Nobody interested in technology has failed to notice how aggressive and remorseless prosecutors can be in pursuing relatively powerless individuals. Examples: any Whistleblower acting in the public interest is at serious risk, as are activists like Aaron Scwartz by the piling on of a century's worth of charges, or journalists who expose information the government would like kept secret, like Barrett Brown, and FBI agents and Federal prosecutors are perfectly happy to tell ridiculous lies to further their abuse (in court filings, the Feds claimed Ladar Levinson exited the back door of his 5th story apartment and drove off -- this would have required a 5 story jump from his balcony).
Of course, if you are politically connected, and you only leak in a self-glorifying manner, then you get a slap on the wrist, e.g., General Petraeus.
This morning I read a letter of apology written by a prosecutor who got an innocent man convicted -- to see that was very moving and makes me feel hopeful that perhaps, the sentiments he writes about will filter back into the prosecutorial community:
The full letter (if ever there is a time to RTFA, this is it) and an excerpt:
In 1984, I was 33 years old. I was arrogant, judgmental, narcissistic and very full of myself. I was not as interested in justice as I was in winning. To borrow a phrase from Al Pacino in the movie "And Justice for All," "Winning became everything."
After the death verdict in the Ford trial, I went out with others and celebrated with a few rounds of drinks. That's sick. I had been entrusted with the duty to seek the death of a fellow human being, a very solemn task that certainly did not warrant any "celebration."
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:20PM
What does it have to do with the case of Aaron Swartz? The prosecutors in the latter case were enforcing the law, and Swartz did not help his cause by taunting the FBI on his website after he walked free in a similar, earlier case.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by hemocyanin on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:38PM
The link is aggressive blind prosecution. Not all prosecutors are like that, but many are, and the examples span the entire gamut of cases, from run of the mill crimes to whistle blowing. I would like that to change, but until we start to see public acknowledgement that this problem exists by those perpetrating the abuses, it won't. So publicity is good.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 27 2015, @02:53AM
Ambitious prosecutors don't mix with prosecutorial discretion, but that's how things are.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:20PM
AMERICA FUCK YEAH!!!! RITE OR RONG AMERICA IS ALWAYS RITE!!!!!!!!!!!!
(Score: 3, Touché) by LoRdTAW on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:23PM
Because this type of thinking only happens in America.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:25PM
Can't tell if you were being sarcastic. Everyone everywhere, stupid as fuck.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:30PM
Regarding the Jewish Question, the Führer is determined to clear the table. He warned the Jews that if they were to cause another world war, it would lead to their own destruction. Those were not empty words. Now the world war has come. The destruction of the Jews must be its necessary consequence. We cannot be sentimental about it. It is not for us to feel sympathy for the Jews. We should have sympathy rather with our own German people. If the German people have to sacrifice 160,000 victims in yet another campaign in the east, then those responsible for this bloody conflict will have to pay for it with their lives.
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:14PM
Interesting. Here is a source [wikipedia.org] for that quote. Gerlach, Christian (December 1998). "The Wannsee Conference, the Fate of German Jews, and Hitler's Decision in Principle to Exterminate All European Jews". The Journal of Modern History 70 (4): 790. doi:10.1086/235167. Reprinted in Bartov, Omer, ed. (2000). The Holocaust: Origins, Implementation, Aftermath. London: Routledge. pp. 106–140. ISBN 0-415-15035-3.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @07:52PM
That is exceptionally intellectually dishonest, intentional or not. Joseph Goebbels was quoted in the source that was quoted in wikipedia. The actual source is Goebbels during first-hand events, not in 1998 by a historian. At least you could have used "qtd. in" instead of parading what one of the most vile people in history said as being from a history writer over half a century later.
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Thursday March 26 2015, @09:09PM
I thought it was obvious from the wikipedia link and from the quote itself, that this was mainly a quote from Hitler, not the opinion of the books author. My apologies to those who didn't get that from context.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 5, Insightful) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:22PM
The irony here is that this prosecutors's repentance for the awful thing he did serves as evidence that even the perpetrators of the most terrible acts can sometimes see the error of their ways and reform, which is in itself a very strong argument against capital punishment...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by ikanreed on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:28PM
And I try to put myself in the shoes of the pro-death-penalty people, because if I can do that for murderer's, I can do it for killers who think they're doing the right thing. Best as I can tell, they think there's a switch that flips and you go from human to sub-human. It's a tempting narrative, because you can't imagine yourself ever going as far as murderer's do.
