Why Texas Needs The Death Penalty
Because of cases like this, where five teenagers allegedly beat a man in Wylie until he died. At least one of them reportedly used a hammer on the victim, 28-year-old Jonathan Bird, whose transgression was asking his assailants to drive slower for the sake of the neighborhood kids. Now, death-penalty opponents who argue capital punishment is useless because it’s not a deterrent may be on to something. However, that’s because these days it’s administered almost quietly–and mainly out of sight. I guarantee if these perpetrators were convicted and strung up by their necks on Wylie’s main street, there’d be a helluva lot fewer “beating deaths” in that town in the future.
55 Comments to “Why Texas Needs The Death Penalty”
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can DMag add a “Like” button to posts like FB?
I’d totally click it on this post.
Arguing, in the 21st Century, for public executions in the town square is priceless.
Absolutely priceless.
By the way, since stringing them up on main street will lead to “a helluva lot fewer beating deaths in that town,” one has to ask: Just how many beating deaths in Wylie have there been the past few years?
Anyone who has read the story carefully, knows that Jonathan Bird didn’t fight back because he knew that they were teenagers. That is, as he was been kicked and hit to death, he showed mercy to his killers. Even as the state takes life and defends it by saying “it is a deterrent,” we no longer publicly humiliate, kill, and display perpetrators. The general principle is that “violence begets violence” and public displays fuel the masses’ passion for watching wrong-doers burn. (Which is kind of a few degrees removed from doing the actual crime.) While it may give comfort to say such times out loud and ruminate on what one might of done had they been there, justice is not served by wishing death upon others as a way to discourage others from killing.
(Go ahead and vote me most unpopular blogger, I can take it.)
Ditto Jackson…times infinity.
Texas executed someone last night, indicating the death penalty is alive and well. We execute inmates fairly regularly, and it’s always mentioned on the news.
So obviously, everyone knows Texas is a death penalty state.
So why didn’t it stop these kids? Is it because the death penalty isn’t actually a deterrent?
Executions as a public spectacle never stopped the types of crime they were supposedly meant to deter, otherwise there would never have been a need to continue public executions. The elements of society that commit crimes like this don’t respond to the threat of consequences.
That’s a fine sentiment Glenn, but the Supreme Court ruled in 2005 in Roper v. Simmons that you can’t give juveniles the death penalty. The reason is juveniles have a lack of maturity and responsibility found in adults. I don’t necessarily agree with that opinion — I understood at 16 years of age that killing a guy out of anger was wrong — but that’s the law.
As long as DNA and other evidence can 100% convict a felon, I’m all for the death penalty. My only request? Put them to death faster. I’d rather pay for that than years of feeding and clothing them with nothing in return to society.
Reporter: Jimmy, would you like to participate in another death penalty debate on Frontburner?
Jimmy: I like turtles.
@Bethany There are three components to a sentence: 1) deterrent, 2) rehabilitation, and 3) punishment. And not every law is designed to leverage all three components, and those that do don’t equally weigh said components.
The death penalty completely ignores #2, has some emphasis on #1, but I’d argue it mainly exists to exercise society’s desire for #3.
@johan Another similar case is currently being argued right now — not for the death penalty, but something just as substansive: life without parole. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120251047
If death penalty ever were a deterrent (whether quietly or on ‘main street’), wouldn’t it be more of a deterrent to older citizens? The reason we don’t let teenagers drink or drive rental cars is that we do not feel that they have as deep a realization of the consequences of their actions. They probably never thought they’d be caught, much less put on death row.
The details of this incident are horrendous, but knee-jerk reactions like Glenn’s led to wrongful conviction of at least 20 innocent people in Dallas County.
I think it’s important to let the case make its way through the justice system before hangin’ anyone high.
this would be exactly why i carry my pistol when im puttering around the yard. this kind of thing doesnt happen all that often, but it happens often enough. ill be damned if im going to be beaten to death by a bunch of punk kids in my OWN DAMN YARD.
Did Glenn’s knee hit his desk when it jerked?
