the death penalty

The death penalty should be used as a punishment in certain circumstances. 1. The justice system is not without flaws, but that does not mean the death penalty should be eliminated. What will happen to those that are guilty? What are the current possibilities? Release them in a couple of years for them to do more harm or continue to spend more money to keep them alive until they naturally pass away? As for the innocent people, let's take a step back. How are more people found innocent compared to the past? Is it not a result of new scientific techniques, advancement in technology, investigations by journalists and the dedication of expert attorneys? Should this not encourage sharpening the justice system to improve rather than eliminating the death penalty and come upon the question of what to do with the guilty people one now? Were the victims that died not also innocent? ***** Marilyn Kay Plantz Executed May 1, 2001 by Lethal Injection in Oklahoma Plantz hired her teenage boyfriend Clifford Bryson and his friend William McKimble to kill her husband for about $300,000 in life insurance. Entering his home after work, he was ambushed by Bryson and McKimble and beaten with ball bats while Plantz and kids were asleep in bed. Plantz got up and instructed them to "burn him" to make it look like an accident. They drove him to deserted location, doused him and his pickup with gasoline and set it on fire. McKimble pled to Life and testified. Plantz and Bryson were tried jointly. Bryson was executed in 2000. The Office of the Clark County Prosecuting Attorney http://www.clarkprosecutor.org... Lois Nadean Smith Executed December 4, 2001 by Lethal Injection in Oklahoma Smith, 61, was convicted of the July 4, 1982 murder of 21-year-old Cindy Baillee in Gans. Baillee was the former girlfriend of Smith's son, Greg. Smith, along with her son and another woman, picked up Baillee from a Tahlequah motel early on the morning of the murder. As they drove away from the motel, Smith confronted Baillee about rumors that Baillee had arranged for Greg Smith's murder - charges which Baillee denied. Smith choked Baillee and stabbed her in the throat as they drove to the home of Smith's ex-husband in Gans. At the house, Smith forced Baillee to sit in a recliner and taunted her with a pistol, finally firing several shots. Baillee fell to the floor, and while her son reloaded the pistol, Smith laughed and jumped on Baillee's neck. She then fired four shots into Baillee's chest and two to the back of her head. An autopsy revealed nine gunshot wounds to Baillee's body. The Office of the Clark County Prosecuting Attorney http://www.clarkprosecutor.org... Reginald Reeves Executed May 9, 2002 Victim: Jenny Lynn Weeks, 14 A convicted killer was executed by injection Thursday for the 1993 fatal beating and rape of a 14-year-old girl he befriended after she ran away from a group foster home. In a lengthy final statement, Reginald Reeves, 28, apologized repeatedly. "I do apologize with all my heart and soul," he said as the victim's mother nodded. "I want you to know I do love you. We're all one big family in humanity." Reeves surrendered to police in Clarksville in northeast Texas in 1993 a day after the body of Jenny Lynn Weeks was found stuffed in a closet of a vacant home. Medical examiners determined died of strangulation. "She was chewed on, bitten, raped and sodomized, then severely beaten, beaten to death, then wrapped up in a rug and dumped in an old abandoned house," Red River County District Attorney Val Varley said. In the final entry in her diary dated Sept. 9, 1993, Weeks wrote of being a bit lonely but otherwise happy living at Reeves' apartment. She was killed later that day. Testimony showed Weeks was in a group foster home when she joined another resident, a 17-year-old girl, who was running away to Clarksville, about 30 miles away. The other girl met up with her boyfriend, a friend of Reeves, who offered to share his apartment with Weeks and she agreed. Source: http://www.prodeathpenalty.com... ***** 2. Essentially, yes, they're pretty much the same. However, the term malice should also be taken into account for. Malice, as defined by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, is the desire to cause pain, injury, or distress to another. The reason for the death penalty is murder. The victim was maliciously ‘punished.' Should the murderer not get ‘punish' the same way? Even if some may say yes, they can't. The criminal is not going to get drown, suffocated with a pillow, set on fire or abused to death. The death penalty is supposed to be quick and painless. The result maybe the same, but process and the intent is different. The decision [intent] was voted for the ‘greater good' of the society rather than a personal gain. 3. A person who commits a murder in the heat of the moment might not think about consequences. However, in planning the act, the murderer would be fearless because he/she is convinced that the result can't be worst than a slap on the hand and a few years behind bars. Sure there's lifetime in prison, but isn't that a waste of taxes and money that can be used to advance technology to better shape the trail process? If there's no consequences, who cares if we get caught? What are they going to do? They can't 'kill us.' Is that what we want? "If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murders, we have allowed the killing of a bunch of innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former. This, to me, is not a tough call." John McAdams - Marquette University/Department of Political Science, on deterrence Source: http://www.prodeathpenalty.com...