But even in that framing, I still find myself thinking of murderer's as flawed humans whose flaws run deeper and more profound that the rest of us. If it's a broken component of their mind, then it's something I have to view as potentially treatable. If it was a conscious choice that lead them down the wrong path, then I have to view it as something that can be reshaped and rehabilitated.
(Score: 5, Funny) by ikanreed on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:37PM
My inexplicable abu'se of apo'strophe's here make's a good ca'se for the death penalty.
(Score: 5, Funny) by hemocyanin on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:41PM
No worries -- you're name are good enough excus.
(Score: 3, Informative) by hemocyanin on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:47PM
There are some examples of that rehabilitation, or at least remorse, amongst executioners in this article as well as some exploration of the redemption issue GP points out:
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/03/24/whogetsredemption/ [firstlook.org]
(Score: 5, Insightful) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:59PM
Well said. I believe the killer is in each and every one of us, it's just that some of us are able to suppress it more than others. Most of us are fortunate enough to never encounter a situation that tests our self control to breaking point.
Weird anecdote time: It's a tiny thing that I will never forget, because it affected me profoundly. I was walking through town one dark evening when I saw a bunch of boisterous teenage boys strutting through the streets. They were posturing, shouting, swearing, spitting and generally trying to impress one another and look tough. One of them decided he was going to punch a street sign. He took a run at it, jumped, swung his fist and hit it with a loud bang, then ran on laughing with his friends.
The reason it affected me is that the motion of that kid - every part of his gait, jump, swing and punch in those few moments was like that of a chimpanzee. Seriously, if you could have motion-captured that event and applied it to a CGI chimp model, it would have fitted right in with Planet of the Apes or Kong. YHTBT I know, but it was uncanny.
We are bald apes. Never forget that. We like to think of ourselves as different and special, and in many ways we are, but no matter how many layers of clothes and civilisation and fancy words we hide our true selves under, every one of us is driven by the same set of violent, primitive impulses that you can see in wildlife documentaries. So much of our supposedly civilised behaviour and beliefs are crude primate reflexes, with a thin justification painted on top because we like to convince ourselves that we are acting rationally. This [wikipedia.org] is an enlightening (and entertaining) book on the subject.
(Score: 1) by inertnet on Thursday March 26 2015, @09:14PM
A killer may be in each and everyone of us, but about 30% of men have a 'warrior gene' according to http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-31714853 [bbc.com]: "About 30% of men have this so-called warrior gene, but whether the gene is triggered or not depends crucially on what happens to you in childhood."
(Score: 3, Interesting) by fliptop on Friday March 27 2015, @12:28AM
Perhaps, but we do have something apes don't: the ability to reason.
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 27 2015, @01:40AM
Speak for yourself, hippy. I vote republican.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by dry on Friday March 27 2015, @03:37AM
Thing is that reason is usually used to explain away our primitive urges rather then change them.
(Score: 2) by dry on Friday March 27 2015, @03:44AM
Not all Apes are equal. Take Bonobos, very non-violent but do they ever fuck and everything related. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonobo#Sexual_social_behavior [wikipedia.org] Along with Chimpanzees they are our closest relative and us 3 apes are the only primates that use sex for other reasons then reproduction.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by TK-421 on Thursday March 26 2015, @05:14PM
Let me preface this by saying that I am not aiming this question at you specifically, but rather at everyone. You just happen to have provided the segue.
So I too struggle with the death penalty. My visceral response had it been someone I loved who was murdered I would expect to want the death penalty imposed of those responsible and found guilty. My faith tells me that I should forgive them and putting them to death seems like the opposite of forgiveness. Note that I said forgive, not forget. I would never forget and I would never allow that person to do the same thing again. I am just saying that the death penalty would be off my table.
So back to my question. If the co-pilot of the Germanwings Flight 9525 had somehow lived would we deny the death penalty? I know it is rare but there have been survivors of this kind of crash in the past. The evidence coming in is seems pretty clear that this guy murdered 150+ people for a yet to be discovered reason. Barring some unthinkable excuse this guy is guilty. When I think of the premeditation required to pull this off I struggle to think of ever seeing him rehabilitated.
For those who struggle with the death penalty does this type of crime, Germanwings Flight 9525, cause you to pause or does it change nothing?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by ikanreed on Thursday March 26 2015, @05:27PM
You're not changing the core formula at all.
