The death penalty or life in prison for Joseph Smith?

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Death penalty or life without parole for Joseph Smith

Death penalty
27
73%
Life in prison without parole
10
27%
 
Total votes: 37

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janswizard
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#41 Postby janswizard » Fri Feb 06, 2004 5:29 pm

brettjrob wrote:
j wrote:
brettjrob wrote:In other words, if we execute 3000 criminals over the next 10 years and later find out 1 of them was innocent, I'd believe that single execution was more WRONG than the other 2999 "legitimate" executions can possibily be considered "RIGHT" by even the biggest proponents of capital punishment.


What about the victims?? Its amazing (well not really) that you never even mention them!

GIVE ME A BREAK!

I would like to increase the chances that the next little 11 year old girl that is on her way home from school, can make it home safely without being abducted, (probably raped), and left for dead like common road kill. I say the way to do this is by setting an example. You kill a child, your life is toast!

You know....its the same old story. "What about the poor prisoners rights"? Well hell! what about that dead girl's rights? She doesn't have any rights anymore, now does she?

GIVE ME A BREAK!! Putting an innocent person to death is just as much of a crime as this girl's death. Don't give me that "you have no respect for the victim's rights" garbage; everyone recognizes their rights. The criminal/defendant's rights are independent of the victim's -- me having regard for the criminal's natural rights does not change my regard and respect for the victim(s).

Your attitude of "who the hell cares if we occassionally mistakenly fry someone as long as I get to see the other 'scumbags' strung up!" is truly disturbing to me.


And I agree with you, Brettrob. There are have been too many "criminals" who have had a death sentence imposed on them but have managed to prove thru later DNA that they were wrongly accused? Not to mention how many people who have actually been put to death and later it was found out they were innocent?

I would rather see someone put in prison than put to death. Sacco and Vanzetti come to mind - and that was back in the 1920's!! Have we as a civilized nation not learned anything in the last 75 years?
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#42 Postby cycloneye » Fri Feb 06, 2004 5:35 pm

Well he has confesed to the crime so case closed.
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#43 Postby Lindaloo » Fri Feb 06, 2004 6:25 pm

I agree Ceye!! Case closed. :)
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#44 Postby CajunMama » Fri Feb 06, 2004 7:53 pm

I voted for life in prison without parole. My reasoning for this is his life will be horrible. From what I understand the other prisoners do not like child abusers. May he rot in prison at the other prisoners expense.
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#45 Postby timNms » Sat Feb 07, 2004 7:10 am

janswizard posted: "There are have been too many "criminals" who have had a death sentence imposed on them but have managed to prove thru later DNA that they were wrongly accused?"

Does anyone have any actual stats on how many innocent people have been put to death? I'm just curious to know.

In the case being discussed, I believe he should get the death penalty. The guy confessed to killing her. I don't think there would be any chance here of putting an "innocent" man to death. It would rid society of a man who is about 12 convictions/arrests beyond rehabilitation.
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#46 Postby george_r_1961 » Sat Feb 07, 2004 3:47 pm

Kelly I agree 100 percent. Many violent crimes are commited by persons who SHOULD be locked up for past offenses. But thanks to bleeding judges and juries who sob at the very thought that some killer didnt get the bicycle he wanted for Christmas or was otherwise deprived as a child many are handed short sentences. Thus they are free to harm or kill innocent victims again.
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rainstorm

#47 Postby rainstorm » Sat Feb 07, 2004 3:50 pm

bill o'rielly pointed out it was judge rapkin that let him out
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#48 Postby janswizard » Sat Feb 07, 2004 4:04 pm

timNms wrote:janswizard posted: "There are have been too many "criminals" who have had a death sentence imposed on them but have managed to prove thru later DNA that they were wrongly accused?"

Does anyone have any actual stats on how many innocent people have been put to death? I'm just curious to know.

