Discussion: The Death Penalty

Joseph Wood's Execution in Arizona Lasted Nearly Two Hours

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Joseph Rudolph Wood's execution in Arizona on Wednesday afternoon took nearly two hours after the lethal injection began. His lawyers, claiming that their client was gasping and snorting for an hour, filed an emergency appeal to have the execution stopped. Wood died before a court could act.

"The execution commenced at 1:52 p.m. at the Arizona State Prison Complex (ASPC) - Florence. He was pronounced dead at 3:49 p.m," Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne said in a statement.

Wood, 55, was convicted in 1989 of killing his girlfriend and her father. His execution came after days of back-and-forth between courts after he claimed that Arizona's secret sourcing of its lethal injection drugs violated the First Amendment. From NBC News:

An appeals panel agreed with him, but the U.S. Supreme Court lifted the stay of execution. The Arizona Supreme Court briefly delayed the execution on Wednesday morning, but ultimately gave the state the green light.

Lawyers representing two other men executed last month—Marcus Wellons in Georgia and John Winfield in Missouri—also filed appeals demanding that their states reveal where they are obtaining their lethal injection drugs, but were denied.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/07/23/arizona-inmates-execution/13071211/

How is this humane? It would be better to just put a bullet in his head. How are these states getting away with pumping people full of mystery cocktails that don't work?
 
There's Always Someone Who Wants to Bring Back Firing Squads

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The death penalty is slowly losing prominence in America. Botched executions and problems with the supply of drugs has made lethal injection harder to carry out. Still, states are determined to balance out this trend with sheer bloodlust.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the state of Wyoming is considering a bill to reinstate the firing squad as the backup method of execution, in the event that the state can't carry out a lethal injection. These sorts of proposals do happen with a certain amount of regularity in our nation's more... frontier-oriented states, but this one sounds more serious than most.

Legislation that passed the state Senate this month on a 17-12 vote would authorize a firing squad in Wyoming if lethal injection can't be performed in a timely manner, or if it is deemed unconstitutional...

In Wyoming, Republican Gov. Matt Mead said he is open to signing the firing-squad bill if it clears the state House, where it is expected to encounter more opposition than in the Senate.


Wyoming does not have any prisoners on death row, thank god. As long as that remains the case, feel free to pass all the embarrassing frontier justice laws you want, you freaking yahoos. Anything that keeps these dangerous legislators distracted can only be considered a net positive.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/wyoming-considers-firing-squad-as-death-row-backup-1422230396

Really? :huh:
 
I think it's better than the current system. We are trying to disguise what we're doing, and that's never good. The state is killing people, and that shouldn't be disguised, whether you think that's right or wrong.

Hang, or shoot.
 
Georgia Executes Mentally Disabled Man

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On Tuesday night, Georgia executed Warren Lee Hill—an inmate with an IQ of 70—who was unable to prove he had a mental disability under Georgia's strict legal standard.

Georgia is the only state that requires defendants to prove an intellectual disability beyond a reasonable doubt, the strictest standard of proof, and one Hill was unable to demonstrate in court.

Hill was already serving a life sentence for murdering his girlfriend in 1985 when he killed a fellow inmate in 1990, earning him a spot on death row.

He was originally scheduled to be executed by lethal injection in 2012, but managed to postpone three times—until the Supreme Court declined to grant him a stay of execution Tuesday afternoon.

He was injected with a lethal dose of pentobarbital and pronounced dead at 7:55 p.m. He did not take a final meal or make a final statement.

"Today, the Court has unconscionably allowed a grotesque miscarriage of justice to occur in Georgia," Hill's lawyer, Brian Kammer, told reporters. "Georgia has been allowed to execute an unquestionably intellectually disabled man, Warren Hill, in direct contravention of the Court's clear precedent prohibiting such cruelty."

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/le...-warren-lee-hill-despite-low-iq-claim-n294206

I'm all for bad guys getting what they deserve but killing mentally challenged people is just wrong
 
Unable to Score Lethal Injection Drugs, Ohio Postpones All Executions

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After a botched execution left a condemned man writhing and gasping for air, Ohio announced this month that it would be returning to an earlier, sodium thiopental-based lethal injection formula. Now the state says it's delaying all executions until 2016 as it struggles to secure a supply of the drug.

According to NBC News, six death row inmates originally slated to be executed in 2015 will have their lethal injections postponed until next year.

Until its sole U.S. supplier stopped making the drug in 2011, sodium thiopental was the drug of choice for lethal injections in America. Since then, states around the nation have experimented with alternative drug cocktails—like the untested formula Ohio gave to Dennis McGuire last January—often with horrific results.

According to one account McGuire "struggled, made guttural noises, gasped for air and choked for about 10 minutes before succumbing to" the experimental lethal injection formula.

Since the European Union bans the export of sodium thiopental for executions, it's unclear how Ohio plans to stock the drug, however a law signed by the state's governor last month promises anonymity to any pharmacy that supplies chemicals for lethal injections.

http://www.drc.ohio.gov/public/press/press437.htm

Is there really any humane way to kill somebody though? Why don't they just OD them with heroin? At least then you know they feel good on their way out
 
Burning.

