Alpha Centauri 2

Community => Recreation Commons => Topic started by: Unorthodox on March 16, 2016, 02:35:17 PM

Title: Death Penalty.
Post by: Unorthodox on March 16, 2016, 02:35:17 PM

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/03/16/ohio-supreme-court-says-state-can-try-to-execute-an-inmate-again-after-failed-attempt/ (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/03/16/ohio-supreme-court-says-state-can-try-to-execute-an-inmate-again-after-failed-attempt/)

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Quote

The Ohio Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the state could try to execute an inmate whom authorities tried but failed to execute in 2009.

In a 4-3 ruling, the court said that because the execution team never actually got any of the lethal drugs into the inmate’s system, his “life was never at risk since the drugs were not introduced.”

In 2009, the state of Ohio tried to execute Romell Broom, a man convicted of raping and murdering a teenager. Officials at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville repeatedly tried to insert the IV to deliver the drugs, but the lethal injection was eventually called off. Broom remains on the state’s death row.

“When the execution team was unable to establish IV lines, the attempt to execute Broom was halted,” Justice Judith Ann Lanzinger wrote in an opinion joined by three other justices. “Because the lethal-injection drugs were never introduced into the IV lines, the execution was never commenced.” As a result, Lanzinger said, the court concluded that under the state constitution, Ohio could try again.

In one of two written dissents, Justice William M. O’Neill wrote that Lanzinger’s description of the first, unsuccessful attempt “chills me to the core” and said he worries about the trauma endured by state employees who tried and failed to execute Broom.

“I believe as a moral and constitutional matter that subjecting Broom to a second execution attempt after even one extremely painful and unsuccessful attempt is precisely the sort of ‘lingering death’ that the United States Supreme Court recognized as cruel within the meaning of the Eighth Amendment 125 years ago,” O’Neill wrote.

Broom was convicted of abducting, raping and killing 14-year-old Tryna Middleton in 1984.

 FILE - This November 2005, file photo, shows the death chamber at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville, Ohio. The Ohio Supreme Court is weighing arguments by death row inmate Romell Broom that allowing the state prisons agency to try again to execute him amounts to cruel and unusual punishment and double jeopardy. The court planned to hear arguments Tuesday, June 9, 2015. (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato, File) The death chamber at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville, Ohio. (Kiichiro Sato/AP)

During Broom’s scheduled lethal injection on Sept. 15, 2009, prison officials authorities spent two hours trying and failing to find a usable vein, making at least 10 attempts to insert the IV and causing Broom to repeatedly grimace in pain, witnesses said. (This followed two other troubled Ohio executions — one in 2006 and another in 2007 — that were delayed because officials had problems inserting the IV.)

A similar issue involving problems with an IV occurred in a botched execution in Oklahoma that drew worldwide attention in 2014.

Clayton Lockett, a convicted murderer, writhed and grimaced on the gurney during his lethal injection, which started late because the technician couldn’t find a place to insert the IV. After Lockett’s physical reaction, officials saw that his vein had collapsed, causing the drugs to seemingly leak or get absorbed into his tissue. Lockett’s execution was called off, but he died of a heart attack a short time later.

As a result of the problems with Broom’s lethal injection, then-Ohio governor Ted Strickland (D) called off his execution. Broom has remained on death row.

The Ohio Supreme Court said in 2014 that it would hear arguments regarding Broom’s appeal. While his attorneys had argued that a second attempted execution would be punishing Broom twice for the same crime, prosecutors argued that the first execution attempt never occurred since the IV could not be inserted.




 


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Ohio has not carried out an execution since the state’s prolonged lethal injection of Dennis McGuire in 2014. Since that happened, the state revamped its execution protocols and, amid an ongoing shortage of lethal injection drugs, has repeatedly delayed its executions. The next execution in the state is scheduled for January 2017, a remarkably long lag between lethal injections for one of the country’s most active death-penalty states.

Utah was also looking to abolish it, but they ended up postponing that law till next session at least. 

Are you for the death penalty?



Personally, I think it's a broken system.  My solution, however, is more frequent and prolific use, not the current trend of abolishing it.  Yes, it costs more to kill someone than life in prison, but it doesn't HAVE to.  The cost is tied up in the court fees of ridiculously long death row stays.  Need more of a wild west approach, 1 appeal and be building the gallows while the trial is going on. 

I realize this makes me a barbarian. 

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 16, 2016, 02:45:20 PM

Quote from: BUncle on September 08, 2015, 11:42:15 PM

Are we all comfortable with my observation that there are people in this world better off not in this world and the world better off without?  Unforgivably bad people are a thing.