All you're doing is upping the severity of the crimes committed. That doesn't make the basal instinct for revenge any more ethically valid. At all.
Either you're achieving something through the death penalty that couldn't be done another way(argument's I'll freely listen to forever, and have heard no good ones), or you're killing people out of emotion, which, to me, is murder.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Jesus_666 on Thursday March 26 2015, @09:53PM
If the co-pilot of the Germanwings Flight 9525 had somehow lived would we deny the death penalty?
Yes. Categorically. If tried in Germany there would be no way he'd get the death penalty and no one would even consider it. A few reasons:
1. We don't practice capital punishment and we don't want to practice capital punishment. Revenge has no place in our legal system (beyond paying out damages) and whatever deterrent effect an execution might have is far outweighed by both the human rights issues and the problem that miscarriages of justice end with an innocent person dying. Plus, it's hypocritical: A jury can sentence an innocent person to death and neither the jury nor the prosecutor nor the judge get sent to death row for that. At the very least the prosecutor should be tried for criminal negligience, which I don't think happens very often.
2. "Extended suicides" (as this kind of action is called) don't automatically mean that the person carrying them out is a psychopath who gets off on killing other people. It might as well be, for instance, an old trauma being triggered that drives an on-the-spot decision to commit suicide right then. The motivations for suicide are manifold and some people don't act rationally while carrying out a plan to kill themselves. (Also note that the premediation in this case amounted to waiting until the pilot was gone. It's not like this thing had to be meticulously planned weeks in advance; it's very much plausible that the co-pilot decided on his suicide during the flight.)
3. Even if we were to implement the death penalty, how would we do it? There is no known way of executing a person that is reliable, switft, painless and dignified. Well, there's vaporization by nuke but that one is unrealistic. Even unrepentant serial killers have a right to be treated well and with dignity. A botched execution would be akin to torture and thus a method of execution with which that is possible can't be allowed in good conscience.
4. Recent history should illustrate that we don't have the state kill people willy-nilly. The Schettino case is a great example: He screwed up (along with the helmsman) and hit a rock, then he failed to inform the authorities in time, then he failed to issue an evacuation order until one hour later, then he left the ship before the evacuation was complete. In the end, thirty-two people were dead. The court in Italy sentenced him to sixteen years in prison. I'm not aware of anyone clamoring for the death sentence. Okay, so this wasn't suicide but grossly unprofessional conduct over the objections of others (like the harbormaster telling him to get out of the lifeboat) but still, lots of people are dead because the person they entrusted their lives to couldn't be arsed to live up to that trust.
Or how about the German nurse who deliberately caused cardiac arrest in hospital patients so he could reanimate them and look like a hero? The number of victims is unclear but might be as high as 180. I think the trial is still ongoing and no, nobody asks for his death, at least not in any public forum I am aware of. A prison sentence followed by preventive detention (essentially indefinite jail time with possible release every two years and intensive support to try to rehabilitate the inmate) seems plausible and would serve society just as well as capital punishment, except we're not having to justify even more death.
For those who struggle with the death penalty does this type of crime, Germanwings Flight 9525, cause you to pause or does it change nothing?
It changes nothing. There is simply no place for the death penalty in a civilized society. You could as well have asked whether Germanwings Flight 9525 caused me to reconsider selling convicts into slavery.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Friday March 27 2015, @01:03AM
You supply examples of European cases and ask whether anyone is clamoring for the death penalty in those cases.
I think you can be pretty sure that if those cases happened in the US there would be people clamoring for the death penalty, it seems to be a common response in the US to seek revenge.
I do agree with your statement though, there really is no place for the death penalty in a civilized society.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Jesus_666 on Friday March 27 2015, @05:58AM
(By the way, having no death penalty does not mean one can't have similar debates about the morality of extreme punishment. Germany recently revised its rules on preventive detention after the old ones were found unconstitutional. This just goes to show that – with or without death penalty – justice in extreme cases is hard.)
(Score: 0, Offtopic) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday March 27 2015, @03:59PM
If your "faith" is one of the Abrahamic ones, spare us all the self-righteous horseshit and go all-in for the death penalty. By stoning or burning. THAT'S what Yahweh ordered in the Old Testament, and Jesus says in Matthew 5:17-20 "Think not that I have come to destroy the prophets and the Law; I have come not to destroy, but to fulfill." This is a reference to passages in Jeremiah etc. which look forward to a time when the Mosaic Law, far from being abolished, is "written on the hearts of men."
