This is exactly why I'm against the death penalty.

[garybeck]

No one should ever be put to death unless there is absolute 100% certainty about their guilt. Like if the suspect admits their guilt. Or DNA or video leaves no doubt. Our judicial system does not offer this degree of certainty in many cases. There are so many places where the judicial system can fail. Souped up lawyers, sympathetic juries, evidence withheld, racial bias, police corruption, I could go on.

I have sat on a jury and I know many times after all is said and done, you have to vote one way or another and you may be 80% sure, but not 100%. "Reasonable doubt" is not clearly defined.

We know that innocent people have been put to death in the past. How many? We may never know.

The Troy Davis trial illustrates to me exactly why the death penalty is wrong. There are enough unanswered questions to show clearly that we are not even close to the 100% degree of certainty. When we are talking about taking a life, 90% is not enough. 95% is not enough. In a case like this, he should spend the rest of his life behind bars, and perhaps pursue a retrial. But there is clearly enough uncertainty that he should not be put to death.

Just look at his picture.



He is a human being. We may never know for sure whether or not Troy Davis is guilty. How many others have died and then later been exonerated? How many others have died but were innocent and we just don't know it? Our justice system is not perfect. OJ got off, and Casey Anthony got off. Countless others didn't get off when they should have. It is part of our judicial system, which is not perfect. When we realize how imperfect our judicial system is, we should remove the death penalty.

This is a complete failure of our justice system.

[Dreamer Tatum]

1. Fail on two critical fronts.

1. Of course he's a person. So is everyone else on death row. Putting his picture up does exactly zero to advance the cause of his innocence, if he actually is innocent.

2. If there is enough doubt about his guilt to make the DP distasteful, why on earth would you advocate life in prison instead? He's either guilty, or innocent. If you think he's innocent, he should be released, no?

[garybeck]

3. I guess you didn't read my post

I said he should continue to pursue a new trial.

read my post... I'm not saying he's innocent and I'm not saying he's guilty. I'm saying that since there is uncertainty, he should not be put to death.

you said "if you think he's innocent, he should be released, no?" where did I say I think he's innocent?

it doesn't matter what I think anyway. the bottom line is there is uncertainty. there is no smoking gun. there is no admission. there is no dna. there is no video. a quick read of his wikipedia page demonstrates clearly there is uncertainty on many accounts. that's all i'm saying. I don't know if he's innocent or guilty. but i do know there are a number of questions about his story and trial that raise a significant amount of uncertainty.

for that alone, he should not be put to death.

you seem to be twisting my OP around. you seem to think i'm saying "why are we putting an innocent man to death? this is horrible!" no where did I say anything like that. I do not necessarily think he is innocent or that he should be released. I don't know enough about his case. But I do know that there is uncertainty. That alone is enough.

have a nice day.

[EstimatedProphet]

6. Why advocate life in prison?

Because if someone is found guilty by mistake or negligence, then they can still be released. That is after all the point of the OP.

[garybeck]

10. exactly my point. thanks. one could also argue

that death is the easy way out, and I've also read that it costs more to put someone to death than to keep them in prison. there are many more arguments against the death penalty... but to me the main one is that you don't EVER want to put someone to death unless you're 100% sure they are guilty and in most cases this is not possible.

there is one case where I would advocate it. I think if someone is convicted and sentenced to life, and they CHOOSE to be put to death over life in prison, that is their choice and they should be granted such.

[EstimatedProphet]

18. Costs more? Yes.

Heard this on the radio this morning so I can't quote a source, but supposedly it costs about $3 million to go through legal channels for an execution. compare that to 20 years in prison at around $10,000 per year.

[socialist_n_TN]

14. That's a BASIC false equivalency on it's face

Unless you think it's possible to revive an executed person and free him/her if he/she is eventually discovered to be innocent.

I've gone back and forth on the death penalty in my life, from anti to for in selected cases to back to anti simply because of what the OP stated. It's almost impossible to know for certain that someone is guilty and the death penalty is irrevokable.

PLUS, it's a class based punishment. NOBODY with wealth is executed. Only the poor and mostly racial minorities. That alone makes me anti death penalty.

[Cigar11]

16. Well when 7 out of 9 witnesses recant thier story ...

You don't need to be that educated in law to say there could be some doubt.

[ChandlerJr]

2. And what of this well groomed, good looking young man

he had a mother and is human and everything. Just look at that pic.


Lawrence Brewer scheduled to be executed Wednesday in Huntsville

[garybeck]

5. I don't know anything about his case, but I would say the same thing

unless he has admitted guilt, there is clear DNA or video, or such overwhelming evidence that leaves no doubt, he should not be put to death.

[tblue]

8. Thank you, garybeck.

I am 100% opposed to the death penalty. In that I guess I am pro-life. Even for that heinous murderer of James Byrd, I would advocate commuting his sentence. Life at hard labor (not torture) is a humane and acceptable choice.