In the case being discussed, I believe he should get the death penalty. The guy confessed to killing her. I don't think there would be any chance here of putting an "innocent" man to death. It would rid society of a man who is about 12 convictions/arrests beyond rehabilitation.




http://archive.aclu.org/issues/death/23executed.html

The 23 Innocent People Who Died
(From Michael L. Radelet, Hugo Adam Bedau, and Constance Putnam, In Spite of Innocence: Erroneous Convictions in Capital Cases. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1992, and Bedau and Radelet, "Miscarriages of Justice in Potentially Capital Cases," Stanford Law Review 40:21-179 (1987))

"Thanks to Modern Politics 23 Innocent People Have been Removed from the Living." They are:

1. Adams, James. Florida. Adams was convicted of first-degree murder, sentenced to death, and executed in 1984. A witness identified Adams as driving the car away from the victim's home shortly after the crime. This witness, however, was driving a large truck in the direction opposite to that of Adams' car, and it was later discovered that this witness was angry with Adams for allegedly dating his wife. A second witness the day after the crime stated that the fleeing person was positively not Adams. A hair sample found clutched in the victim's hand, which in all likelihood had come from the assailant, did not match Adams’ hair.

2. Anderson, William Henry. Florida Anderson was convicted of the rape of a white woman, sentenced to death, and executed in 1945 without an appeal having been made. The victim had not resisted, screamed, or used an available pistol to resist Anderson's advances. Anderson and the victim had been consensually intimate for several months before rape charges were filed.

3. Applegate, Everett. New York. Applegate was convicted, with Francis Q. Creighton, of the murder of Applegate's wife; both were sentenced to death in 1936. Creighton had been tried and acquitted on two separate occasions for similar murders a dozen years before she met Applegate. In this case, she killed the victim (by arsenic poisoning) at Applegate's instigation. "Virtually no evidence against Applegate existed beyond Mrs. Creighton's unsupported word." Governor Herbert Lehman, who had doubts about Applegat's guilt, requested the prosecutor's support for clemency for Applegate; it was not forthcoming, and clemency was denied.

4. Bambrick, Thomas. New York. Bambrick was convicted of murder, and sentenced to death. Evidence was later discovered that convinced Warden Thomas Mott Osbourne and the prison chaplain that another man had committed the crime. Osbourne commented "It is almost as certain that Bambrick is innocent as that the sun will rise tomorrow."

5-6. Becker, Charles and Frank ("Dago") Cirofici. New York. Becker and Cirofici were convicted of murder; Cirofici was executed in 1914 and Becker in 1915. The victim, Rosenthal, was a gambling house owner. He was convicted largely on the testimony of gamblers and ex-convicts in the glare of extensive newspaper publicity about police corruption. Former Sing Sing warden, Thomas Mott Osbourne, who knew the closet friends of the gunmen, stated that these friends all agreed Cirofici had nothing to do with the murder and was not even present when it occurred. Warden Osbourne also believed that Becker was not guilty.

7. Collins, Roosevelt. Alabama. Collins was convicted of rape, sentenced to death, and executed in 1937. Collins testified that the victim the "victim" had consented, which caused a near-riot in the courtroom. The all-white jury deliberated for only four minutes. Subsequent interviews with several jurors revealed that although they believed the act was consensual, they also thought Collins deserved to death simply for "messin’ around" with a white woman. Even the judge, off the record, admitted his belief that Collins was telling the truth. "An innocent man went to his death."

8. Dawson, Sie. Florida. Dawson was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death. The conviction by an all-white male jury was based on a confession obtained from Dawson after he had spent more then a week in custody without the assistance of counsel and on an accusation by the victim's husband. Dawson had an I.Q. of 64. At trial, Dawson repudiated his confession, claiming it was given only because "the white officers told him to say he killed Mrs. Clayton or they'd give him to "the mob’ outside." There were no eyewitnesses and the circumstantial evidence was slight and inconclusive.

9. Garner, Vance. Alabama. With Jack Hunter and Will Johnson, Garner was convicted of murder and sentenced to death. No appeals were undertaken. Garner had maintained his complete innocence, while Hunter admitted his own guilt and absolved both Garner and Johnson. Johnson's sentence was later commuted to life, but Garner was executed in 1905.

