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No

13 (72.2%)

Yes

5 (27.8%)

Total Members Voted: 16

Voting closed: December 13, 2005, 05:15:48 pm

[miles]

BTW: Tookie was unable to name the victems of the crime he has been convicted of when asked in interview today.

Real remorsefull, 'eh?

Doesn't he deny committing the crimes?  If so, isn't that a bit unfair?

Edit:  Yes I realize that "they all" deny it, but say that he really didn't commit those crimes.  The justice system may do a decent job of establishing truth, but it's far from perfect.

[arkabee]

anybody paying attention to the Cory Maye case?

he didn't start a gang, he's a dad who shot a police officer
after the police accidentally enterred his home instead of
the other half of the duplex he lived in.

[antioch]

I'm bummed about this. I can't think of any deflation that's going to make the world we live in seem any good.

[Carlos del Vaca]

anybody paying attention to the Cory Maye case?

he didn't start a gang, he's a dad who shot a police officer
after the police accidentally enterred his home instead of
the other half of the duplex he lived in.

Yeah, this is extremely heinous.  He shot somebody in what sure seemed to him like the home-invasion scenario the NRA is so fond of pimping, and now he's on death row.

http://crookedtimber.org/2005/12/12/knock-knock-bang-bang/

[arkabee]

the more i read about it,
the sadder and angrier i get.

i want the people who want to trade their liberty for safety,
to be confined to padded cells.

for their safety,
and for my own.

that crooked timber post's comments,
someone brought up the old clash song
(which a long time ago on the internet someone
kindly told me was not originally by the clash..)
"when they kick in your front door".

given the turn of events,
it's as if they simply kicked in his door and killed him,
if the conviction and the sentence stand.

except,
rather than a quick death,
that his daughter would mourn later,
(she was, 18months old?)
he will die, slowly, possibly decades on death row.
his daughter will be old enough to,
maybe, understand.

i wonder if they'll make her watch her daddy die for
trying to save her life.

i mean,
that's the crux, isn't it?

isn't that what a parent is SUPPOSED to do?

every idealized explanation of what parents are SUPPOSED to
do and be and etc,
has always been shown to me as they would gladly die
to protect their children.

middle of the night,
someone's in your house,
your 18month is laying next to you.

and the next thing you know,
you are on death row.

[CortJstr]

I basically conflicted about the whole idea of execution but it is a convenient way to finger hypocrits that claim to be pro-life.

[AlohaDawg]

At least on its face, the Cory Maye case sounds like a natural case for clemency at the least and possibly even pardon.

If the gun was legal and legally owned, I'd say the police officer basically suffered what amounts to an industrial accident - people die doing dangerous jobs every day - and that doesn't make life any better for the officer's family but in this case, it sounds like the officers' mistake is going to cost two lives and impact very seriously several others.

[Doc]

Damn I thought they only gave the death penalty for especially heinous crimes over there? What amounts to a (terrible) mistake and what he believed to be self defense doesn't sound like it fits the bill.

[AugustWest]

Generally I am anti-death penalty. Like Asherdan, I'm familiar with the criminal justice system, only from a different perspective.  It just seems way too likely that we are executing non-deserving people.  Not to be cliche, but I'd rather a million deserving criminals escape the death penalty than execute one innocent one.

As far as Tookie goes I can't comment.  I know virtually nothing about the facts of his case and therefore I don't feel qualified to guess whether he was guilty or not.  

But I do have a couple of comments:

First, this case became severly politicized.  I don't know which side I agree with, if any.  But I do know that when individual cases get drug into the political arena facts, logic and rationality go by the wayside. (see Schiavo, T; Simpson, O.J.)  When the people who are given to power to decide life and death don't have truth as their ultimate goal, bad things happen.