Just a thought: the death penalty is WAY more expensive for states because of the lengthy appeals process involved in death penalty cases. I don’t see that as a good use of public funds. Since the death penalty doesn’t do much to deter crime anyway, the only thing public executions would do is lower the public to the level of the criminal. We should be better than those who do these horrific crimes.
Did Glenn just unironically call for public hanging? He did, didn’t he?
Amazing.
@Tim. Yes, he did. You should ask him if it applies to people who break into cars at DART rail stations.
KS is right. $10M more per year is spent on death penalty inmates, as opposed to those with life without parole.
He did Tim, and you get to work with him.
There isn’t any way to quantify how many murders were “deterred” as a result of the death penalty. Not to change gears, but it’s along the same lines as calculating “jobs saved.” It just can’t be done.
And for people who say that the death penalty isn’t a deterrent because non-death-penalty states have lower murder rates should take a step back. That’s an apples to oranges comparison. The only way (that I can think of) would be to compare the murder rates in the SAME STATE before and after the death penalty was either instituted or abolished. That’s not even taking into consideration the fact that different states prosecute murder and manslaughter at different rates, yet death penalty studies only look at murder convictions. While you’re at it, if states with the death penalty have higher murder rates, why not just come out and say that the death penalty encourages violent crimes. It’s the same ridiculous correlation proves causation line of thinking.
Some people are going to commit a violent crime regardless of the punishment or lack thereof. These are the people that don’t deserve to be on our streets or in our prisons. It’s real easy to stand on a soapbox and scream against the death penalty. But when your wife, child, sibling, etc. is the victim, you may want to be the first one at the firing line.
I guarantee if these perpetrators were convicted and strung up by their necks on Wylie’s main street, there’d be a helluva lot fewer “beating deaths” in that town in the future.
How politically incorrect of you.
*applauds*
Actually, I think a far worse punishment for these kids is to watch their peers grow up, get married, have kids, succeed in life, while they’re in prison.
Watching the life you could’ve had pass you by while you sit in prison is a pretty harsh punishment, when you think about it.
We all get all caught up in the fact that the death penalty is revenge. Eye for an eye. But what we forget is that if you’re wanting revenge, living is sometimes far worse, depending on the quality of life you’re offered.
I like reading the stories of what got the guys strapped to a table in the first place. The Cuban they(we) executed yesterday was one bad hombre. Looks like 4 more executions are scheduled this year. Those four convicts are responsible for the deaths of 11 people(that are known).
Smithdew… anonymous posting causes supercilious behavior, too.
How do you like them oranges?
The classical way of dealing with these sorts of problems was to hunt down the perpetrators and dispose not only of them but also of anyone related to them on the reasonable theory of nipping a diseased genetic tendency in the bud before carting off their portable wealth and burning their real property to the ground. This provided a deterrent in two ways. The perps could never repeat their crimes, and if one happened to notice little Timmy pulling the wings off flies at an early age, an intervening accident could be arranged for him before things got out of hand and he placed the whole family or tribe in peril. Little Tommy was coming along behind him anyway and odds were he would turn out just fine as a replacement.
Nowadays, though, a chirping Eloi chorus reciting dubious death penalty statistics on internet message boards has replaced these classical procedures as the preferred deterrent. And, in an indirect way, it works: who of sound mind would risk life or limb by living anywhere near these bleating human sheep and the liabilities they cultivate?
Our justice system was based on natural law. As such, some acts are so vile, they demand the removal of the doer from society.
While it’s fine to claim the DP is not a deterrent, the data set required to ascertain that doesn’t exist.
There’s no way of knowing how many crimes, or escalation of crimes, the DP *has* prevented.
smithdew beat me to the punch.
@Bethany – I agree with your point
@DMBurrows: Ditto.
Am I conflicted?
Do people forget/not know/ignore the fact that the death penalty actually costs MORE than keeping someone in prison for life? They’re called appeals, and boy, are they expensive.
Anyway, what those teenagers did in Wylie was sickening and deplorable. I wonder if they’ll think it’s worth it when they’re sitting in jail (or, I guess, dead, since this is Texas) 30 years from now.
Bless poor Jonathan Bird.
Laura,
Teenagers can’t get the death penalty.
