Texas Insists on Executing a Man the State Admits is Innocent

[georgesbluegirl]

I support the death penalty for murderers because according to God, it is the only method of cleansing the land of innocent blood that was shed. In addition, God instituted the death penalty for various other offenses in the Old Testament including homosexuals, witches, idolators, people cursing their Father and Mother, rape, and various other crimes. It is up to each individual government to decide what crimes are capitol offenses, and in my opinion, if in America they decided to expand the death penalty to additional crimes, it would be fine by me. It would save the tax payers a great deal of money keeping up criminals, and reduce the number of repeat offenses by criminals after they are released.

(Bolding mine)

It costs more, actually, to go through the capital process than to imprison an individual for life. Expanding the death penalty would probably wind up costing the taxpayer a lot more.

When you say it costs more, what exactly do you mean? Do you mean in regard to the lengthy appeals process in court, or the actual cost of the procedure? Appeals will take place regardless of the sentence, so if that is what you are basing your claim on, it really holds no weight. If you are refering to the cost of an execution, I don't see why that should be expensive. I would personally like to see them return to death by firing squad. That would be a very humane way of executing someone, and would only cost the price of the bullets and the salary of the executioners.

Going through the appeals process for a capital trial costs a lot more than for a non-death penalty case. There was a big exhaustive study that came out of Duke a while ago that looked at the death penalty on a state level and then nationally (this was sometime in the 1990s I think, but similar data exist from many other reports). Overall, they found that the capital trials can cost the taxpayer something like up to 16 times more. According to an excellent summary article I read a little while ago from Columbia law, states with the death penalty spend about 2.5 - 5 million per capital case compared to about 1 million on a case for life without parole (lol, can you tell this is one of my soapbox issues?). I'll do some more sourcing if you'd like, but it's pretty easy to do a search of academic papers and studies and find that capital punishment isn't economically efficient. This, again, doesn't go to the moral dimensions of it, but when someone asserts that the death penalty "costs more than life in prison," there is a solid foundation of fact and study behind them - it's not just a hollow statement, it's pretty well substantiated.

We can get into the utter arbitrariness as to how and when the death penalty is sought and the corresponding racial bias if you'd like, too....

[MorningGlory]

Excuse me?!?!?! Is this some kinda joke? This guy is the driver of a car in which he and his friends drove around doing drugs and committed two armed robberies. They then drive to a persons house at which one of his friends attempts to rob another person...and the victim is murdered. I'm supposed to feel sorry for this guy.

Society is lucky that more people weren't murdered that night...and we are equally lucky that this guy will no longer be a threat to society as of Aug 30th.

NO ONE should ever be executed unless they murder another or rape a child under 12. Period. Sure, this guy is probably a mutant scum bag but....he shouldn't be executed because he was WITH someone who committed murder. I live in Texas too, and I believe in the death penalty, but only as aforementioned. This isn't China, after all. Texas is a tough state in which to find yourself on death row but I hope appeals prevail in this case. I also hope he never gets out of prison.

[georgesbluegirl]

Excuse me?!?!?! Is this some kinda joke? This guy is the driver of a car in which he and his friends drove around doing drugs and committed two armed robberies. They then drive to a persons house at which one of his friends attempts to rob another person...and the victim is murdered. I'm supposed to feel sorry for this guy.

Society is lucky that more people weren't murdered that night...and we are equally lucky that this guy will no longer be a threat to society as of Aug 30th.

NO ONE should ever be executed unless they murder another or rape a child under 12. Period. Sure, this guy is probably a mutant scum bag but....he shouldn't be executed because he was WITH someone who committed murder. I live in Texas too, and I believe in the death penalty, but only as aforementioned. This isn't China, after all. Texas is a tough state in which to find yourself on death row but I hope appeals prevail in this case. I also hope he never gets out of prison.

