Coppermine wrote:NPR's "All Things Considered" has been running an amazing story this week about Larry Peterson, a man accused and convicted of a 1987 rape and murder of a young woman. He was sentenced to 40 years in prison based on witness testimony and hairs found at the crime scene that "compared" to Peterson's using the available technology of the time. It wasn't until 2005 that the evidence was re-examined using DNA evidence, effectively clearing Peterson of the crime... after 17 years in prison. Now the state of New Jersey says they don't owe him a thing.
It's an interesting story and quite amazing; but there are a lot of people in jail right now convicted based on evidence used prior to DNA testing, many of which have not been re-tried. Others have already been executed. Certainly not all of them are innocent, but it's hard to imagine how many may be.
wrveres wrote:Just because 2 or 3 people a year are mistakingly convicted is no reason to let the other 14,997 people go live with their buddies and watch color tv 24-7 while having meals prepared for them and all their health concerns attended too. I am not buying it.
This is flawed logic. Just because someone is against the death penalty doesn't mean they are in favor of the maintaining the status quo in the prison system. I'm against capital punishment, but I would be in favor of keeping convicted muderers in some kind of solitary confinement with no TV privileges, a bread and water diet (maybe no literally bread and water, but just enough to maintain health), one hour a day of supervised excercise, isolated from other inmates, etc.
Someone can be against the death penalty, and against the pampering of convicts.
wrveres wrote:Just because 2 or 3 people a year are mistakingly convicted is no reason to let the other 14,997 people go live with their buddies and watch color tv 24-7 while having meals prepared for them and all their health concerns attended too. I am not buying it.
This is flawed logic. Just because someone is against the death penalty doesn't mean they are in favor of the maintaining the status quo in the prison system. I'm against capital punishment, but I would be in favor of keeping convicted muderers in some kind of solitary confinement with no TV privileges, a bread and water diet (maybe no literally bread and water, but just enough to maintain health), one hour a day of supervised excercise, isolated from other inmates, etc.
Someone can be against the death penalty, and against the pampering of convicts.
I agree.
If I can semi-hijack, I would like to go back to the belief that some people believe that the death penalty shouldn't be used because it isn't a deterrant. It isn't?? If 1 person is deterred, that's enough for me. I am also for the punishment fitting the crime.
I agree. I think it's safe to say that it's at least as much as a deterrent as life in prison.
Maine has a good swing for a pitcher but on anything that moves, he has no chance. And if it's a fastball, it has to be up in the zone. Basically, the pitcher has to hit his bat. - Mike Pelfrey
Absolutely Adequate wrote:I just ran across an interesting statistic.
Number of U.S. priosoners freed through DNA evidence since 1989: 201 Percentage of those who had been mistakenly identified by eyewitnesses: 77
How many were on death row?? I would also like to reiterate that I am only in favor of the death penalty in instances where there is absolutely no doubt. Those cases may or may not be few and far between and I am fine with that.
Absolutely Adequate wrote:I just ran across an interesting statistic.
Number of U.S. priosoners freed through DNA evidence since 1989: 201 Percentage of those who had been mistakenly identified by eyewitnesses: 77
How many were on death row?? I would also like to reiterate that I am only in favor of the death penalty in instances where there is absolutely no doubt. Those cases may or may not be few and far between and I am fine with that.
I don't know the answer. I think what the statistic does, however, is show the staggering amount that eyewitnesses are wrong. It may be that the only time we are absolutely without doubt are times where the criminal confesses, we have eyewitnesses, and we have corroborating DNA evidence.
Absolutely Adequate wrote:I just ran across an interesting statistic.
Number of U.S. priosoners freed through DNA evidence since 1989: 201 Percentage of those who had been mistakenly identified by eyewitnesses: 77
How many were on death row?? I would also like to reiterate that I am only in favor of the death penalty in instances where there is absolutely no doubt. Those cases may or may not be few and far between and I am fine with that.
I don't know the answer. I think what the statistic does, however, is show the staggering amount that eyewitnesses are wrong. It may be that the only time we are absolutely without doubt are times where the criminal confesses, we have eyewitnesses, and we have corroborating DNA evidence.
Not very often, actually.
I don't think that number is staggering at all. You don't even know if those were murder convictions, or even death penalty cases. On top of that it is only 77 cases over an 18 year period versus probably 1 million plus convictions over that same period. How is that staggering?
wrveres wrote:Just because 2 or 3 people a year are mistakingly convicted is no reason to let the other 14,997 people go live with their buddies and watch color tv 24-7 while having meals prepared for them and all their health concerns attended too. I am not buying it.
This is flawed logic. Just because someone is against the death penalty doesn't mean they are in favor of the maintaining the status quo in the prison system. I'm against capital punishment, but I would be in favor of keeping convicted muderers in some kind of solitary confinement with no TV privileges, a bread and water diet (maybe no literally bread and water, but just enough to maintain health), one hour a day of supervised excercise, isolated from other inmates, etc.
Someone can be against the death penalty, and against the pampering of convicts.
I will agree with you. But in reality, what you propose will never happen.
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by deerayfan072 » Wed Jun 13, 2007 8:07 pm 
thats a little sacrey! I just hope I'm not in the "right" place at the wrong time!
