76-yr old man executed in California

[Julia_E]

What do you all think of this?

The death penalty is something I’ve wrestled with a lot. I am generally opposed to it, although I certainly don’t lose sleep over it when somebody like this guy gets it.

This man ordered the murder of a 17 year old girl – his son’s girlfriend – because he thought she was going to rat on him for a robbery he commited.

Then while in prison, he ordered someone else’s murder. The person was killed along with two bystanders.

Obviously, other people’s lives meant nothing to this man.

The fact that he was 76, not to mention nearly blind and deaf, are irrelevant to me. He wasn’t 76 when he commited these vicious crimes, nor was he blind or deaf.

None of his victims got to live to be 76, or to live old enough to go blind or deaf. So I don’t see why those things should be considered here.

“Cruel and unusual punishment” to execute an old blind and deaf guy? What did his victims do to deserve the cruelty that he foisted on them?

Like I said, I’m generally against capital punishment – but in this guy’s case, I can definitely make an exception.

 

[FightingFat]

So why do you think he should be executed? Revenge?

 

[MikeWM]

Pointless, and quite sickening. If they can’t make society safe from a 76-year-old blind and deaf guy who can’t walk, then the US prison system is to blame and should be changed, not Catholic teaching. The Catechism is quite clear that we should be opposed to such executions.

Mike

 

[walstan]

I sometimes think we need to write a new proverb:

The road to moral damnation is paved with exceptions!

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It would seem that whenever capital punishment is mentioned there is always “an exception”. Whether it is this 75 year old man, or a child molester or murderer, a terrorist or cop killer, always exceptions!!! Is this moral equivelancy? Once you make a decision based on exceptions, where does it end? who makes the judgement of what is or is not “exceptional”? I have no particular love for “Arnie” and the job he has made for himself in California but, when a country has the death penalty and then talks about “exceptions” you are asking one man, the Governor, to make your decisions of life and death for you, to take to his immortal soul YOUR judgment so you can sit back in silent comfort only having agreed with the “exceptions”. Moral expediency, or Moral cowardice?

Death by the hand of man under any circumstances is immoral and wrong. Catholic and Christian morality is not negotiable, murder, either by an individual or the state is still MURDER, no matter how much you dress it up as justice, retribution or whatever and to lay the decision to carry out that murder by the state on one man is a cop out.

If you want retribution, if you want revenge then lock them up and throw the key away. Don’t complain about the cost in dollars, is one mans life, the life given by God not us, negotiable in monetary terms irrespective of what the have or have not done? I hope not.

 

[rlg94086]

Pat,

The problem with your argument is that the Governor could say the reverse about exceptions when deciding whether to stay an execution. (i.e. Why should he make an exception in a given case and stay an execution, rather than allow the jury’s decision to stand?)

IMHO, this guy’s case, not his current capabilities, do not merit the death penalty. As I said in another thread, I struggle with the issue, but I think if you are going to have it at all, the death penalty should be reserved for monsters - serial killers and the like who mutilate, eat their victims, etc.

walstan:

I sometimes think we need to write a new proverb:

The road to moral damnation is paved with exceptions!

It would seem that whenever capital punishment is mentioned there is always “an exception”. Whether it is this 75 year old man, or a child molester or murderer, a terrorist or cop killer, always exceptions!!! Is this moral equivelancy? Once you make a decision based on exceptions, where does it end? who makes the judgement of what is or is not “exceptional”? I have no particular love for “Arnie” and the job he has made for himself in California but, when a country has the death penalty and then talks about “exceptions” you are asking one man, the Governor, to make your decisions of life and death for you, to take to his immortal soul YOUR judgment so you can sit back in silent comfort only having agreed with the “exceptions”. Moral expediency, or Moral cowardice?

Death by the hand of man under any circumstances is immoral and wrong. Catholic and Christian morality is not negotiable, murder, either by an individual or the state is still MURDER, no matter how much you dress it up as justice, retribution or whatever and to lay the decision to carry out that murder by the state on one man is a cop out.

If you want retribution, if you want revenge then lock them up and throw the key away. Don’t complain about the cost in dollars, is one mans life, the life given by God not us, negotiable in monetary terms irrespective of what the have or have not done? I hope not.

 

[Julia_E]

walstan:

I sometimes think we need to write a new proverb:

The road to moral damnation is paved with exceptions!

---

---

.

In this case, I would disagree with that proverb. Allowing for exceptions is not for the purpose of being able to talk ourselves into allowing things like the death penalty.

In fact, I look at it the opposite way – if applying the death penalty is the EXCEPTION, then that must mean that the GENERAL RULE is to NOT apply it.

I see that as a mark of a compassionate society – one in which individual cases are taken into account and, in most of these cases, the rule (don’t apply the DP) is most prevalent.

Remember that the vast majority of murderers in America, and even in death-penalty states like California, do not receive the death penalty.

As for the facts of this case not warranting the maximum penalty, which in California is capital punishment, I have a hard time with that. This man cold-bloodedly and premeditatively ordered the murders of four people whose lives he didn’t give a damn about. In a way, he’s worse than a serial killer – at least serial killers often have some mental defect going on that may be driving what they do.

In this guy’s case, he knew perfectly well what he was doing, and just plain didn’t care.

