true hard enough, then it must be true, even if all evidence is to the contrary. People are incredibly fallible, and gullible. That's true of every element of the justice system, which is, of course, a human system.

 

[NWRatCon]

The govt has that right outside of prison as well. I don't understand is how death isn't a cruel and unusual punishment

It's cruel, but, sadly, hardly unusual.

 

[mrjurrs]

It's cruel, but, sadly, hardly unusual.

I think the government executing someone is unusual. Global executions seem to back me up. American exceptionalism?

 

[Nickyjo]

"Texas’s refusal to allow a pastor to pray while holding a dying man’s hand is an offense to basic Christian values. ...Texas would permit Ramirez his pastor but draw the line at the minister laying hands on the man or praying aloud over him as the state kills him because, it argues, it has “a compelling interest in maintaining an orderly, safe, and effective process when carrying out an irrevocable, and emotionally charged, procedure.” A pastor praying aloud, holding a dying man’s hand, would bring too much flesh, too much humanity, into the thing. Execution theater is all about maintaining the illusion of mechanism.

...“The state of Texas is wrong,” says Russell Moore, the director of Christianity Today’s Public Theology Project and a longtime Christian ethicist with special expertise in Baptist and other American Low Church traditions. “The Book of James calls upon Christians … to lay hands on those who are sick, and quite often those who are dying … to be with them to help them to pray—which is one of the things that their pastors do, is to help people to pray in moments in which it is very difficult to pray. And the execution chamber would certainly be one of those moments.” In that sense, Texas’s limitations seem as much a restriction on the pastor’s religious practice as the inmate’s. I asked Moore if the prayer has to be audible, in his tradition, since the state has disputed as much.

Not that Texas seeks to ban such things, only to deny them to the condemned, leaving room solely for what the state would have the law consider satisfactory Christian practice. And there Texas would betray the faith, whittling it into something so distant from its original shape as to render it barely recognizable. Whatever this Christian religion was meant to be when it was first formed, a luxury for the sinless and pure it certainly was not.

Link

Brunig makes an excellent point. State-sanctioned killing relies on painting the accused as something less than human. It allows us, as a society and the execution to follow through with it with a clear conscience. How is that poor, God-fearing executioner supposed to feel if he's pulling the switch on someone being prayed over - a fellow Christian, a fellow human being? It can't be good.

Bob Dylan sang it well years ago, “And the executioner’s face is always well hidden.”