Shot through the heart, and you're to blame...

I'm totally for capital punishment in certain select incidences. Also, so long as they are mentally fit, certain prisoners should be able to opt for it (although, it's an arguable point that if they do opt for it, then they're not mentally fit).

For myself, I'd choose firing squad. No one knows conclusively if lethal injection is painful or not. I've been shocked, so that does not appeal to me. Choking to death on gas doesn't sound like fun. And hangings can get fucked up.

 

Colliseum. Gladiator style.

 

Alt. Focus: Either hanging (done properly), beheading, or lethal injection would be the least painful, but for the sake of becoming a media sensation I'm gonna have to go with crucifixion.

 

Not only would this probably be a more fun way to go but the government could make a killing (pun partially intended) on ticket and PPV sales. And Merchandising, MERCHANDISING; that's where the real money is made.

Alt Focus: I'd probably choose to have excessive amounts of morphine pumped into me by an IV, I've heard that's the most pleasant way to go.

Edit: I also think having someone kicking inmates into a pit ala 300 would be kinda funny. But he wouldn't say "this is Sparta" every time, he could change it up and say stuff like "So long and thanks for all the fish" or "Nice shirt."

 

Some guy at the pub last night told me that he hopes I die in an Aids Fire. It was funny because I thought the conversation was going swimmingly up until that point.

 

Absolutely for capital punishment in certain instances, serial killers, child molesters. Worst of the worst type assholes.

Alt focus: I'm Italian, so I always thought the classical Roman way of opening your veins in a warm tub would be okay, but I would want to be high as a kite on morphine, or some such similar opiate.

 

Focus: I am against capital punishment. The issue, to me, is not whether certain people deserve to die or not, but that we do not have a 100% certainty of factual guilt for the people we execute. DNA evidence has exonerated a lot of people on death row and I can only imagine the number of people who were innocent who died before DNA evidence or who will die because it will not be available to them for whatever reason. Until we can have 100% certainty, it is not worth it to me to kill the innocent in order to also kill the guilty. At least with life sentences, if you realize later they are innocent, they can be released to try and have some semblence of a life. Once executed, you can't do anything if you find out they are innocent later on.

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/351.php" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/351.php</a>

 

If I was given the choice, I beleive I would do the same as this guy. Firing squad is a quicker death than lethal injection, plus there's an undeniable cool factor and it's a hell of a conversation starter.

''So little Timmy, where is your father now?''
''oh, He was shot in the heart by five police officers last wednesday''.

 

Focus: I am for capital punishment 100%. I would buy them on PPV of it was done in an entertaining fashion. Like George Carlin said,"You could behead them and have their head roll down a hill and go into 1 of 3 numbered slots. People could place bets."

Alt Focus: Since I have always said people should die in the manner they murdered someone I would take that. However something utterly entertaining would also be a good way to go. Like a well rehursed and practiced circus clown act, except in the final one one of the clowns walks up all happy and blows my brains out.

 

Agreed. However, in instances where DNA evidence doesn't mean a damn thing, I'm totally for it. Example: A guy shoots someone dead while stealing their car. It was captured clearly on surveilance video and there were multiple eye witnesses with matching stories of the incident. At that point, to me, DNA evidence is entirely moot and there's no chance that he'll be found innocent 10 years down the line because there was someone else's bloody fingerprint on the trigger of the gun.

If there's any problem that I have with the existing death penalty, it's that the person isn't killed fast enough. Now, I can understand the appeals process for crimes involving a lot of circumstantial and DNA evidence, some of which might not even see the light of day until a decade after the person was originally put in jail. However, in instances like the example I made above, where guilt is apparent, then I don't think that person should be able to sit in jail for 25 years before they die. The process needs to be expedited for criminal cases where DNA evidence won't change the ruling. A sort of "Take 'em out back and shoot 'em" policy with a more politically correct name.

 

In 2008 there were over 16,000 murders http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/data/table_02.html . In 2008 there were only 37 executions http://ourtimes.wordpress.com/2009/05/29/executions-in-2008/ .

