Upon the miasma of midnight, a darkling spirit identified as Ian
Johnston gently breathed:
On Thu, 14 Sep 2006 11:43:11 UTC, Alistair Gunn
wrote:
: In uk.railway Pyromancer twisted the electrons to say:
: Upon the miasma of midnight, a darkling spirit identified as Tim Fenton
: We don't execute.
: That's the problem. We let them out to re-offend, again and again, and
: each time some other innocent victim's life is ruined, often forever.

: You don't need the death penalty in order to prevent reoffending. You
: just need a society that is prepared to lock people up such that they
: either come out of prison in a box or not at all ...

Or one that changes people while they are in prison so they don't
reoffend when they come out.

Indeed. Which is one reason to only execute serial offenders (and even
then only those who commit the worst types of crime). Re-habilitate and
reform wherever possible - but also accept that there are those who
cannot or will not change their ways.

--
- DJ Pyromancer, The Sunday Goth Social, Leeds. http://www.sheepish.net

Broadband, Dialup, Domains = http://www.wytches.net = The UK's Pagan ISP!
http://www.inkubus-sukkubus.co.uk http://www.revival.stormshadow.com

In message , at 00:13:31 on Thu,
21 Sep 2006, Pyromancer remarked:

Which is one reason to only execute serial offenders (and even
then only those who commit the worst types of crime).

You still get edge cases. In the USA some states automatically execute
murderers on the second offence. Unfortunately, this collides with a
separate recent ruling that unborn children count, so someone murdering
a pregnant woman (even if he was unaware of the pregnancy) is in danger
of getting his "two strikes" in one go.
--
Roland Perry

Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 00:13:31 on Thu,
21 Sep 2006, Pyromancer remarked:

Which is one reason to only execute serial offenders (and even
then only those who commit the worst types of crime).

You still get edge cases. In the USA some states automatically execute
murderers on the second offence. Unfortunately, this collides with a
separate recent ruling that unborn children count, so someone murdering
a pregnant woman (even if he was unaware of the pregnancy) is in danger
of getting his "two strikes" in one go.

I think, given the object is to prevent executing someone who's
innocent, then that would still only count as "one act of murder", even
if it killed more than one person. To be executed in the system I'm
proposing, someone would have had to be convicted, beyond all
reasonable doubt, of two seperate "acts". No doubt some of the Daily
Wail congingent would claim that's too lax, but with something which
really is unreversible, better to err on the side of caution, just in
case.

The USA has peculiar religious concepts driving some of it's social
ideas, including a resurgance of the old idea that a child's life is
worth more than a mother's, which is leading to campaigners demanding
that all women of child-bearing age must at all times refrain from
drinking, action sports, or anything else that might conceivably in any
way harm any child they might happen to conceive. Women who's babies
have been stillborn have been dragged off to jail if they are drug
users and it's though the drug use has harmed the baby.

In message .com, at
03:30:17 on Thu, 21 Sep 2006, Pyromancer
remarked:
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 00:13:31 on Thu,
21 Sep 2006, Pyromancer remarked:

Which is one reason to only execute serial offenders (and even
then only those who commit the worst types of crime).

You still get edge cases. In the USA some states automatically execute
murderers on the second offence. Unfortunately, this collides with a
separate recent ruling that unborn children count, so someone murdering
a pregnant woman (even if he was unaware of the pregnancy) is in danger
of getting his "two strikes" in one go.

I think, given the object is to prevent executing someone who's
innocent, then that would still only count as "one act of murder", even
if it killed more than one person.

It might under some ideal system that you have in your head, but how do
you know that a similar issue that you hadn't predicted would arise in a
few years time? The way law and sentencing works is largely reaction to
unexpected things happening in real life, rather than what the
legislators were able to predict.

To be executed in the system I'm proposing, someone would have had to
be convicted, beyond all reasonable doubt, of two seperate "acts".

In this case, one act is killing the mother, and the other act is
killing the child. The argument which has arisen is that it doesn't
matter whether the child was in the mother's arms, or womb, at the time.

--
Roland Perry

Roland Perry wrote:
In message .com, at
03:30:17 on Thu, 21 Sep 2006, Pyromancer
remarked:

I think, given the object is to prevent executing someone who's
innocent, then that would still only count as "one act of murder", even
if it killed more than one person.

It might under some ideal system that you have in your head, but how do
you know that a similar issue that you hadn't predicted would arise in a
few years time? The way law and sentencing works is largely reaction to
unexpected things happening in real life, rather than what the
legislators were able to predict.

No system can be perfect, but with a little common sense, and a
presumption to always err on the side of caution, it can be made to
work. That's why we have human judges and juries, and not sentencing
by (say) computer.

To be executed in the system I'm proposing, someone would have had to
be convicted, beyond all reasonable doubt, of two seperate "acts".

In this case, one act is killing the mother, and the other act is
killing the child. The argument which has arisen is that it doesn't
matter whether the child was in the mother's arms, or womb, at the time.

No no, I'm talking about entirely seperate "acts" - in different places
or different timeframes. Even if someone planted a bomb that killed 50
people, from the death penalty POV it'd still be one act - the bomb
itself. If they then went on to shoot or stab someone somewhere else
(and left enough evidence in both cases for completely sound
convictions), that would be a different act.

The objective is not to start hanging people left right and centre, but
only to do so for clear, serial offences.

In message om, at
10:10:57 on Thu, 21 Sep 2006, Pyromancer
remarked:
It might under some ideal system that you have in your head, but how do
you know that a similar issue that you hadn't predicted would arise in a
few years time? The way law and sentencing works is largely reaction to
unexpected things happening in real life, rather than what the
legislators were able to predict.

No system can be perfect, but with a little common sense, and a
presumption to always err on the side of caution, it can be made to
work. That's why we have human judges and juries, and not sentencing
by (say) computer.

To be executed in the system I'm proposing, someone would have had to
be convicted, beyond all reasonable doubt, of two seperate "acts".

In this case, one act is killing the mother, and the other act is
killing the child. The argument which has arisen is that it doesn't
matter whether the child was in the mother's arms, or womb, at the time.

No no, I'm talking about entirely seperate "acts" - in different places
or different timeframes. Even if someone planted a bomb that killed 50
people, from the death penalty POV it'd still be one act - the bomb
itself. If they then went on to shoot or stab someone somewhere else
(and left enough evidence in both cases for completely sound
convictions), that would be a different act.

The objective is not to start hanging people left right and centre, but
only to do so for clear, serial offences.

This is all hopelessly idealistic in the real world of criminal justice
systems. Never mind, you are allowed to dream.
--
Roland Perry

Upon the miasma of midnight, a darkling spirit identified as Roland
Perry gently breathed:

The objective is not to start hanging people left right and centre, but
only to do so for clear, serial offences.

This is all hopelessly idealistic in the real world of criminal justice
systems. Never mind, you are allowed to dream.

Well, TBH the criminal justice system is probably one of the placed we
really need to be as idealistic as possible - getting it wrong tends to
have very serious consequences, and not just regarding the death
penalty.

It's been a very interesting thread - thanks to all who contributed.

--
- DJ Pyromancer, The Sunday Goth Social, Leeds. http://www.sheepish.net

Broadband, Dialup, Domains = http://www.wytches.net = The UK's Pagan ISP!
http://www.inkubus-sukkubus.co.uk http://www.revival.stormshadow.com