I kid. Morbid humor. I agree with Thundercrack, though I think child molestation is the only crime where I would want the death penalty...and in that case, I think it is more humane for the state to devise something than to leave the perp to "prison justice."
 
I support the death penalty for serial rapists/pedophiles/killers.

With the pedophiles/child killers, just release them in the courtyard of a rough prison, and let the prisoners do the work for you.
 
Ya screw any humane treatment for child molesters or killers. F*** those guys. Getting raped for years in prison or shanked is too good for them
 
I don't understand how the death penalty doesn't qualify as cruel and unusual punishment.

Well, hey, perhaps the perps should of thought of that before they unleashed their own cruel and unusual punishment against totally innocent victims. Just to think, Dahmer would have been serving 15 life terms in prison, if he wasn't killed by a fellow inmate. I just don't feel sorry for the dude at all, in any way whatsoever!
 
We could always burn prisoners at the stake.
 
There is no such thing as absolute certainty. There should be no punishment on the books that can't be reversed in the event that new information comes to light. There is no practical need for the death penalty. No country should have a death penalty. It's that simple.
 
Death penalty.


I figured. I was messing with you. I personally think if someone who committed a crime so bad that they are sentence to death and they suffer a little during the execution is not a bad thing. People who commit death penalty type crimes are usually not good people.
 
I figured. I was messing with you. I personally think if someone who committed a crime so bad that they are sentence to death and they suffer a little during the execution is not a bad thing. People who commit death penalty type crimes are usually not good people.

More human than leaving them to prison justice.
 
More human than leaving them to prison justice.

Well, we should also fix our prisons. We should more away from a punishment-based model of corrections entirely, and more towards a rehabilitation model.
 
Well, we should also fix our prisons. We should more away from a punishment-based model of corrections entirely, and more towards a rehabilitation model.

The true psychopaths, serial killers, rapists, child predators, there is absolutely no rehabiliation for these guys. I personally, wish nothing but death upon these sickos. If not by the death penalty, then by the other prisoners which seem to have a higher moral code than the civilized world does when concerning child rapists/killers.
 
The true psychopaths, serial killers, rapists, child predators, there is absolutely no rehabiliation for these guys. I personally, wish nothing but death upon these sickos. If not by the death penalty, then by the other prisoners which seem to have a higher moral code than the civilized world does when concerning child rapists/killers.

The people you're talking about make up a very small percentage of the prison population.

Everyone always talks about prison and harsh sentences for "psychopaths" and "serial killers" and use those people as evidence for a more retributive system, but the fact is that serial killers make up such a small part of the prison population that building a system around them and their crimes is regressive. They're an exception, not the rule.
 
Utah Just Brought Back the Firing Squad

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Governor Gary Herbert of Utah just signed a bill into law that allows the state to use firing squads—which he referred to as "a little bit gruesome"—as an alternative method of executing inmates when lethal injection drugs are unavailable, The Associated Press reports.

"Those who voiced opposition to this bill are primarily arguing against capital punishment in general and that decision has already been made in our state," Marty Carpenter, spokesman for Herbert, said in a statement.

"We regret anyone ever commits the heinous crime of aggravated murder to merit the death penalty and we prefer to use our primary method of lethal injection when such a sentence is issued. However, when a jury makes the decision and a judge signs a death warrant, enforcing that lawful decision is the obligation of the executive branch."

According to the AP, the governor's statement also pointed out that Utah is not the only to come up with alternative ways of killing people:

In Washington state, inmates can request hanging. In New Hampshire, hangings are fallback if lethal injections can't be given. And an Oklahoma law would allow the state to use firing squads if lethal injections and electrocutions are ever declared unconstitutional.​

Utah's last execution by firing squad took place way back in 2010. The state does not currently have lethal injection drugs on hand, the AP reports, although it does have plenty of inmates awaiting execution.

http://news.yahoo.com/governor-signs-law-making-utah-only-state-firing-225514503.html

If I had to chose I would prefer the bullet to the head over some crazy concoction that may leave me in agony for hours
 
I guess death by firing squad is efficient, but it sounds so old-fashioned.
 
As a pacifist I am against any form of death penalty. However, as we live in a pluralistic society I know I won't get my way :)

Sooo...if I had to choose, I would say firing squad. It's quick, painless and efficient.
 
As a pacifist I am against any form of death penalty. However, as we live in a pluralistic society I know I won't get my way :)

Sooo...if I had to choose, I would say firing squad. It's quick, painless and efficient.

It is probably less messy too. Or hanging could work. I remember the time a death row inmate that got morbidly obese on purpose to avoid being hanged cause his weight could cause him to get decapitated.

I understand a lot of people who are against the Death Penalty. But with the end of Jim Crow era laws and especially the rise of forensics the odd of a innocent person being executed is miniscule.
 

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