Death Penalty

This is one that I have some problems with.

There are people who deserved to be put to death and frankly, the planet is better off with them dead sooner rather than later. Adolph Eichmann. Ted Bundy. Timothy McVeigh. John Wayne Gacy. Michael Ross.

I don't doubt for a second that the death penalty is a failure at general deterrence. When the British were hanging people for what we now would consider misdemeanor theft charges, that didn't stop thieving. The death penalty is, however, very good at specific deterrence, as dead men rarely commit more crimes.

The problem I have with the death penalty is that there are no shortage of cases were inmates have been let off Death Row or out of prison for crimes that they were wrongfully convicted. False confessions do occur. Evidence is mishandled or falsified. Experts in forensics have lied on the stand. Cops have lied on the stand. Other criminals will lie someone onto Death Row in order to shorten their sentence. Attorneys in death penalty cases can be overworked, underpaid, unexperienced, asleep or just incompetent. Judges have been biased. District attorneys have been blind to exonerating evidence or covered it up.

All of those things have happened. You can do a little bit of research and find examples for all of those things.

If a felony case is screwed up and fifteen years later, it comes to light because those who lied have seen the light or better testing reveals the evidenciary flaws, then you can let a wrongfully-convicted prisoner out of the pen. They can be compensated, somewhat. Restitution can be had, maybe the truly guilty can be punished.

But all of that is hard to do if the wrongfully convicted person is six feet under.

And what really gripes my caboose is the prosecutors who take the position "the jury found them guilty" and flat-out refuse to reopen the case if new evidence comes to light. Where is the justice in that? If someone is innocent, where is the justice in keeping them in prison? I see folks on the Right rail about someone getting off "on a technicality", but I have yet to see them state that keeping someone in prison on a technicality is equally offensive, if not moreso.

Yes, I see the argument that the courts could become clogged if we allowed prisoners to endlessly reopen their cases. That can be addressed, to some degree, by shifting the burden of proof: After the appeals have run on the original conviction, the prisoner would have to show, by clear and convincing evidence, that the conviction was wrongful.

Hard to do if you're dead, though.

And because a case that looked ironclad can be shown later to be "Swiss cheese" clad, I have to conclude that we, as a nation, ought to get out of the business of executing people.