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I'm thinking more along the lines of a Jeffery Dahmer. There was overwhelming forensic evidence of guilt, along with full confessions. In that case, guilt was a

by choko 10y ago

I'm thinking more along the lines of a Jeffery Dahmer. There was overwhelming forensic evidence of guilt, along with full confessions. In that case, guilt was all but irrefutable. I've yet to hear an argument as to why someone like that, and under those circumstances, should be allowed to remain alive. I submit that allowing such unrepentant and irredeemable evil to exist is more barbaric than a quick death.

teddyh 10y ago
You still have not clearly defined how you would differentiate between the two cases. Both were convicted, with forensic evidence, and had confessed, to multiple murders. If a conviction is not enough, what would be?
- choko 10y ago
  I'm not a lawyer or a legislator. I don't have the legal wherewithal to know exactly how to word a potential codification of death penalty requirements based on a large amount of forensic evidence and a confession. It doesn't change my opinion that there are some people (in extremely rare cases) that should lose their lives. For what it's worth, the article you cited states that there was a lack of technical forensic evidence, which was not a problem in the Dahmer case.
  - teddyh 10y ago
    So what you seem to be saying is that the death penalty is only for when we’re really, really sure that the person is guilty. The problem is, we already have such a thing, and we call it a conviction in court. This is already only supposed to happen when we’re really, really sure of a person’s guilt. What you are proposing is some sort of “super-conviction”, and the question of where to draw the line between the two forms of conviction, and how they should be defined, becomes extremly subjective. Until you have some concrete objective measures which can stand up to legislative scrutiny, I doubt the possibility of even doing such a thing.
    - choko 10y ago
      There's guilty, where you have evidence that points to a suspects guilt, and then there's (for example) "I did this thing in full view of 100 people and cameras" guilty. That's already pretty big difference between levels of assurance of guilt. As I said before, I can't come up with legal, concrete, and objective measures because I haven't studied law. It's completely unreasonable for you to ask that. Furthermore, as a taxpayer and regular voter, I help fund and choose the people that have said training. It's up to them to figure out how to implement a solution. I can't be expected to do everything.

by choko 10y ago

teddyh 10y ago

You still have not clearly defined how you would differentiate between the two cases. Both were convicted, with forensic evidence, and had confessed, to multiple murders. If a conviction is not enough, what would be?

choko 10y ago
I'm not a lawyer or a legislator. I don't have the legal wherewithal to know exactly how to word a potential codification of death penalty requirements based on a large amount of forensic evidence and a confession. It doesn't change my opinion that there are some people (in extremely rare cases) that should lose their lives. For what it's worth, the article you cited states that there was a lack of technical forensic evidence, which was not a problem in the Dahmer case.
- teddyh 10y ago
  So what you seem to be saying is that the death penalty is only for when we’re really, really sure that the person is guilty. The problem is, we already have such a thing, and we call it a conviction in court. This is already only supposed to happen when we’re really, really sure of a person’s guilt. What you are proposing is some sort of “super-conviction”, and the question of where to draw the line between the two forms of conviction, and how they should be defined, becomes extremly subjective. Until you have some concrete objective measures which can stand up to legislative scrutiny, I doubt the possibility of even doing such a thing.
  - choko 10y ago
    There's guilty, where you have evidence that points to a suspects guilt, and then there's (for example) "I did this thing in full view of 100 people and cameras" guilty. That's already pretty big difference between levels of assurance of guilt. As I said before, I can't come up with legal, concrete, and objective measures because I haven't studied law. It's completely unreasonable for you to ask that. Furthermore, as a taxpayer and regular voter, I help fund and choose the people that have said training. It's up to them to figure out how to implement a solution. I can't be expected to do everything.