Now I understand that there is a lag behind convictions / crime committed and execution, but if only 0.23% of murderers are executed, what deterrence does that provide? I believe that murder should carry a guaranteed Execution sentence, with only extreme situations to do otherwise.

I also believe that prisoners serving guaranteed life sentences with no chance of parole should also be executed. If someone who committed a crime can NEVER be re-admitted into society because of that crime, why keep them alive?



As for the way I'd like to go? I'd say lethal injection. Only because I'd like to surprise it on them that anesthetics don't work too well on me. Mid way through the injection I'd suddenly wake up, yell that I can feel everything, and then pretend to thrash about / actually thrash about from the pain.

 

I've had this conversation with a friend of mine, and I usually take the pro-captial punishment side. More to play devil's advocate than because it's what I believe in. I haven't put enough thought into it. Anyway, one of the points we always end up on is cost. I say capital punishment is better because you don't have to feed and take care of the prisoner for up to 80 years. However, she maintains that that is still somehow cheaper than execution. I find it hard to believe that 80 years worth of meals could be more expensive than a little vial of whatever it is they inject. Does anyone know any facts, or sources that can settle this? I did a quick google search but nothing I understood came back.

One point that I like for the against side is that by keeping them locked up in jail their whole lives, you're basically forcing them to suffer, which I think is definitely deserved. If they don't appear to be suffering enough, just go ahead and execute them.

Alt focus: I would want them to 'surprise' me while I'm sleeping. I don't want to wake up, but I want the specific day to be a surprise, so I don't have to deal with knowing when I'm going.

 

Some info here. <a class="postlink" href="http://deathpenaltyinfo.org/costs-death-penalty" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://deathpenaltyinfo.org/costs-death-penalty</a>

Generally speaking the issue is not the cost of the procedure, but the associated costs of the conviction and appeals process as the system tries (but all too often unsuccessfully) to weed out the innocent or otherwise comply with state and federal death penalty restrictions and mandates.

 

The way I understand it, people who claim this are figuring in the year/decades of appeals and the cost to the government in legal bills, as well as the cost to house them in prison for whatever length of time before they are executed. I'm fairly sure that the actual cost to carry out the execution, regardless of method, is miniscule compared to those other figures. 5 bullets? Sounds pretty damn cheap to me

 

Oh, duh, that makes sense. I never even considered the overhead...

 

Alt Focus: Like this........and I want not only midgets but pole dancers also to pump up the crowd before I enter the execution center.

Instead of screaming out freedom, I would simply scream, "Nookiieeeee!"

 

Focus This certainly isn't an easy decision to make! Should we be able to condemn an individual to death? Do we have the power? However After reading about a serial killer or child molester than yes, often I feel that he should be executed, however the judicial system in every country has wrongly imprisoned people, sometimes innocently, and at other times less so. In conclusion I don't like the idea of a state which is allowed to kill it's own citizens, if the citizens are innocent.

Alt. Focus I choose death by sex [ala Futurama] with hot girls, preferably lesbians (for those of you who missed the Futurama episode, it means you are sexed to death). If that's not available it would be fun to blow myself up in the middle of a crowd of Muslim suicide bombers, payback's a bitch!

 

I believe in capital punishment and think those that have been condemned to die need to be killed within close proximity of their date of execution and not prolong the ordeal through a series of appeals.

Also, I think the administration of death should be done by citizens same as jury duty. And the whole thing about some firing squad members or doctors firing/dropping blanks so as to conceal the lethal dose/shot is complete bullshit.

And of course it should be on TV. The Punishment Channel?

 

Ok, this is outside the debate on pro vs. con so hopefully is ok to respond to. Why would you possibly want to require someone who might well be a pacifist, or against the death penalty or otherwise recoils in horror at the thought of inflicting harm, to kill another human being as a condition of their citizenship? Is it to increase the deterrent value because civic duty and murder are somehow highly correlated?