Forever?
Is there a point at which that becomes cruel and unusual?
That’s the standard Jewish translation. God commands people to kill all throughout the Bible.
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That was clearly not the case with this execution, nor with the vast majority of executions.
There may be cases where executing a prisoner is the least bad option. I’d have to see a real such case to judge. I suspect that most cases of prisoners killing in prison could be prevented with lesser measures, however.
I think if we treated prisoners better there would be a great deal less prison violence, for instance.
Sure, I’m saying in general, not this particular case.
Thanks. I wonder if there are other death penalty opponents who would agree there might be a few cases.
I have no doubt there’s a lot of room for improvement in our prisons. I’m less convinced that would result in “a great deal less prison violence” though.
It still might be the “most painless and humane” method we have.
Admittedly, the phrase “most painless” is most dubious.
“Least painful and most humane”?
Yeah. The glass is half-painless.
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So is CO poisoning and N2 poisoning pretty similar from the dying person’s POV or are there material differences? Because I’d heard CO poisoning suggested as a means of execution but this is the first I’d heard of N2 poisoning.
Would holding your breath with CO poisoning result in a pretty similar outcome? Just curious.
Like … air is something like 78% nitrogen already, whereas it’s only a tiny percent carbon monoxide. Does that make a difference? Would carbon monoxide kill you faster because your body can withstand only a tiny amount of it compared to nitrogen?
I have no idea… maybe that’s a ridiculous way of thinking about it.
Probably. The issue appears to have been that he held his breath long enough to have pain from CO2 buildup.
The difference between using N2 and using CO is that with N2 there’s no Oxygen available, and with CO your blood picks up the CO instead of oxygen. But you don’t have a way to sense either of those, so they feel pretty similar when they are happening.
I assume they picked N2 because it’s safer for the other people in the room. It doesn’t matter if some of it leaks, because air is mostly N2 and there’s not enough in the canister to matter, once it’s diluted with the rest of the air.
Industrial accidents with nitrogen asphyxiation are somewhat common, and tricky because workers typically don’t know there’s a problem until too late.
When nitrogen is used for assisted suicide, or when people accidentally walk into a room full of it (a typical industrial accident) the affected people don’t hold their breath, and don’t suffer. But… I rather suspect if i were being executed, I’d hold my breath as long as i possibly could, too. And that causes a lot of pain.
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That makes sense.
if he can’t interact. allow solo yard time, or shackled yard time.
personally i feel death is an easier out than life in prison
The Executioners Song makes for an interesting read on this.
Being put to death, and surviving, just to go through it again is as cruel as it gets
That sounds difficult and/or expensive, particularly if there are a lot of these prisoners.
prison is expensive
death row appeals are expensive
It sounds unusually expensive even by the standards of how much it typically costs to incarcerate a person.
There are too many prison-for-lifers found innocent, and too many times including present day that police/DAs knowingly put away innocent people, for me to ever support the death penalty.
To anybody who supports the death penalty, I’d ask if they’d be willing to also be executed to ensure the execution of one child molester rather than life in prison. If they say yes, at least they’re consistent. If they say no, I’d ask if they’d kill another innocent person.
If they argue that the scale is wrong, I’d ask how many child molesters need to be executed to justify killing 1 innocent person - because we have certainly done the math and in certain states decided there is a number of guilty executions to justify killing that innocent person, while other states have decided the innocent person should live.
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I hear these types of arguments a lot. But why does the prospect of an innocent person spending life in prison not bother you equally as much?
That should be equally troubling, IMO… maybe moreso.
It does bother me, but in the case of exoneration, the innocent person is probably… somewhat more appreciative while alive.
We’ll never have a prison system without innocent people, so given that I think it’s best not to kill some of them.
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Yes - assuming the life sentence actually persists for the entire life.
With execution it is guaranteed to.
That line of reasoning falls flat with me. Let’s work on doing a better job of not locking up innocent people. That’s reform I would be on board with.