10-11. Grezchowiak, Stephen and Max Rybarczyk. New York. Grezchowiak and Rybarczyk were both convicted of felony murder and sentenced to death. Co-defendant Alexander Bogdanoff insisted that neither Grezchowiak nor Rybarczyk had been involved in the crime, and that each had been mistakenly identified by the eyewitnesses. He refused, however, to reveal the names of his true accomplices. In their final words, they maintained their innocence, and Bogdanoff again declared that the two were innocent.

12. Hauptmann, Bruno Richard. New Jersey. Hauptmann was convicted of felony-murder-burglary, sentenced to death, and executed in 1936. He was infamous as the ransom-kidnapper of the Lindbergh baby. Although Governor Hoffman believed that Hauptmann was framed, he chose not to halt the execution. There is no doubt that the conviction rested in part on corrupt prosecutorial practices, suppression of evidence, intimidation of witnesses, prejured testimony, and Hauptmann's prior record.

13. Hill, Joe. Utah. Hill was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of two storekeepers. The prosecution was based on sketchy circumstantial evidence and was in part the result of collusion between the prosecution and the trial judge in an atmosphere of anti-union hostility. Despite several appeals from President Woodrow Wilson to the Utah authorities for a reprieve, Hill was denied a new trial. Hill appears to have been an innocent victim of "politics, finance and organized religion, a powerful trinity"; his conviction and death are "one of the worst travesties of justice in American labor history."

14. Lamble, Harold. New Jersey. Lamble was convicted and sentenced to death. After the execution, Governor Edward Edwards refused requests to appoint a special counsel to investigate the case, despite what the New York Times called a "rather widespread fear that perhaps" Lamble was innocent. Lamble's attorney was disbarred for mishandling the defense.

15. Mays, Maurice F. Tennessee. Mays was convicted of murder in the killing of a white woman and sentenced to death. Mays’ conviction rested on the testimony of a police officer who had disliked him for years and on the testimony of an eyewitness who never got a clear look at the killer. On appeal, the conviction was reversed because the judge, rather than the jury, had fixed the penalty at death. Mays was retried, reconvicted, and resentenced to death. In 1922, Mays was executed, still maintaining his innocence. In 1926, the real killer confessed in a written statement that revealed she was a white woman who had dressed up as a black man to kill the woman with whom her husband was having an affair.

16. McGee, Willie. Mississippi. McGee was convicted of the rape of a white woman and sentenced to death by an all-white jury that deliberated for only two and a half minutes. the chief evidence against him was a coerced confession that he gave after being held incommunicado for thirty-two days after his arrest; the victim's husband and her two children, asleep in the next room, never heard any commotion from the alleged attack. The victim had been consorting with McGee for four years and was angry at his efforts to terminate their relationship. Nonetheless, local blacks were too intimidated to give this evidence in court, and local whites felt the woman's consent was impossible or irrelevant. McGee was executed in 1951.

17-18. Sacco, Nicola, and Bartolomeo Vanzetti. Massachusetts. Sacco and Vanzetti were convicted of murder in the course of armed robbery, sentenced to death, and executed in 1927. Their case is probably the most controversial death penalty case in this century. They were arrested and tired in an atmosphere dominated by "the Red Scare" of the early 1920s. In 1925, another man also under the death sentence in Massachusetts confessed to the crime. Extensive investigation of the confession convinced many that he was, indeed, telling the truth. In 1926, the trial judge denied motions for a retrial based on the confession. In 1977, on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the executions, Governor Dukakis signed a carefully worded proclamation intended to remove "any stigma and disgrace" from their names.

19. Sanders, Albert. Alabama. Sanders was convicted with Fisher Brooks of murder and sentenced to death. Though he had nothing to gain by helping Sanders, Brooks testified at Sander's trial that Sanders was innocent. Another fellow prisoner testified that he had heard Sanders confess, however, and both Brooks and Sanders were executed in 1918. In a statement from the scaffold, Brooks again insisted on Sanders’ innocence.