Jesus was not some peace-loving hippie. Lest you forget, your demonic God is so UN-forgiving that he says several times he will torture most of humanity, even believers ("Not all who say to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the Kingdom"), for all of fucking eternity in fire.
So don't give me that "my faith tells me not to be violent!!!1111one" bullpucky. There is no more violent ideology than Abrahamic religion. Even Hitler, and YES Godwin's Law is appropriate here, wouldn't have tortured his victims for all of eternity.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday March 26 2015, @06:05PM
But even in that framing, I still find myself thinking of murderer's as flawed humans whose flaws run deeper and more profound that the rest of us.
From the Justice System perspective sometimes the flaw is that they are actually innocent.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 27 2015, @08:01AM
I still find myself thinking of murderer's as flawed humans whose flaws run deeper and more profound that the rest of us.
May I suggest you try viewing them as people who simply got into a situation the rest of us have never been subjected to. While I have not murdered anybody to this day I cannot honestly claim that it's something I would never do under extreme circumstances. And frankly I find anybody who does to be a hypocrite.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @09:33PM
And it helps when you are nearing the end of your life and you think you need to atone for stuff before you kick the bucket. It is little surprise that you see these cathartic moments from "old" people. This is why my empathy or sympathy for them is inversely proportional to their age. Tell me you're sorry when you did it, not when you think you need to tidy your moral affairs before meeting St. Peter.
(Score: 2) by CirclesInSand on Friday March 27 2015, @12:06AM
That's only if you believe the purpose of courts is reform, instead of maintaining public order. I hate the idea that courts should just a person's beliefs and "reform" them. It's creepy 1984 style government.
I like the older view of the courts, that the purpose is to maintain order in issues of trial and accusation and punishment. Not to judge people's beliefs or degree of reform.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Jaruzel on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:49PM
The cold comfort here I guess is that Glenn Ford never actually made it to the death chamber.
I'm not sure I could live with myself if I were Marty Stroud and Ford had been executed.
His closing statements in the apology ring deep. We're supposed to be civilised. Civilised people do not kill other people, no matter what they've done. I'm not a liberal and I do believe in apt punishment, but murdering a murderer makes you a murderer also.
There's no one band-aid for crime - there never will be - some people are just programmed to be anti social. Until we manage to colonise other rocks in space and send these people there, the only option we really have is to remove them from society via incarceration.
-Jar
This is my opinion, there are many others, but this one is mine.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by gmrath on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:21PM
"Until we manage to colonise other rocks in space and send these people there . . . "
Um, I think that's already been tried around the 1700s. Discover Australia, figure out a better use for it than just a colony like send all the criminals, all the social misfits, and especially all your political enemies there. See, it has been tried before . . . and, my goodness, look what happened! "Good on 'em, Mate." So, yes incarceration is the only option. In a civilized society. If there really is a civilized society.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Jaruzel on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:28PM
Good point. If we send all the criminals to AlphaPrime, they'll only just thrive, develop space weapons and come back and kill us all.
At least the Australians only unleashed cheap fruity wine upon us. So I'd say we got off fairly lightly.
This is my opinion, there are many others, but this one is mine.
(Score: 5, Funny) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:38PM
I'm not too worried about the yahoos from Alpha Prime. Sure they're well armed, but they mostly just want to play sports, drink beer and avoid getting sunburned.
It's the descendants of the uptight religious fundamentalist fruitloops who all ran off to Vega III that scare the shit out of me.
(Score: 1) by gmrath on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:42PM
And kangaroos. Don't forget the kangaroos. One got loose in my neighborhood years ago (south suburbs of Chicago). No one knows from whence it came; at least no one claimed to know. Efforts to catch it made local law enforcement and fire fighters look like bunch Keystone Kops. Absolutely hilarious. I was working nights at the time and had the opportunity to follow along for the whole show. I only wish I had a video recorder back then. Funny, the story never made it on the local TV news.
Oh, and sending criminals to Alderaan beforehand might do the trick. . .
(Score: 2) by cmn32480 on Friday March 27 2015, @02:02AM
To send them to Alderaan we'd need a time machine and it would have to travel across many light years. After all, it happened "A long time ago, in a galaxy far far away....."