[Rob H.]

9. He's one of the three convicted of killing James Byrd in Texas 1998

From wikipedia:

James Byrd, Jr. (May 2, 1949 – June 7, 1998) was an African-American who was murdered by three white men in Jasper, Texas, on June 7, 1998. Shawn Berry, Lawrence Brewer, and John King dragged Byrd behind a pick-up truck along an asphalt pavement after they wrapped a heavy logging chain around his ankles. Byrd was pulled along for about two miles as the truck swerved from side to side.

(snip)

The murder

On June 7, 1998, Byrd, age 49, accepted a ride from Shawn Berry (age 24), Lawrence Brewer (age 31), and John King (age 23). Berry, who was driving, was acquainted with Byrd from around town. Instead of taking Byrd home, the three men took Byrd to a remote county road out of town, beat him with anything they could find, urinated on his unconscious body, chained him by his ankles to their pickup truck dragging him for three miles. Brewer later claimed that Byrd's throat had been slashed by Berry before he was dragged. However, forensic evidence suggests that Byrd had been attempting to keep his head up while being dragged, and an autopsy suggested that Byrd was alive during much of the dragging. Byrd died after his right arm and head were severed after his body hit a culvert. His body had caught the culvert on the side of the road, resulting in Byrd's decapitation.

Berry, Brewer, and King dumped their victim's mutilated remains in front of an African-American cemetery on Huff Creek Road; the three men then went to a barbecue. Along the area where Byrd was dragged, authorities found a wrench with "Berry" written on it. They also found a lighter that was inscribed with "Possum", which was King's prison nickname. The following morning, Byrd's limbs were found scattered across a seldom-used road. The police found 75 places that were littered with Byrd's remains. State law enforcement officials, along with Jasper's District Attorney, determined that since Brewer and King were well-known white supremacists, the murder was a hate crime. They decided to call upon the Federal Bureau of Investigation less than 24 hours after the discovery of Byrd's remains.

King had several tattoos considered to be racist: a black man hanging from a tree, Nazi symbols, the words "Aryan Pride," and the patch for a gang of white supremacist inmates known as the Confederate Knights of America. In a jailhouse letter to Brewer that was intercepted by jail officials, King expressed pride in the crime and said he realized in committing the murder he might have to die. "Regardless of the outcome of this, we have made history. Death before dishonor. Sieg Heil!", King wrote. An officer investigating the case also testified that witnesses said King had referenced The Turner Diaries after beating Byrd.

[RaleighNCDUer]

17. And Byrd's family is opposed to the execution. nt

[polmaven]

15. Brewer was convicted of

dragging James Byrd to his death behind a car in Texas on June 7, 1998. He is also schedule for death at 7:00 tonight.

We disagree only that I am 100% anti death penalty in all cases. I just cannot accept killing ANYONE, even the most heinous killers, in my name. Life, without the possibility of parole is my preferred punishment.

[donheld]

20. They are both dead.

One there was never doubt about his guilt, the other there were very serious questions about his guilt.

[gratuitous]

4. The other aspect that goes unmentioned

If you reserve the death penalty for those cases that are particularly heinous or where the defendant isn't sympathetic, you wind up with prosecutions that paint the crime as particularly heinous (whether it is or not) and defendants as unsympathetic. The death penalty then becomes a popularity contest or who can make crimes fit the template so as to persuade a jury. Eventually, you get to the point where prosecutions seeking the death penalty will settle for "Well, okay, this guy may not be as vicious as I've tried to make him out to be, but can you know for certain he won't eventually become that vicious? Better safe and execute him than sorry if at some indeterminate point in the future he gets out and practices that hypothetical viciousness on you or someone you know or love." Surprisingly, this argument (perhaps not so baldly stated) is persuasive to any number of people.

If there's a problem revealed later on about actual guilt or innocence, it's pretty hard to release someone who's been executed, and posthumous exoneration is cold comfort at best. Another person has died for no better reason than blood lust.

[MsLeopard]

7. I'm against it for one simple reason

It's exclusively a poor person's penalty. The wealthy can rape, pillage, loot, steal, lie, cheat, murder, etc. without fear of any penalty at all. Our two tier justice system has been institutionalized and rich white men can pretty much do whatever they want. Look at the banksters and war criminals walking around free as can be. It's enough to make you :puke:

[EFerrari]

11. K&R

[Logical]

12. You realize every jury thinks they are 100% guilty???

[sfpcjock]

13. Killing the wrong dude to honor the memory of a police officer--low class, Georgia

You need to start over. Sad.

[surrealAmerican]

19. Perhaps I'm a crazy optimist, but I actually have a glimmer of hope that ...

... if we were to abolish the death penalty (in all cases), within a few generations we could end up with a populace that truly believes that killing is wrong, instead of believing that it's a good thing to kill some people.