20. Sberna, Charles. New York. Sberna was convicted of first-degree murder of a police officer. His codefendant, Salvatore Gati, testified at the trial that Sberna was innocent. Gati also said the head of the New York Homicide Bureau had told him that he knew Sberna was innocent, and would clear his name if Gati would reveal the name of his real accomplices. Gati refused to do this. Sberna and Gati were both wrongfully executed in 1938. The prison chaplain said of Sberna, "This is the first time I’ve ever been positive that an innocent man was going to the chair."

21. Shumway, R. Mead. Nebraska. Shumway was convicted of the first-degree murder of his employer's wife on circumstantial evidence and sentenced to death. One juror, the only one to hold out against the death penalty, told his friends he "had not slept well any night since the trial." He later left a note in which he expressed "great worry at the trial," and he then killed himself. In 1910, the victim's husband confessed on his deathbed that he had murdered his wife.

22. Tucker, Charles Louis. Massachusetts. Tucker was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death in 1905. More than 100,000 Massachusetts residents signed petitions on behalf of clemency. Among those convinced of his innocence was the county medical examiner and a clergyman who said a witness had told him she perjured herself at the original trial. Tucker was nonetheless executed in 1906.

23. Wing, George Chew. New York. Wing was convicted of first-degree murder (after a 30-minute trial) and sentenced to death. While he was in prison awaiting execution, Wing convinced several observers that he had been falsely identified by eyewitnesses and that perjured testimony had been used against him. Warden Lewis Lawes also questioned his guilt, but Wing was nonetheless executed in 1937.



I don't care to extend any argument any further. I disagree with the death sentence and that's a personal choice I've made. As for Smith, I have spent considerable time saying that even though he has confessed to the murder, it's up to a jury to determine his guilt and his fate (if he doesn't plead guilty at the appropriate place and time). While I disagree with the death sentence, if that's what a judge and jury give him, I'll respect the decision that they make.
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#49 Postby janswizard » Sat Feb 07, 2004 4:10 pm

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Note: Opinions expressed are my own. Please look to the NHC for the most accurate information.

Anonymous

#50 Postby Anonymous » Sat Feb 07, 2004 4:37 pm

Great info, janswizard.

I have a question for all you DP supporters... looking through that list of 23 innocent people executed, do you truly believe that is was "worth it" to have all the other criminals executed when the policy COULD have simply been to put murderers in maximum confinement for life and those 23 never would have died? Can ANYTHING justify the government putting an innocent person to death when there is an alternative way to remove murderers from society?
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#51 Postby Derek Ortt » Sat Feb 07, 2004 4:40 pm

Life

Treason is a far more serious offense and the most severe punishment must be reserved for the most serious offense
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#52 Postby FLguy » Sat Feb 07, 2004 4:44 pm

killing the guy is a victory for him, its just like getting away. by putting him in prison for life, it gives him the rest of his life to think about it.

he will also find out quickly what its like to have the same thing done to him as what he did to that poor little girl, when some other male inmate wants to make him his girlfriend. that i think is a MUCH better punishment than the death penalty ever could be.
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#53 Postby mf_dolphin » Sat Feb 07, 2004 5:27 pm

Janswizard, while I respect your point of view on the death penalty, you never responded to my question on the other side of the coin. How many released killers have murdered more innocent people? I agree that some of the cases you posted are tragic but I also noticed that they go back many years. Legalized lynchings are a disgrace on our history but history they are. I am not for widespread use of the death penalty personally, but crimes against defenseless child and such deserve the ultimate penalty.
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#54 Postby Pburgh » Sat Feb 07, 2004 6:24 pm

The point is ---- He confessed to the crime. It's not an issue whether he is inocent or not - He did it!!!
I say death. He definitely will not go to heaven and that means he'll FRY in Hell. That's exactly what should happen.
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#55 Postby janswizard » Sat Feb 07, 2004 6:32 pm

I can't tell you how many released people have gone on to kill again, Marshall. I'm sure there are plenty. There is a way to prevent that - without putting a person to death. It's called life without parole. And if we don't like the way our criminal justice system works, we should petition our legislatures to change the law so that people will never be released unless and until such time that it can be proved they did not commit the crime.