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:52PM
Not sure about AlphaPrime, but we should probably check on the ones left on Ceti Alpha V [memory-alpha.org] sometime.
(Score: 2) by arslan on Friday March 27 2015, @01:37AM
Wut?!?! What about our kanga bangas and merino furs?...
(Score: 2) by NoMaster on Thursday March 26 2015, @10:30PM
Not to mention the US. The British used it as a for-profit penal colony (prisoners were transported & sold into servitude) well before Australia was claimed by Britain. In part, the settlement of Australia was driven by the fact that their biggest criminal dumping ground had declared its independence a few years earlier...
Live free or fuck off and take your naïve Libertarian fantasies with you...
(Score: 5, Informative) by hemocyanin on Thursday March 26 2015, @06:07PM
While he wasn't executed, he did have his whole life taken away. He has terminal cancer and a life expectancy measured in months at this point.
(Score: 2) by hubie on Friday March 27 2015, @01:26AM
Of course he didn't go to the chair, he escaped [imdb.com] first!
(Score: 2) by Marneus68 on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:33PM
Indeed, but how is it tech related exactly? Are we turning into some regular social news site with some political slants? How is that better than 's exactly?
(Score: 2) by fadrian on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:49PM
Well, I think it's better. There's not as much astroturf here. Besides, if you don't like the comments here, you can always go back to "the site that shall not be mentioned" (most of the stories here are the same) or start your own.
That is all.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:58PM
> Indeed, but how is it tech related exactly?
Soylent News ... is people killing people.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Thursday March 26 2015, @06:11PM
It's topical because of the issue of aggressive prosecution has caused huge damage in the geek world. This is an example of a prosecutor expressing remorse in the criminal side of that exercise of state power. Would you not like to see similar remorse from those currently engaged in corralling freedom loving geeks and making them toe the line? I would.
(Score: 5, Informative) by urza9814 on Thursday March 26 2015, @06:47PM
Soylent has never claimed to be solely focused on tech news.
It's not "News for nerds" here; it "...is people!" And these people sometimes have interests beyond computers and technology.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @08:53PM
I want to discuss non-nerd things with nerds. This is what I want most. Tech news is a major bonus, but not the most important thing.
We need enough nerd stories to scare away the non-nerds. About 90% nerd stories ought to do the job.
(Score: 2, Flamebait) by tathra on Thursday March 26 2015, @10:38PM
what does it matter? SN isn't a tech site.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:43PM
When arrogant, judgmental, narcissistic and people full of them selves are allowed to get into positions of power where their drive is to win not to seek out the truth and consider the long term consequences. Misery follows all around. It's a system failure.
That personality profile seems to fit the government and lots of the persons involved in the system of laws, not justice. A system that is driven by such personality characters cannot be trusted with power or influence in any form.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @05:10PM
This is a little random, so I will try to keep it short...
I was thinking that the dungeons & dragons alignment matrix of "good/evil" and "lawful/chaotic" was really poorly chosen and may have mislead tons of young D&Ders. At least I think it did that to me, re-enforcing the false social narrative of good versus evil. I think that if Gygax had gone with "altruistic/self-serving" instead of "good/evil" it would have cut a decade off the time for me to get a good grasp of human behaviour in the real world.
Guys like this prosecutor are a much better fit for "lawful self-serving" - the result of his actions were certainly evil, but he certainly didn't think of himself as evil at the time (and probably still doesn't, just misguided).
(Score: 1) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday March 27 2015, @04:42PM
That's very well-thought-out, actually. My first reaction was "that's not the same thing," but when you think about it...good and evil basically *are* defined by how one goes about pursuing one's own goals and what they are in relation to other peoples' lives. I'll still continue using good/evil as terminology, but you are correct that those concepts are not in reduced form, as it were.
I am very strongly Neutral Good on that matrix by the way. Laws have their place, but if a law is unjust, it is failing its function and should not be followed. At the same time, I've always wondered about how Good the Chaotic Good types actually are. Seems as if the legal environment can change how someone's Law/Chaos alignment is perceived, but not their Good/Evil...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Thursday March 26 2015, @05:18PM
Just to avoid misunderstandings: I do not approve of the death penalty, for several reasons. As a human being, I do feel anger and rage for the perpetrators of horrible crimes, but I don't think humans should kill humans.
