7 ms·
"I agree but in my opinion the only one." "In practice, it's more expensive than life-in-prison" doesn't do it for ya?
by dllthomas 11y ago
"I agree but in my opinion the only one."
"In practice, it's more expensive than life-in-prison" doesn't do it for ya?
- CamperBob2 11y agoI'd guess that the legal expense associated with endless appeals and delaying tactics is incurred for the same reason I believe capital punishment is immoral on a personal level -- namely, that "guilty beyond reasonable doubt" is nowhere near a strong enough criterion to justify taking a life. It's just too subjective. We wouldn't need to build so much fault tolerance into the process if it weren't so badly flawed to begin with. If the death penalty were reserved for use in cases that meet a higher standard -- say "guilty beyond any conceivable possibility of doubt" -- I wouldn't necessarily have a problem with it. To me, that's the difference between a Timothy McVeigh and a West Memphis Three. But I don't have any insight into how many cases would meet that criterion. It may be that the death penalty is simply not worth reserving as an option in those cases.