But here's where I am on what to do with them: I'm not throwing the switch, and ethically, I may not ask anyone to do it for me - or condone having it done on my behalf.

Also what Rusty said.  The gub'ment not only wants to make us slaves, it's a bloodthirsty mega mass murderer with no intention of ever. stopping. killing.  Governments are that way, along with the inevitable bureaucracy and oppression; it's only a matter of when, not if, they get carried away.

So I say no.  But I say it with much reservation and regret.

But we are wealthy enough, strong enough, and moral enough to lock the animals away and treat them better than they deserve while they wait to die of old age.

That's where I stand on the death penalty.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Unorthodox on March 16, 2016, 03:03:53 PM

That's why I couldn't find a thread on it. 

Never would have thought that discussion (I vaguely remembered) would have been in presidential candidates thread... 

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 16, 2016, 03:14:12 PM

Uh, I just skimmed around looking for that statement, and missed how it came up that time - segued from abortion, I think.

Pretty much anything in the line of national policy is inherently game in a presidential politics thread, though.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Lorizael on March 16, 2016, 04:29:53 PM

I maintain that the death penalty represents nothing more than admitting we have completely failed as a civilized state. Failed to create a society in which people have no desire to commit terrible crimes, failed to prevent a terrible crime, failed to find a way to balance the scales, failed to transform a human who has done something awful into one who might yet still be productive. I am absolutely opposed to the death penalty in all cases, regardless of the magnitude of the crime (as in, I wouldn't have wanted Hitler to be executed).

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 16, 2016, 04:36:10 PM

This is a respectable stance.  You argued with my opening observation at the time, IIRC.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Lorizael on March 16, 2016, 04:52:45 PM

Indeed. But my opposition there doesn't stem from somewhere warm and fuzzy, but from the fact that we're all just lumps of flesh. There is nothing, in principle, that prevents us from transmuting a lump of flesh that breaks things into a lump of flesh that builds things. The details are messy, of course...

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 16, 2016, 05:05:46 PM

Of course.  And there's a where-do-you-draw-the-line issue I want nothing to do with.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Valka on March 17, 2016, 09:46:03 AM

Canada doesn't have the death penalty. We used to, but not for several decades now.

That means that disgusting wastes of oxygen such as Paul Bernardo, Robert Pickton, and the Shafia family are allowed to live (there is absolutely no doubt whatsoever of their guilt), but it also means that people such as David Milgard, Donald Marshall, Guy-Paul Morin, and quite a few others were not executed. They were all discovered to have been innocent, in some cases many years after being imprisoned.

And as Canada gets into serious discussions of doctor-assisted death/euthanasia, there are more conversations about whether it's murder to euthanize someone who has no hope of recovery, is in constant pain, and is incapable of anything that a reasonable person would consider a meaningful life.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 17, 2016, 11:36:28 AM

Does anyone have any sense of the statistics for euthanasia by removing the feeding tube or otherwise starving someone to death?

I hold that euthanasia CAN be a loving act of mercy - but starving someone to do it doesn't sit right - it's definitely legal in some jurisdictions.  It was on option mentioned to us in Daddy's last weeks...

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Valka on March 17, 2016, 12:11:42 PM

The idea is to stop making such methods the only legal options. Death by starvation/dehydration is not a merciful act.

To me it's wrong that my cats have more right to a quick, painless, dignified death than I do, if any of us were ever to be afflicted with terminal cancer (for example).

Of course I hope that I'm never in that situation (ditto for my cats; I've had to sign too many euthanasia papers at the vet's for various cats and dogs). But many people are suffering from cancer, MS, and so on, and they know they're not going to get better. It should be their choice if they want to "let nature take its course" or if they'd prefer their own terms.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 17, 2016, 12:14:16 PM

Of course, it's entirely different between patients awake and aware - and those not, that someone has to make a decision for.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Lorizael on March 17, 2016, 02:07:03 PM

I understand why some people might choose death over continued suffering, and I'd be in favor of legalizing it, but it's just a non-starter for me. If I ever have the money for it, I plan to go the cryonics route when I'm dead-ish. Yeah, cryonics is basically a crock right now, but the whole idea is that it won't be a crock by the time you get thawed out. Additionally, my odds of surviving into the distant future are 0% if I kill myself and not necessarily 0% if I freeze myself. It seems like such an easy choice. Also, I wouldn't have spent my money on anyone else, anyway, because I'm a selfish [progeny of unmarried parents].

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Rusty Edge on March 18, 2016, 03:00:19 AM

I think Niven figured it out. The Cryonic corpsicles are just spare parts for the living. Sooner or later.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 18, 2016, 03:29:18 AM

I'm not sure he groks how squeamish people are about the dead - and cloning parts is going to put paid to the body banks before they start.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Rusty Edge on March 18, 2016, 04:14:21 AM

Yeah. I am squeamish. My wife has had 4 or 5 cadaver bone grafts in her mouth, to strengthen her jaw for implants. Unlike most people she has an acidic mouth which dissolves her teeth.


