Is there anyone who initially opposed the death penalty, but later changed their minds because...?

Question

they themselves, or someone close to them, had eventually became the victim of a horrendous crime such as witnessing the murder of loved ones right before their eyes ( for example the scene from Death Wish or The Devil's Rejects)?

Answer 1

I know at least one woman whose son and daughter in law were brutally murdered. As a devout Catholic, she had opposed the death penalty. Immediately after the murder, she wavered and supported the death penalty. But as she has healed, she not only continues to oppose the death penalty she speaks out against it.

Another woman I know, whose sister was murdered (by a serial rapist and killer) was asked by the DA how she felt about him going for the death penalty. Her reply was that she knew that whatever she needed, a death sentence was not going to help her.

The head of the New Jersey Crime Victims' Law Center.
whose own son was murdered has said that even though he supports the death penalty in principal, he hopes that it will be replaced by life without parole because of the heavy toll the death penalty process takes on people like himself and those he helps.

Answer 2

I opposed capital punishment until I became a prosecutor (& latera defense attorney) & learned after meeting, seeing & prosecuting thousands of criminals (including murderers robbers & rapists) that there are some individual who are simply vicious, psychopathic animals, who can never be "rehabilitated" into contollable people who can safely live with anyone else. They are so miserable & so governed by anger & irrationality that they cannot enjoy life & just endanger & render everyone around them miserable. There is no reason why the rest of us should pay the costs of maintaining & restraining them for decades & suffer tne danger of their escape or eventual release. Nor is there any reason why we should subject the vast majority of other prisoners to the dangers of being housed with these monsters. They should be isolated and killed as quickly as the law and due process permits.

Answer 3

I think it is the normal response to want to kill whomever killed a loved one of yours, but at the same time it's just you wanting revenge. In the end, I think that the death penalty is unacceptable. If someone is worthless enough to commit a murder, then he or she should be sent to jail for life. Death penalty cases are much more expensive and take longer to try than life in prison cases.

Answer 4

It form of is going against your thought of consumer-friendly sense, however the respond isn't any. they does no longer substitute their perspectives with regard to the death penalty interior the occasion you supply on your question. maximum people who vehemently oppose the death penalty accomplish that because of the fact of a reliable ethical conviction this is erroneous, below any condition, to take somebody's existence. to each and each, his very own. i for my area might pull the turn on any newborn molester convicted for a 2d offense - and that i'm able to think of of a few different examples i does no longer loose any sleep over the two.