However, I try to make my decisions logic-based, or at least to be able to support them by logical arguments. There are several arguments opposing to death penalty:
- Judgement it always error-prone, death sentence is irreversible. In my eyes, this is the weakest argument, as I think I might prefer death compared to a life-time in prison. Even if it was "only" 40 years in prison and afterwards an apology and a grand compensation, I think I'd prefer death.
- Death-penalty is not economic [forbes.com]. Usually, the expenses to go through all required juristic instances for a death-penalty costs more than imprisoning the delinquent for the rest of his life. Still, I find this argument sad, as it implies that sentencing someone for a life-time in prison is not checked as thoroughly. But at least it might convince some cold-bloods.
- For the recent years, the state didn't have a humanly way of killing people. I submitted a story about the firing squads in Utha for this topic because I find it hard to grasp this should really be a technical problem, so I also don't like this argument.
- The most convincing argument in my opinion (although I didn't hear it anywhere else yet) would be that hot-heads might like the risk of death-penalty more than the risk of lifetime-imprisonment. Risking the death-penalty might sound cool in certain circles. Risking to exist several decades in prison in order to rot might sound worse to the same circles. I'm not only talking terrorists who become martyrs here. It might also apply to gang members or other hot-heads.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Thursday March 26 2015, @06:15PM
Interesting -- I never of thought of the martyrdom potential of the death penalty and the way you put it, certainly would be a motivating factor to commit crimes. Everyone already knows it does squat to prevent them -- if it could be shown reliably that the death penalty encourages horrific crime, that would go a long way to repeal because it makes us LESS safe, not more.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday March 26 2015, @07:04PM
- For the recent years, the state didn't have a humanly way of killing people. I submitted a story about the firing squads in Utha for this topic because I find it hard to grasp this should really be a technical problem, so I also don't like this argument.
People have mentioned here and on The Other Site a number of times: Nitrogen. Painless, I assume it's cheap as hell...but it doesn't provide the theater of watching the guy suffer when he dies, apparently (not suffer a lot, just suffer "the perfect amount").
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by dry on Friday March 27 2015, @04:00AM
The vet seems to have some good drugs for putting down animals as well.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by wisnoskij on Thursday March 26 2015, @08:12PM
"I was not as interested in justice as I was in winning."
OK, and I am pretty sure that is the definition of his role in the justice system. The prosecutor, as well as everyone else, is not supposed to elect themselves judge and jury. They are not supposed to care if he is innocent or guilty. He is not supposed to say: "I know this guy is innocent so I am just not going to show this damning evidence to the jury because they might make the wrong decision."
That is ridiculous. His role as the persecutor is to take the stance the accused is guilty. And then set out and to the best of his ability try and convince the jury of this "fact". The justice system cannot work otherwise. Imagine if the defendant's lawyer was supposed to decide if he charge with guilty or not and if guilty he was morally obligated to lose the case?
What the lawyer is talking about in this letter is unjust, it is corrupt, and it is a horrendously dishonest. Full Stop. He should be bis-bared this instant for expressing such a statement.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @09:34PM
The police and prosecutors aren't supposed to bring charges against anyone without proof beyond reasonable doubt. That's also the standard of proof that the jury/judge uses when making the final decision, but the prosecutor also is supposed to use it to decide whether or not to file the charges.
(Score: 1) by inertnet on Thursday March 26 2015, @10:00PM
That's what you get in a society where the most ambitious one gets the job instead of the most appropriate one.
(Score: 2) by CirclesInSand on Thursday March 26 2015, @10:08PM
It seems it should be the defense lawyer writing a letter, and whoever made him the defense lawyer should be put in cuffs.
(Score: 1) by wisnoskij on Thursday March 26 2015, @10:21PM
Or maybe it is the jurors who are at fault. They were the ones who judged him.
Or maybe the whole system is broken.
Or more likely nothing went wrong at all.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by CirclesInSand on Thursday March 26 2015, @11:53PM
I did not question the unfairness of Mr. Ford having appointed counsel who had never tried a criminal jury case much less a capital one. It never concerned me that the defense had insufficient funds to hire experts or that defense counsel shut down their firms for substantial periods of time to prepare for trial. These attorneys tried their very best, but they were in the wrong arena. They were excellent attorneys with experience in civil matters. But this did not prepare them for trying to save the life of Mr. Ford.
This is a big problem. I can't really blame the defense since "inexperience" might not have been sufficient grounds for them to recuse themselves.