Oh, then there's the bit about the heirs and the state not wanting to wait for their share of the estate when it comes to declaring somebody dead.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Lorizael on March 18, 2016, 01:16:36 PM

Yeah, I suspect lab-grown parts will make that not a worry.

Quote from: Rusty Edge on March 18, 2016, 04:14:21 AM

Oh, then there's the bit about the heirs and the state not wanting to wait for their share of the estate when it comes to declaring somebody dead.

Well, currently, cryonics is a joke as far as the government is concerned, so when you get preserved, you count as dead legally. In fact, the way that almost everyone pays for cryonics is by having a life insurance policy that pays out to the cryonics organization of your choice (which is part of why most people think the whole thing is a scam, honestly...). As far as the part of your estate you're hoping to still have when you wake up... my understanding is that most people create a trust that, again, is held by the people freezing you. (Last time I checked, only about 250 people are preserved by the ~3 organizations doing cryonics.)

But all of that misses the wider point for me. If I do preserve myself, I might wake up in the future. If I don't, I won't.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Rusty Edge on March 18, 2016, 02:02:06 PM

I recall seeing an episode of the Morton Downey, Jr. Show on Cryogenics. I think it was when FOX was a new broadcast TV network. One of the guests was an outstanding young doctor who went into the field. He explained that cryogenics was the ultimate cure, for in time medicine would find a cure for everything. So I started to see it as a way to treat untreatable disease rather than prolong the life of a worn out body.

In the same episode they had a guest who was signed up to be frozen, and he was described in a subtitle as a " neurological suspension candidate." That struck me as particularly funny. In fact, We might have a neurological suspension candidate or two running for president today.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 18, 2016, 02:07:01 PM

Neurological suspension probably means they just freeze the head.  That's a thing, I hear. ‬

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Valka on March 18, 2016, 02:09:23 PM

Ben Bova uses cryogenic freeze in a few of his Grand Tour novels. People get frozen until they can be cured of whatever would have killed them... but the tradeoff is that their minds are infantilized and they have to relearn everything - walking, talking, eating, and need a lot of therapy. They also have little or no memory of their former lives.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Lorizael on March 18, 2016, 02:26:15 PM

Quote from: Rusty Edge on March 18, 2016, 02:02:06 PM

So I started to see it as a way to treat untreatable disease rather than prolong the life of a worn out body.

Sure, but maybe aging is just a disease that everybody gets.

Quote from: BUncle on March 18, 2016, 02:07:01 PM

Neurological suspension probably means they just freeze the head.  That's a thing, I hear. ‬

Yep.

Quote from: Valka on March 18, 2016, 02:09:23 PM

Ben Bova uses cryogenic freeze in a few of his Grand Tour novels. People get frozen until they can be cured of whatever would have killed them... but the tradeoff is that their minds are infantilized and they have to relearn everything - walking, talking, eating, and need a lot of therapy. They also have little or no memory of their former lives.

That is something that worries me. I'm not interested in preserving my body's ability to carry on; I'm interested in preserving my personal existence.

...

Also, the pedant in me is required to point out that people involved with cryonics called it that, as opposed to cryogenics. Cryogenics is just the study of cold stuff, whereas cryonics is specifically about cryopreservation.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Rusty Edge on March 18, 2016, 03:00:40 PM

Cryonics it is.
And yes, he could only afford to have his head frozen. He looked like Link from The Adams Family. I still laugh when I think about it. I guess I would have described him as a client rather than a candidate, considering he had pre-paid.

As for aging, I will allow that there may be a more perfect balance of sustainable cell renewal, somewhere between aging and cancer, and that this could be attainable through gene therapy some day.

Title: Re: Death Penalty.
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 18, 2016, 03:02:54 PM

Quote from: Lorizael on March 18, 2016, 02:26:15 PM

Quote from: Valka on March 18, 2016, 02:09:23 PM

Ben Bova uses cryogenic freeze in a few of his Grand Tour novels. People get frozen until they can be cured of whatever would have killed them... but the tradeoff is that their minds are infantilized and they have to relearn everything - walking, talking, eating, and need a lot of therapy. They also have little or no memory of their former lives.

That is something that worries me. I'm not interested in preserving my body's ability to carry on; I'm interested in preserving my personal existence.

Very nearly as central an issue as surviving at all.

I reread A World Out Of Time recently, and I wouldn't have made it through the training/probation period if I woke up a slave...