I didn't. My point isn't dependent on any one case.

my point is

Do you think there are not sound reasons for abolishing the death penalty that have been developed (and accepted) by most civilized nations?

I was in Clayton, New Mexico, a few days ago, and on one wall of the Dairy Queen was the story of "Black Jack" Ketchum, the only man ever hanged in Clayton.

http://www.claytonnewmexico.net/blackjack.html

Very interesting story of the Old West, but the reason I bring it up here is because the people in Clayton weren't too skilled in hangings, and ol' Black Jack was decapitated by the rope. The pics are at the link (as they also were on the wall in the fucking Dairy Queen!!).

So....no opinions on why I bumped this thread in the first place?

i meant to reply yesterday, but got sidetracked. given that dna evidence now exists, doesn't your argument lose credence, at least if the conviction was based on dna or clear video or confession or something similarly conclusive and not solely witness testimony?

His point is that in the future there might always be some sort of technology we don't have now.

I think it's a pretty weak argument. But 2 points for effort.

The problem is we're human, and therefor there will always be the human element in our justice system, which means that it's possible somewhere along the line someone fucked up which means we probably shouldn't have any irreversible punishments.

Well, yah. But that's not what he asked.

I don't read posts.

Can you imagine your post count if you did?

You just blew my mind.

actually, i thought that was what GH asked.

It's a combination of both.

Simply put, the death penalty is unique in that it is an irrevocable sentence. If a mistake was made, there's no way to repay the convict's loss of freedom. If we're of the opinion that wrongful sentences can be challenged, then the death penalty contradicts it.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110126/ap_ ... g_shortage

Sedative maker deplores execution use
By ANDREW WELSH-HUGGINS, AP Legal Affairs Writer Andrew Welsh-huggins, Ap Legal Affairs Writer – 1 hr 13 mins ago

COLUMBUS, Ohio – The sole U.S. manufacturer of a sedative that Ohio plans to use to execute death row inmates — and that Oklahoma already uses to do so — said Wednesday it opposes the practice and has asked both states to stop using the drug.

Pentobarbital maker Lundbeck Inc. says it never intended for the drug to be used to put inmates to death.

"This goes against everything we're in business to do," Sally Benjamin Young, spokeswoman for the Denmark-based company's U.S. headquarters in Deerfield, Ill., told The Associated Press.

"We like to develop and make available therapies that improve people's lives," she said. "That's the focus of our business."

State prison officials in Ohio and Oklahoma both said they hadn't seen copies of the letter Wednesday and could not comment.

Oklahoma has used the drug in combination with two others in three executions, while Ohio announced Tuesday it is switching to the sedative as the sole drug used to put inmates to death.

Lundbeck does not sell the product directly to end users and has no way of preventing either state from using the drug.

"While we cannot control how our products are administered, it is our intent that our products be used in a safe and appropriate manner and encourage use consistent with the label," the company said in a statement.

Ohio has not yet purchased its first supplies and Oklahoma has said it obtains its supply from a private pharmacy.

Both states switched to pentobarbital as a national shortage worsened of the drug they used previously, sodium thiopental.

That drug's sole U.S. manufacturer, Hospira Inc., of Lake Forest, Ill., deplored the drug's use in executions and also asked states not to use it, to no avail. The company announced last week it was discontinuing the product.

Pentobarbital is a barbiturate used to induce comas during surgeries to prevent brain damage when blood flow is interrupted, and to reduce possible brain damage following strokes or head trauma. It is chemically related to the same product used to euthanize pets.

Medical experts say Ohio and Oklahoma's dosages are so big they're lethal by themselves.

The amount that Oklahoma uses and Ohio has proposed — 5 grams — is 50 times the normal dosage used in hospitals, said Howard Nearman, chairman of the Anesthesiology Department at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Cleveland.

Not only would a dosage that size stop someone's breathing, it would also likely cause a drastic drop in blood pressure, all of which would easily lead to a person's death, Nearman said Wednesday.

Experts who testified in a federal lawsuit trying to stop Oklahoma's proposed switch to pentobarbital were split on the drug's effectiveness in putting humans to death.

The size of Oklahoma's dosage "by itself would cause death in almost everyone," Mark Dershwitz, a University of Massachusetts anesthesiologist, said in a report submitted to a federal judge in an Oklahoma hearing last year.

"It's a massive overdose," Dershwitz said Wednesday in a phone interview.

A second expert testifying in Oklahoma said the lack of clinical evidence for using pentobarbital as an anesthetic raises questions about its effectiveness in capital punishment.

"The use of pentobarbital as an agent to induce anesthesia has no clinical history and is non-standard," Harvard medical professor David Waisel told the court.

"Because of these significant unknowns, and a lack of clinical history related to using pentobarbital to induce anesthesia, using pentobarbital as part of a 3-drug lethal injection protocol puts the inmate at an undue risk of suffering."

Waisel confirmed his comments in a follow-up phone interview Wednesday, saying there's no way of knowing the drug's effects.

The prisons department said it will use its remaining supply of sodium thiopental for the scheduled execution Feb. 17 of Frank Spisak, who killed three people at Cleveland State University in 1982.

The first use of pentobarbital is planned for March's scheduled execution of Johnnie Baston of Lucas County, condemned to die for shooting the owner of a Toledo store in the back of the head during a 1994 robbery.

The drug has been used in 200 of the 525 assisted suicides in Oregon since 1998, according to data compiled by the Oregon Public Health Division. It also was prescribed for 5 of 47 assisted-suicide patients in Washington state in 2009, state health statistics show.

Illinois abolished it. Good job.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110309/ap_ ... y_illinois

Currently, Idaho is one of five states (Oregon, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and South Dakota) that has executed someone post-Furman, but has never executed anyone against their will. Unfortunately, that's set to no longer be the case on November 18th.

http://www.idahostatesman.com/2011/10/2 ... -1987.html

Another fun fact I discovered regarding the death penalty post-Furman: out of all executions since then, a whopping 82% of them took place in the South. Not hugely surprising, expect maybe that it was such a high percentage.

Damn, it sucks to no longer be part of that list.