This case did bring up an interesting point to me though. After a trial, a person should obviously have very limited right (or maybe even none at all) to have an audience with the courts and claim their innocence. However, a person should have every right to speak their innocence to any member of the public who is willing and able to listen. A life sentence ends a persons life just as affirmatively as a capital sentence does in my opinion : life is more than having a beating heart, it is about freedom and possibilities. However, a capital sentence eliminates a person's ability to argue their innocence to any who will listen; so in a sense a capital sentence is a life sentence plus the loss of freedom of speech.
I think it is very important that people be allowed to shout "the real murderer was a cop and the prosecutor is friends with him!" in the exercise of the 1st amendment; and judgement plus execution eliminates this. So I wonder if capital punishment is just too much power for a state to have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 27 2015, @12:31AM
The justice system cannot work otherwise.
I beg to differ. What evidence do you have that the justice system cannot work otherwise?
Screw the ideological purity bs, modern legal particle is very prone to failure, it's simply irrational to cling to a clearly flawed model and disregard the possibility of improvement.
Imagine if the defendant's lawyer was supposed to decide if he charge with guilty or not and if guilty he was morally obligated to lose the case?
Apples and oranges. A lawyer messing up will sentence an innocent man. The inverse will set a guilty man free. Need I explain why the former is much worse?
(Score: 2) by dry on Friday March 27 2015, @04:08AM
The prosecutor is supposed to only prosecute people where there is evidence of guilt and lacking that evidence they are supposed to stay the charges. It's part of their job, reviewing evidence and deciding whether to pursue the case.
(Score: 1) by wisnoskij on Friday March 27 2015, @04:21AM
Considering that he was sent to death row there certainly was more than enough evidence for a case to be had. And you misunderstand the situation. It is his discretion to have the case or not, because he will be the one making the case against the guy. Even then he will be assuming the guy is guilty, but will not waste his own time if he cannot get enough evidence to have any chance of winning. He never judges the guy, to do so would break his objectivity. Pursuing the case is simply a matter of if he thinks he has a chance of winning or not. And has nothing to do with if he thinks he is guilty or if he deserves punishment.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 27 2015, @09:14AM
Considering that he was sent to death row there certainly was more than enough evidence for a case to be had.
Baseless. Have you watched the documentary Witch Hunt? Prosecutors are more than happy to destroy people's lives (not only with the death penalty) even if it is clear that they are innocent.
Pursuing the case is simply a matter of if he thinks he has a chance of winning or not.
This sort of nonsense is why we shouldn't be giving promotions based on how many people someone successfully prosecutes. Quality is more important than quantity, especially in such a serious endeavor. It's also why we need to remove the close relationship between police and prosecutors, and hire special prosecutors to try police. All to protect the innocent from our mess of a 'justice' system.
(Score: 2) by dry on Saturday March 28 2015, @03:34AM
There's been enough cases of the prosecution repressing evidence that cast doubt on guilt that the win at all costs method of prosecuting is not in the publics interest and has sent too many innocent people to prison or worse while allowing the actual criminal off scot free. That's why there are rules like sharing of evidence with the defence, to avoid dishonest prosecutors trying to win at all costs, even if it means breaking the rules. It's a real problem in jurisdictions where prosecutors (and judges) are elected as it leads to railroading the first person that can't put up a defence, usually due to lack of money.
Where I come from, the prosecution is supposed to act in the interest of the public, not their own interest.
(Score: 1) by wisnoskij on Saturday March 28 2015, @01:48PM
There is a huge different between doing everything you can to win, aka his job, and breaking the law and lying to the jurors.
When Prosecutors try to do the public "good", that is when they start inventing evidence and railroading defendants, because they cannot stand the chance of the jurors making the "wrong" decision.
(Score: 2) by dry on Monday March 30 2015, @02:30AM
They're our betters and don't break the law, just bend it and it's OK because they're doing it for good purposes.
Sadly too much of our governments behave this way, mine is into "law & order" but routinely breaks the law and can't even see that they're doing wrong.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 27 2015, @01:00AM
English executioner Pierrepoint said something similar after retirement, after killing hundreds of people, many of them political prisoners. That he did not think execution helps anyone.
Too little too late?
He can go screw himself. With great power comes great responsibility, and he proved that power got to his head and he misused it, much like Big Brother does today.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 27 2015, @01:31AM
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/03/24/whogetsredemption/ [firstlook.org]