2007-12-05 09:47:34 · 26 answers · asked by EM 6 in Politics & Government ➔ Politics
Politics is full of thumb downers too I see, yippee!!
2007-12-05 10:08:26 · update #1
Yes, and I did. 12 years ago I was foreman of a Jury. We convicted him, and gave him the death penalty. Wasn't hard to do at all. I and the others had to look at the picture of this little girl that he murdered. Among other acts he did to this innocent little one. I don't feel to this day bad at all.
2007-12-05 09:52:48 · answer #1 · answered by Sasha 5 · 3⤊ 3⤋
Good question. What's especially interesting about this is that people with reservations about the death penalty can be thrown off a jury panel.
Prosecutors in death penalty cases can be sure they have have jurors who do not oppose the death penalty and do not have any reservations about it. The Supreme Court has ruled that this is constitutional. In a June 2007 decision, it held that excluding a juror who had expressed only doubts, but not uniform opposition, to imposing the death penalty, is constitutional.
You don't have to sympathize with criminals or want them to avoid a terrible punishment to ask if the death penalty prevents or even reduces crime and to think about the risks of executing innocent people. But if prosecutors believe that you are concerned about these things, it is in their power to keep you off a jury. (This also can tilt the jury against the defense in the guilt phase as well as the sentencing phase.)
2007-12-05 22:01:25 · answer #2 · answered by Susan S 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I would not be able to serve on a jury in a capital case. If they asked me if I could sentence someone to the death penalty, I'd have to honestly say, NO, and the prosecution would reject me.
2007-12-05 23:06:48 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
Let's try looking at it from the (innocent until proven guilty) defendant's point of view for JUST a moment, may we?
Would I want my life or death decided by 12 citizens who are too stupid to not know how to get out of jury duty?
Not when we have literally THOUSANDS of those same "guilty defendants" who were executed and then found NOT GUILTY by DNA or other exculpatory evidence?
Years ago, here in Mesa, AZ, there was a local access call-in TV show and their guest of the evening was a former State Attorney General for Maricopa County, Arizona.
I had called into this show many times before and so I was allowed to ask this "prosecutor" one question.
"As a State Prosecutor, what did you consider to be your number one function?"
He replied, quick as you please, "To convict.".
I replied, "Funny, I thought it was a prosecutor's duty TO FIND JUSTICE."
He quickly backpedalled and agreed, but the reality of the American legal system is, for Assistant Prosecutors who want to be State Prosecutors, their CONVICTION rate is used to determine their effectiveness, meaning they are not in a position to determine justice, they are to convict whomever they are trying for a crime, whether he or she is guilty of that crime or not.
LA Police were under fire a couple years ago for systematic false testimony and the falsification of evidence to convict an overwhelming number of blacks and hispanics in the Los Angeles area. There was even a new verb coined for their crimes, "Testi- lying".
How would you feel if you voted to convict someone and also to send them to the gas chamber, only to find out AFTER THEY WERE EXECUTED, they were completely innocent of the crimes in question?
2007-12-05 18:13:52 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
If the defendant was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt then yes I would. As long as the punishment of the death penalty was appropriate for the crime.
2007-12-05 17:51:35 · answer #5 · answered by labken1817 6 · 4⤊ 1⤋
simple answer to this from me YES, i would be able to sleep to after getting rid of just one person who is scum of society i would gladly stick the needle into his body, but this is done by machine now, i think 8 10 needles containing a concouqutation of chemicals.
or gladly take the job of hangwoman. no problems there, besides we would have more room in our prisons, and the tax we pay from our wages, to keep this scum alive would not be so high these lifers are pampered far too much.
2007-12-06 09:20:17 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
I have and i did. The trouble was, I could only convince 2 others to my point of view. Believe it or not, it is very hard for a person to take another person's life. I saw grown men and women cry and say they just couldn't do it, even though the person deserved it. And anyone that hasn't been there and says they would have no problem, really doesn't know.
2007-12-05 17:53:16 · answer #7 · answered by grumpyoldman 7 · 2⤊ 2⤋
Yes, there are some people that commit crimes so horrible thtat the death penalty is the only answer. Some people will kill in prison or any where you put them. They have no redeeming qualities and can never be rehabilitated.
2007-12-05 18:02:20 · answer #8 · answered by Just my opinion 5 · 1⤊ 2⤋
Nope. 100% against the death penalty. It is archaic and doesn't work. More expensive than putting the criminal in prison for the remainder of their life.
I would rather see the criminal spend the rest of their life in prison without the possibility of parole.
2007-12-05 18:01:46 · answer #9 · answered by kenny J 6 · 2⤊ 2⤋
Ummm, let's see.... I live in Minnesota and three times I've been up for jury duty and I've never made it beyond them receiving the form I've had to fill out.
SHUCKS
2007-12-05 18:03:09 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 1⤋