God set up the death penalty in the Old Testament for many crimes besides murder. It was given for such things as idolatry, witchcraft, rape, adultery, homosexual acts, beastiality, etc. In this country, it was once common to have people executed for being a thief. I really have no problem with this execution going forward, and would not be all that up in arms if the death penalty were expanded to addition crimes besides 1st degree murder. If it was ok with God when he set up the law for his people in ancient Israel, it is fine with me.

Okay, but we live in America, not a theocracy. While you might be theologically okay saying that the death penalty should be administered for doing X, the reality is that human governance is always going to have a degree of error - and in the case of the death penalty, it's really not effective or efficient to execute people. Only a small percentage of cases that could be wind up being tried as capital cases, leading to a huge amount of arbitrariness about which cases are tried as capital cases (hint: if you can afford a good or even decent lawyer and/or are white, your chances get exponentially better). Given the amount of energy it takes to go through the capital appeals process to ensure that an individual is guilty, and then the fact that innocent people still find their way to death row, some of whom are exonerated only after death (and I tend to give a lot of weight to even one innocent man dying)...I just don't think that it's worth it to try to fix what is already a hugely flawed system. It's much more feasible to protect the populace by locking up convicted killers for life. If we were somehow omniscient, it might be worth arguing for, but we're human beings - and I think that we should leave death between God and the sinner.

[georgesbluegirl]

I understand your position Georgesbluegirl, and you are right that on rare occassions, innocent people are put to death, as was also the case in ancient Israel. At the same time, murderers sometimes escape from maximum security prisons and kill again. It doesn't happen often, but it does occur, and innocent lives are lost that way as well.

Just because God instituted the death penalty doesn't mean we must have one in America, anymore than it must be expanded to include all the crimes God said it could be used for. As a citizen, you have every right to oppose it, but in the case of capitol murder, I support it for the reasons I gave. It is just an area where we will have to agree to dissagree. I appreciate your civil discourse on a subject I know you are very passionate about.

You too!

[followerofjesus]

It doesn't appear the this young man had anything to do with the murder other than being present, in that case everyone their should be found guily under this premise. He may have felt fear for his life after the murder and drove him around not really knowing what to do. This seems a little harsh.

[followerofjesus]

Not enough facts means it might be good to have some before somebody is executed, unless he played some role its not fair.

[followerofjesus]

lets hope and pray thats the case, there is nothing worse than putting someone to death that doesn't deserve it.

Should children be prosecuted when their mother is abused by the father? Under this law aren't they guilty to? (just for the case of argument)

[Marnie]

Besides, applying the death penalty to murderers is not the issue here. The primary problem for me is that this guy did not actually kill anyone, although he was involved in the crime. As far as I know, none of the other states allow the death penalty for what amounts to being accessory to murder; to me, allowing it implies that you are not only responsible for your own decisions but for the decisions of those around you to a degree that surrendering your life to the state is acceptable.

Mike was addressing your incorrect assertion that the death penalty is not a deterrent according to "stats." Stats almost never tell the whole truth. You ought to know that.

This man broke a law, was convicted under that law and deserves to be punished according to the law of the land, in Texas. If you live in Texas, seek to change the law. However, after having been in law enforcement I can tell you it is not a bad law. After having been assaulted by two men with priors much worse than Foster's, I can't help but wonder if justice was more swift and more severe and more certain all across the boarder, how much different my life would have been. It's easy to make moral pronouncements about some guy you have no knowledge about. The jury found him guilty for a reason and imposed the maximum sentence for reason. None of us were in the jury room. It's also easy to make moral pronouncements about the unfairness or injustice of a law when you have never been the victim of a heinous crime.

[kat8585]

It doesn't appear the this young man had anything to do with the murder other than being present, in that case everyone their should be found guily under this premise. He may have felt fear for his life after the murder and drove him around not really knowing what to do. This seems a little harsh.

When he was driving the car, did he know the guy was going to commit murder?

[JustinM]

quote georgesbluegirl: "Nevertheless, we still incarcerate people - to keep them from harming society but also to try to rehabilitate them."

Funny, I thought we incarcerated people to punish them.