The battle between Justice and Revenge has always had a fine line. If you don’t believe me, just ask Batman… he lives on that very line.
At least one of these perps was described as a bully so I’m sure that there are a few of their peers in and around Wylie that are releived that they are off the street. Anyone that has lived in fear of someone that is a little deranged and a bully knows what I mean.
On another note, someone in Austin may know of a study that proves that falling on the ground where there are acorns mimics the effects of being hit in the head with a hammer and they will get off.
With respect to the deterrent function of the death penalty, you need to distinguish between specific deterrent and general deterrent. Specific deterrent means that the criminal herself will never commit the same crime (which the death penalty provides wonderfully). General deterrent means that, based on someone else’s punishment, other people won’t commit the same crime. I think that if death penalty cases were accelerated through the docket, appeal rights were abbreviated, and the punishment itself were publicly enforced, the death penalty would work just fine as a general deterrent.
And by the way, to those on this board who argued that life in prison without the possibility of parole is a worse punishment than death — I say, thanks for allowing me to be the more humane commentator for once.
The lust for blood in this state is appalling. The state has no right to take a life because the state does not give life. that is up to God.
Maybe not in this particular case, when there are plenty of eyewitnesses, it seems, but the death penalty in general?
Until we can get fix things like this: http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/2009/11/unanalyzed-evidence-held-by-law.html ,
I think we need to think long and hard about the concept of the death penalty.
@Baba
The “state” does not decide to take the life, the people do, through the jury system
Why think long and hard about stuff if you can be hanging people instead?
@Dubious Brother
I’m fairly certain you have not given me your lunch money this week. That better be corrected today.
Amazingly stupid post. There are arguments to be made for the death penalty, but this isn’t one of them. It sucks even as satire!
Still, it’s only number two on my list of worst local blog posts of the year. Glenn’s apparently serious “War on Columbus Day” rant remains number one, because it actually wouldn’t suck as satire. If it was. Which it wasn’t.
We don’t have a perfect system, but we still have the best system. Trial by jury is far better than trial by judge/dictator/politician.
The argument that it isn’t a deterrent only works on people who are opposed to the death penalty. Why? Well, it’s because the rest of us don’t care. There are many tools that should deter people from committing murder, and they should be used as much as is possible, but once the crime is committed it moves beyond deterrence to punishment.
If you beat an old man to death with a hammer solely because you don’t like him, or if you drag a man to death because you don’t like the color of his skin, then you have sacrificed your right to live. Deterrent or no deterrent, you shouldn’t be allowed to long outlive your victims.
Dear Bethany:
Isn’t it a bit condescending to assume that we haven’t already thought long and hard about the death penalty?
RAB-
Great argument. The expedition of sentencing and execution in capital punishment cases ultimately defeats much the the deterrent value of capital punishment.
As for proponents of prions vs. capital punishment, the ongoing problem with recidivism calls to question whether prisons, in general, are effective in either deterring or preventing criminal behavior.
In the end, I believe this deals with the unchecked problems in our legal system. Law and justice are rarely the same thing. The delays in the legal process regularly diminish the administration and impact of justice as it relates both to punishment and exoneration.
Ultimately, we want justice. Unfortunately what we usually get is the law…and the death penalty issue is always caught in the middle.
Good words, Dallasite.
Sometimes I want to pat her on the head and give her a cookie.
I never said you haven’t, RAB. But given that we have possibly killed an innocent man, and given the scads of exonerated men who weren’t on death row, I think the argument could be made that it’s time to step back, and examine the process that allows the needles and tubing to be used.
If it’s the right and just punishment, surely a little more scrutiny and a whole lot of responsibility isn’t objectionable, right? It should only prove the death penalty is the correct and obvious option.
Coincidentally, NRO’s Corner blog is having this same debate, and this bit by Mark Krikorian is food for thought:
There’s a defense of the death penalty I’ve not seen mentioned, though I’m sure someone has addressed it somewhere.
To start with the punch line, it seems to me the existence and imposition of the death penalty is a condition of the legitimacy of the state. What, after all, was the reason for the original social contract? Not the theoretical contracts that Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau discussed, but the actual ones all over the world where family and clan groups at different points in history first submitted themselves to the state?