Once a life is taken, it's over. There's no bringing it back. The same goes for the accused. I can't imagine what it must be like sitting on a jury that condemns a man to death, having that man put to death, and then later finding out that a mistake was made.

Read the link I posted from the truthinjustice.org. There are men sitting on death row now who may be innocent. DNA evidence could be used to prove their innocence - but it costs lots of money and most of them don't have it.

If someone does something so despicable, such as this Smith character in Sarasota, his life would be a living hell if he were to spend the rest of it in jail. Inmates don't like people who kill or rape children, either. They have their own kind of justice system - I would rather see him face their brand of justice.

The case of Nathan Brazil comes to mind here. He's the 14 year old Florida boy who killed a little girl by supposedly performing wrestling moves on her. He was tried as an adult. Thankfully, he did not get the death sentence but he was the youngest child to receive a life sentence in country. Suppose it had been a death penalty?

Another case that comes to mind is the Andrea Yates case in Texas. She killed ALL her children. She escaped the death penalty but will spend the rest of her life in prison. And this woman was mentally sick at the time of the murders. What if it had been a death sentence? Should someone who is mentally incapacitated be put to death for an unimaginable horror?

I doubt if I will ever be able to change anyone's mind on how they feel about this issue. I would just be happy to have one person read all the information that is out there. We need to think and make decisions with our heads, not our hearts.
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#56 Postby Derek Ortt » Sat Feb 07, 2004 6:34 pm

<i>He definitely will not go to heaven and that means he'll FRY in Hell. </i>


You could not be farther from the truth and before commenting on things like that, I'd advise you to closely read the New Testament. The only thing he cannot be forgiven for is blasphemy against the Holy Siprit, or not accepting Christ by the time of his death. He does that, he's in hell for sure. However, he has the opportunity for forgiveness for his sins if he sincerely confesses to Christ. A sin is a sin, his are no worse than mine (even though I have done nothing like he has)
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#57 Postby mf_dolphin » Sat Feb 07, 2004 6:43 pm

Janswizard, you point out two cases in support of your position but neiter one of them resulted in a death penalty so I don't see how they are even on issue. I also think it's presumptive of you to say that people who support the death penalty don't use their heads. That's an awfully arrogant position to take IMO.The truth is that a lot of people who think with their heads fall on both sides of the issue. I think we'll just have to disagree on this issue...
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#58 Postby Pburgh » Sat Feb 07, 2004 6:47 pm

Please do not advise me of anything. Your advise on the treatment of criminals is all the same no matter what the crime is. Here's how you would treat someone who starts a computer virus. This is also how you would punish a murderer. "how about life without parole and siezure of all possessions because this is a crime that affects how the nation operates." Is that your quote????

Gimme a break!!!!
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#59 Postby Derek Ortt » Sat Feb 07, 2004 7:00 pm

Give you a break? Oh please. Crimes against the nation, which sending a computer virus is (in case you havn't noticed, that affects the ENTIRE nation and has the potential to diusrupt national security) are as serious, if not more so that a crime against an individual. The nation comes first, I am only a small part and if anything happened to me, I would not want the person to be treated any worse than a traitor (unless the action was one that went against national security, such as a McVeigh attack)
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#60 Postby Lindaloo » Sat Feb 07, 2004 7:00 pm

Pburgh wrote:Please do not advise me of anything. Your advise on the treatment of criminals is all the same no matter what the crime is. Here's how you would treat someone who starts a computer virus. This is also how you would punish a murderer. "how about life without parole and siezure of all possessions because this is a crime that affects how the nation operates." Is that your quote????

Gimme a break!!!!


Excellent post Karan!! :D
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