Second, whether Tookie was guilty or not or whether he deserved to die or not he was unquestionably an extremely talented man.  Look at the organization he created.  Given a different background the guy could have been running G.E.  To me it's proof positive that environment has a huge effect on our destinies.  For whatever reason he used his talents in an anti-social way.  It's a crying shame he couldn't have used those talents in a constructive rather than destructive way.  Although I suppose it's possible that he and his writings could have a net positive effect in the long run.  I hope that's true, but I'm doubtful.

[CortJstr]

I basically conflicted about the whole idea of execution but it is a convenient way to finger hypocrits that claim to be pro-life.

Wow, what an inflammatory bull shit statement. Unless that fetus is going to be the next Gilmore or Tookie and it's basically a pre-emptive strike.

Now that I poured gas all over & shit here's a more moderate statement of disagreement.  I don't buy the comparison between ending the life of a convicted criminal who was judged and sentenced via our legal system and scraping out the pieces of what could have been, given time & a little luck, an unwanted human.

? My point was that there are a lot of people who claim to be "pro-life" when discussing abortion but who then turn around and support the death penalty. Pro-life means anti-choice, anti-execution, anti-war, and anti-euthanasia/assisted suicide. But the term has been so twisted that many people only associate it with the first one so you've got "pro-life" people who actively want adults to be killed.

[misterqueue]

Edited out because I was just being snarky and it's early.

ha HA... snark.

[andalucia]

Keep it under control, OK?
We already did the abortion thread and it was unpleasant and I just want everyone to get along and debating abortion is pretty much the worst way to go about that.  I think the point of comparison that CJ brought up is totally legitimate, but I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who wants this thread to stay away from that topic?  Cause the death penalty is controversial enough?


Look at me, all being a moderator.

[pmcd9]

Look at me, all being a moderator.

Man you jest moderatin' the shit outta this thread aint'cha...

~Paul

[CortJstr]

See, I went and interpreted that 'pro-life' label as a single issue subject 'cause there's too much room for well reasoned disparity of opinion between the subjects on that list you threw out there for my taste.

That was the definition I learned growing up Catholic where all of those issues were seen as black and white. Although I've since learned that pro-choice organizations also use this definition but for snarky reasons.

[Hobot]

I didn't get a chance to vote in the poll, but consider me a Death Penalty naysayer.  Below I've compiled some quotations that explain the reason for my opposition.

From Amnesty International re: the Death Penalty:
"It has never been shown to deter crime more effectively than other punishments."
"The most recent survey of research findings on the relation between the death penalty and homicide rates, conducted for the United Nations in 1988 and updated in 2002, concluded: '. . .it is not prudent to accept the hypothesis that capital punishment deters murder to a marginally greater extent than does the threat and application of the supposedly lesser punishment of life imprisonment.'"
"The death penalty is discriminatory and is often used disproportionately against the poor, minorities and members of racial, ethnic and religious communities. It is imposed and carried out arbitrarily."
"There are those who argue that imprisonment alone has not prevented individuals who have been imprisoned from offending again once set free. The answer is to review the parole procedures in place with a view to preventing relapses into crime. The answer is certainly not to increase the number of executions."
"In addition experience demonstrates that whenever the death penalty is used some people will be killed while others who have committed similar or even worse crimes may be spared. The prisoners executed are not necessarily only those who committed the worst crimes, but also those who were too poor to hire skilled lawyers to defend them or those who faced harsher prosecutors or judges."

From a PBS programme about mentally ill inmates:
"According to the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI), 16 percent of the prison population can be classified as severely mentally ill, meaning that they fit the psychiatric classification for illnesses such as schizophrenia, major depression, and bipolar disorder."
"However, when other mental illnesses, such as anti-social personality disorder, borderline personality disorder and depression, are included, the numbers are much higher, and NAMI puts the number of inmates suffering from both mental illness and substance abuse the percentage at well over 50 percent."

From Death Penalty Information Center re: the costs of the Death Penalty:
"The most comprehensive death penalty study in the country found that the death penalty costs North Carolina $2.16 million more per execution than the a non-death penalty murder case with a sentence of life imprisonment (Duke University, May 1993)."