It was to avenge murderers in a targeted, orderly, proportional, rule-based fashion, thus avoiding the disorder of private justice. Before that, and still in places with weak or non-existent states, families or clans would get justice on their own, so that when one of theirs was killed by a neighboring clan, they’d get the boys together and kill one of theirs.
The problem with this, of course, is that it leads to endless cycles of vendetta or feuds, and doesn’t even necessarily result in the right person being punished. So people surrendered the right to avenge their kinsmen’s deaths in exchange for a promise by the state to avenge the deaths for them.
As Jason said, when a someone’s loved one is murdered, it’s natural (and always will be, given the permanence of human nature) to insist that the murderer pays for his crime with his life. When the state, as a matter of policy, refuses under any circumstances to execute murderers, it welshes on the deal that brought the state into existence in the first place and undermines its legitmacy.
Dear Bethany:
If you’re referring to the Willingham case, no, I don’t think it’s likely that we killed an innocent man.
With respect to the Innocence Project, it’s clearly laudable and should be pursued vigorously. But I would note that what has exonerated those wrongfully convicted is new DNA technology that is standard procedure in current murder cases, so the risk of wrongful convictions is diminishing.
We’ve had plenty of scrutiny, and I think that those administering the punishment feel the full weight of the responsibility already.
To extend Gentle Shane’s distinction between justice and law, and to provide a new gloss on an old saying: law deferred is justice denied.
What’s the point of debating the death penalty? What Glenn advocates is unbridled brutality carried out with sadistic glee. Oh, they’d think twice about being punks if I could hang them upside down from a tree in my front yard and sell tickets to beat them in the privates with a tire-iron! Excuse me for being “politically incorrect,” which is invariably synonymous with “morally brave,” but that would be awesome!! Especially if we could douse their eyes and nostrils with jalapeno juice!!
Great Criminy Jeebus on a hot dog bun.
Nevertheless, Baba is morally correct when he states “The state has no right to take a life because the state does not give life. that is up to God” (or natural law, or Lord Darwin, whatever). The state, as described by Lincoln, is the people, by the people, and for the people. The only entity that is ever justified in taking life is (insert your higher power here).
However, my mother did used to tell me “I brought you into this world, and I can take you right back out.” …. so there might be something to that as well.
@simon: you are my twin, separated at birth. or an illicit clone, one or the other. i have long maintained that the most effective deterrent for the most severe of offenses would be to apply punishment to the perpetrator AND immediate family up and down the tree (children and parents), with an exemption being granted if the family reports and turns over the perp immediately upon discovery of a crime. it would produce the ACTIVE deterrent you describe, whereby it is in everyone’s interest to make damn sure their family stays in line (and turning over the ones that dont, hopefully BEFORE they beat a man to death). maintaining discipline on a brood of unruly hellspawn would suddenly jump to the top of most parent’s list of priorities (where it properly belongs).
@daniel: that is, without a doubt, the most incredible idea ever. id buy a ticket for that. seriously.
Glenn,
I don’t think very many people (though I’m sure there are some) would use THIS case to support an argument AGAINST the death penalty. People are more prone to put on their anti-death penalty hat in cases where there is some evidence that the perpetrator may not in fact be guilty or simply where there is some level of doubt surrounding the facts of the case.
Couple that with your previous concession that it is not a deterrent, and there you have it.
Hmmmm, I’ve always assumed Glenn was as mature, maybe even more so, than myself, I’m sixty one and no longer counting.
I guess I was wrong because Glenn sounded just like the guyals and gals over on the Wylie View (google it). Sad, sad, sad.
The death penalty is not a deterrent because the people it’s meant to deter cannot and do not read or watch the news. They murder people.
You know, I’m pretty super liberal and have always been on the fence w/ the death penalty but after reading this I know that some people’s light deserves to be extinguished… in the public square, preferably.
I’m not against the death penalty but in my opinion they should give something back to humanity. How about testing these people instead of animals who did absolutely nothing. What better results would you get on cancer study on humans than actually using humans as the subject. Lets face it, prison does not rehabilitate it only serves to increase one’s self deviance and violence. Lets do something positive.