Life and Death Row BBC3

pawsies

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b03ytvjz/Life_and_Death_Row_Execution/


I am so glad we don't have this in the UK.

I admire the liberal attitudes of Scandinavian countries who have shown rehabilitation does work

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1300/J076v40n01_05#.UyebTqhv6P8

Georgiegirl256

I think for some crimes, that's exactly what we need in the UK....

Tropez

Georgiegirl256 wrote: »

I think for some crimes, that's exactly what we need in the UK....

Fortunately, while we're a member of the EU, capital punishment will never be reintroduced as it breaches the European Convention on Human Rights.

If it were to ever be reintroduced to the UK, I would leave the country.

I refuse to be a part of a society that would exercise a barbaric means of justice that has already been proven, multiple times across multiple jurisdictions, to have been carried out against innocent people and would, were it not abolished in the UK, have been carried out against more innocents on our soil.

Georgiegirl256

Tropez wrote: »

Fortunately, while we're a member of the EU, capital punishment will never be reintroduced as it breaches the European Convention on Human Rights.

If it were to ever be reintroduced to the UK, I would leave the country.

I refuse to be a part of a society that would exercise a barbaric means of justice that has already been proven, multiple times across multiple jurisdictions, to have been carried out against innocent people and would, were it not abolished in the UK, have been carried out against more innocents on our soil.

I see what you are saying, but for those where there is NO doubt whatsoever that they are guilty. People such as serial killers, kiddy killers etc etc, human rights? Pah! What about the 'human rights' of their victims?

codemonkey

I think the thing that stood out most for me, (although I only saw the first half) was that nobody seemed very happy with it in the end. The victims and their families wanted it to be more brutal and visible, and the family of the guy being put to death were in pain because they were losing their son. The guy on death row was right. Killing him didn't make any difference, the people he killed were still dead, the survivor was still scarred and didn't seem to feel better afterwards.

Tropez

Georgiegirl256 wrote: »

I see what you are saying, but for those where there is NO doubt whatsoever that they are guilty. People such as serial killers, kiddy killers etc etc, human rights? Pah! What about the 'human rights' of their victims?

But in the vast majority of cases people are convicted based on "beyond reasonable doubt" and it is not perfect, as is shown by the fact that this state both has (and would have were capital punishment not abolished) taken the life of innocent people. What about their human rights? What can the state do to bring them back and let them have their freedom? Nothing.

And you cannot make a special exception for where there is no doubt because you throw a huge spanner into the wheels of justice. If you permit executions based solely on no doubt, then when those only convicted under the traditional method of beyond reasonable doubt reach their appeal having not been sentenced to death, their legal teams will inevitably argue that there is a reasonable doubt they were guilty because otherwise they would have been sentenced to death. The ramifications of that are quite severe.

Imprisonment is a perfectly viable alternative that allows for varying degrees of life to be lived by wrongly convicted parties while removing numerous rights and freedoms of those who are guilty of the crimes they committed.

Death is absolute and permanent. Sending an innocent person to their death is nothing more than state-sponsored murder.

paulsad

My lad at 19 had to kill people as he was in the army in Iraq - its a sobering kick up the anus when you have a rant about someone and say "I'd kill him" ... your son - so much younger in years but so much older in experience then says to you "shut up dad you don't know what it's like to have killed someone" ... certainly does put me in my place

Georgiegirl256

Tropez wrote: »

But in the vast majority of cases people are convicted based on "beyond reasonable doubt" and it is not perfect, as is shown by the fact that this state both has (and would have were capital punishment not abolished) taken the life of innocent people. What about their human rights? What can the state do to bring them back and let them have their freedom? Nothing.

And you cannot make a special exception for where there is no doubt because you throw a huge spanner into the wheels of justice. If you permit executions based solely on no doubt, then when those only convicted under the traditional method of beyond reasonable doubt reach their appeal having not been sentenced to death, their legal teams will inevitably argue that there is a reasonable doubt they were guilty because otherwise they would have been sentenced to death. The ramifications of that are quite severe.

Imprisonment is a perfectly viable alternative that allows for varying degrees of life to be lived by wrongly convicted parties while removing numerous rights and freedoms of those who are guilty of the crimes they committed.

Death is absolute and permanent. Sending an innocent person to their death is nothing more than state-sponsored murder.

I totally see what you are saying. I guess I was looking at it in a fairly black & white manner, like the majority of us on here, I know nothing about law, my way is I guess a very simplistic way of looking at it. I see what you are saying about sending an innocent person to their death, that's why I said where there is NO doubt AT ALL. But thanks for explaining the ramifications of it, I can see that it's not that simple.

rpc

Whole life tariff does the job - justice not revenge. Death sentences don't act as a deterrent.

With a whole if tariff, there is the option to correct mistakes. Our justice system is built on the idea that it is better to let a guilty person walk free than to punish an innocent. Yet we still make mistakes - I'm sure plenty wanted the death penalty for the Birmingham six.

With a whole life tariff, the guilty will die in jail. It just takes a little longer.

With a whole life tariff, it is cheaper* than a death sentence. Why pay more for something that has little real effect?

*Done the American way at least, I'm sure China and North Korea have rather cheap death penalties.

SandC

I thought it was a very thought provoking programme and I'll watch next week.

The thing for me in the USA is that it's only certain States that have the death penalty. It also seemed to me that we have some horrendous crimes committed in Britain where nobody will be executed and yet over there, only in certain places, someone gets to decide whose crime is the worst and sentence them to death rather than whole life imprisonment.

I wonder how much of the acceptance and support of this is only due to the fact that they are used to it happening because of where they live?

Of course, I can never say how I would feel if someone close to me were murdered. I know that when I see social media posts from people spouting off about how x killer or killers should be executed when they know about the crime only through the media and have no connection whatsover with the victim or any of their friends/relatives I find myself wondering who they are getting angry for. If it happened here, who would decide? A jury? A judge? A committee of some sorts set up specifically for this?

fivetide

rpc wrote: »

Whole life tariff does the job - justice not revenge. Death sentences don't act as a deterrent.

Theirin lies another issue though.

Rehabilitiation, doesn't really work. Punishments, don't really work.

Prisons have always been full of people who reoffend on a regular basis. Whilst you might catch the odd one that gets their by accident the vast majority are not first time ofenders.

It isn't difficult to pull the stats for this http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18188610 90% of those done for serious crimes had done so before, many with 15+ convictions.

this is despite all the improvements in education, training conditions etc etc all at great expense tot he taxpayer.

Personally, I'd ditch the niceties. Why do we live in a world where someone like Anders Brevik (100% guilty and a great candidate for a death sentence) can kick up a fuss because his PlayStation is an old model? http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/02/25/anders-breivik-prison-video-games_n_4852786.html

Prison should be about keeping people safe from those who are put inside and punishment for those who are in there. People don't change unless they want to unfortunately, no matter how much money you throw at it.

IMHO of course