Why the attention to the death penalty now, with SP convicted...

[Solon]

and not about this man who was possibly executed wrongly based on bad evidence. What makes SP more valuable? And why haven't the Pro-DP people defended this man's execution?

[babylonsister]

1. Another example

of this society going to hell in a handbasket. Good question, and one that deserves more attention than SP ever did.

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Solon]

3. I think it has more to do with her and her husband...

being in a higher class of society than anything else. Is it a tragedy, of course, is he guilty, hell if I know, and to be honest, I think that the case I just mentioned actually warrants more attention as to the systematic deficiencies of the system.

[forgethell]

5. And children aren't??? n/t

[forgethell]

4. While I am a firm supporter of

the death penalty; it should only be applied to the guilty. If what is in this article is correct, the man should have gotten a stay, and possibly a new trial.

I don't believe in endless appeals over technicalities, but evidence pointing to innocence should always be considered, enen at the very last minute.


MERRY CHRISTMAS

[Solon]

6. That's an odd position...

you say that only the guilty should be executed, and in the same message say that "endless appeals over technicalities" should not take place. What if the that person was convicted only on a technicality, I guess they are shit out of luck then, huh?

[forgethell]

8. You got an example

of what you're talking about?? 'Cause I don't know exactly what you're saying. People should be convicted on actual evidence of guilt or innocence. People either actually did, or did not do, the crime. That's what a trial is about, to determine as best we may whether the accused is actually the perpetrator. We do this through evidence and logical deductions. So I don't exactly know what technicality you would be referring to.

On the other hand, obviously guilty people are released all the time because the police made a mistake of some kind. While I understand the need to restrain the police from violating our civil and privacy rights, it really doesn't affect the facts. Now, if the police beat a confession out of a suspect, then probably evidence should be thrown out, regardless. But I like the idea of a single series of appeals in which all such issues are decided. After that, appeals only on the basis of new evidence should be permitted.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

[Solon]

9. They should be, but that is not always the case...

I'll give an example of someone getting penalized on a "technicality" for you to munch on...

In the spring of 1993, Morris Gauger and his wife, Ruth Gauger, were bludgeoned and stabbed to death on their family farm near Richmond, Illinois. Their son, forty-year-old Gary Gauger, phoned 911 after he and a friend discovered his father’s body on the floor of the antique motorcycle shop located at the farm. Police became suspicious when they arrived to find an oddly serene Gary Gauger, who calmly tended to his vegetable garden during the investigators’ search for evidence. After discovering the body of Ruth Gauger—but no signs of struggle or attempted robbery—police subjected Gauger to twenty-one hours of intensive questioning. During this interrogation, Gauger later reported, detectives claimed that they had a “stack of evidence” proving that he had committed the murders. It did not occur to Gauger that his accusers might be lying.

Gauger, a pot smoker and reformed alcoholic at the time of the murders, became convinced that he had blacked out—as he did on occasion when he was a heavy drinker—and killed his parents. The interrogators, reportedly trying to jog Gauger’s memory, showed him photos of his mother’s wounds and asked him to hypothetically recreate the murders. Gauger described how he might have easily sneaked up behind his “trusting” mother before striking her head and slashing her throat, and then doing the same to his father. The police accepted Gauger’s statements as a confession. After his trial in October 1993, a jury took three hours to reach a guilty verdict. Judge Henry Cowling sentenced Gauger to death by lethal injection.

Soon after Gauger’s conviction, FBI agents reported that they had overheard members of a motorcycle club discussing questionable details about the Gauger murders. Ginger Gauger, Gary’s sister, then enlisted Northwestern University Law School professor Lawrence Marshall to help with her brother’s appeal. Marshall was able to prove that there was no real evidence against Gauger and that he had been tricked into giving a false confession. Eventually, two motorcyclists were indicted for the murders of Ruth and Morris Gauger, and Gary Gauger’s sentence and conviction were overturned.

This is but one example of what happens in our justice system. For example, if this were in Texas, he would have been executed, because there, you have to present such evidence 30 days after conviction, otherwise it doesn't matter. That is a problem, you talk about how things should be, I talk about how they are. People don't really care about facts and evidence in cases where emotions run high, look to the lynchings that took place all throughout the country mostly in the south as an example of this. Also our justice system strongly favors rich/middle class whites vs. everyone else, who is more likely to be executed, a black man who killed a white, or a white man who killed a black? Answer honestly, and you'll get the real reason why I oppose the death penalty, it permanent.

[forgethell]

10. As I think I said,

evidence pointing to innocence should admissible at all times. There is no doubt that the laws can be improved. However, that, in itself is not an argument against the death penalty.

Further, I do not see this as an example of a trivial technicality, but of police imcompetence, or misconduct. As for your last little comments, I agree that this is unjust. But the injustice is not that one man was punished whil another went free for the same crime. The injustice is that both were not punished.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

[SemiCharmedQuark]

7. The Death Penalty is an atrocity of our time.

It's already been banned in most of the West. It will be banned in the United States if the U.S. has to go kicking and screaming. People always say things about those in say, the 19th century, like "How could they have believed in slavery! How could they justify that!" Well, people are already asking that question in other countries and here in the U.S. as well. It will end up as just another "how could they" to our children or children's children.