**OT**
Richard, as far as I am concerned, if you can show me a single case where an innocent person has been executed by any state, it is a violation of the constitution and the death penalty should be modified. I personally would take the biblical dictum that states, the death penalty for murder should be imposed only if there were two eye witnesses (some go even further, and say that "litmus test should be that these witnesses warned the murderer that his "coming action" is a death bearing and grave sin).
Applying the death penalty based on circumstantial evidence is not only "state arrogance" (our prosecutor knows best), it brings on all the tax payers (paying for those killings) the moral responsibility for killing an innocent person. Of course, it also applies the law differently to different classes of people. The rich like OJ, von Bilow (sp, and I do not mean our Carl, but the Conn. guy that murdered his sick "heiress" wife, etc...) can afford "high powered" lawyers and get off the hot seat, but the poor (and too often, the black) get the electric chair.
I think that the Republican Gov. of IL is right in suspending the death penalty, they found that more than one innocent person was killed, and a much larger number was going to undergo state assassination for the wrong reasons.
By the way, this point of view, IMHO, is a true "Libertarian" point of view, it has nothing to do with "liberalism" or "compasionate conservatism" (careful, that type of compassion kills, it is a "moral recession"), it has to do with individual rights, including the rights of those "framed" by law enforcement elements. We already know that in LA, such practices were widespread, I wonder how many other police departments practice justice in the same manner.
Zeev |