 

[Julia_E]

MikeWM:

Pointless, and quite sickening. If they can’t make society safe from a 76-year-old blind and deaf guy who can’t walk, then the US prison system is to blame and should be changed, not Catholic teaching. The Catechism is quite clear that we should be opposed to such executions.

Mike

Correct me if I am wrong, but I don’t recall reading of Catholicism calling for a “no exceptions” condemnation on capital punishment as with abortion.

In fact, I thought that in some cases, according to Catholic teaching, capital punishment may be an unavoidable thing.

Whether that was the case with this guy in California is why I brought this up for debate.

To me, one who is not a big fan of the death penalty, the cold-blooded and premediated nature of this man’s crimes might – just might – justify the punishment he received last night.

It’s not to “protect us from a 76 yr old man” but rather to serve as a deterrent against other people doing the same thing.

There’s also the argument that the punishment should fit the crime. If someone says that the DP fits the crime of cold-bloodedly ordering the murders of four people, I would not call that person unreasonable.

 

[rlg94086]

Julia,

IMHO the bar is set pretty low if all that is required is that the murderer was cold-blooded, pre-meditated and that he/she didn’t give a damn about the victims.

Robert
Julia E:

In this case, I would disagree with that proverb. Allowing for exceptions is not for the purpose of being able to talk ourselves into allowing things like the death penalty.

In fact, I look at it the opposite way – if applying the death penalty is the EXCEPTION, then that must mean that the GENERAL RULE is to NOT apply it.

I see that as a mark of a compassionate society – one in which individual cases are taken into account and, in most of these cases, the rule (don’t apply the DP) is most prevalent.

Remember that the vast majority of murderers in America, and even in death-penalty states like California, do not receive the death penalty.

As for the facts of this case not warranting the maximum penalty, which in California is capital punishment, I have a hard time with that. This man cold-bloodedly and premeditatively ordered the murders of four people whose lives he didn’t give a damn about. In a way, he’s worse than a serial killer – at least serial killers often have some mental defect going on that may be driving what they do.

In this guy’s case, he knew perfectly well what he was doing, and just plain didn’t care.

 

[Julia_E]

FightingFat:

So why do you think he should be executed? Revenge?

No, it’s not revenge.

It’s for justice for the victims, their families, and everyone else who was impacted by their loss.

It’s for protection for society – when this man committed this brutal crime against these four people, he committed it against society in general.

If we are to argue that abortion impacts all of society – and it does – then we would be inconsistent if we did not also argue that this man’s 4 murders also impacted society.

I also don’t recall reading anything about this man ever expressing remorse for what he did. No surprise there, since he ordered 3 more murders while he was serving a life sentence for the first murder he ordered.

 

[Julia_E]

Remember, too, that when this man was convicted of his first murder, he was NOT given the death penalty. He was given a life sentence.

So what did he do with the opportunity given him by the state, which chose to spare his life the first time around? He went and ordered three more murders!

This tells me that simply locking him up and throwing away the key was NOT protecting society from this man – not when he was still essentially murdering people from within the jail cell.

That’s what it’s all about – protecting society, not revenge. The guy was still having people killed even AFTER he’d been locked up – so obviously, simply locking him up wasn’t protecting society.

 

[Julia_E]

MikeWM:

Pointless, and quite sickening. If they can’t make society safe from a 76-year-old blind and deaf guy who can’t walk, then the US prison system is to blame and should be changed,
Mike

Mike, 3 out of the 4 murders this man ordered were ordered AFTER he had been locked up.

Locking up THIS particular man did NOT make those 3 additional victims safe. Nor, by extension, did it make the rest of society safe.

Maybe locking up most other murderers for life makes society safer – but this guy was an exception, since 75% of his victims were killed after he was sent up the river. Hence the exception in my mind.

 

[MikeWM]

Julia E:

Mike, 3 out of the 4 murders this man ordered were ordered AFTER he had been locked up.

Hence my argument about the prisons needing to be better. He shouldn’t be able to order people murdered while in prison. The fact that he may have done so again is an argument for a more secure prison system, not for killing him.

Mike

 

[Julia_E]

rlg94086:

Julia,

IMHO the bar is set pretty low if all that is required is that the murderer was cold-blooded, pre-meditated and that he/she didn’t give a damn about the victims.

Robert

That’s not all.

You forgot to mention that he ordered 3 of his 4 victims murdered from prison, after he had already received a life sentence.

Clearly, rehabilitation wasn’t working on this man, and he displayed a glaring lack of willingness to become rehabilitated.

 

[Julia_E]

MikeWM:

Hence my argument about the prisons needing to be better. He shouldn’t be able to order people murdered while in prison. The fact that he may have done so again is an argument for a more secure prison system, not for killing him.

Mike

He wasn’t able – legally speaking – to order people murdered while in prison.

You are making it sound like it’s the prison’s fault that this man chose, deliberately, to ignore the law again. As if it was the prison’s fault, and not his, that he deliberately chose to disregard others’ right to life and have them murdered.

The man did not order 3 more murders because the prison system was bad. That’s not what made him kill again.

What made him kill again was that, after having killed one person, he didn’t give a damn about 3 other people and decided to kill them too. It was what was in his heart, and not some defect in the prison system, that caused him to kill.

This man made a choice to order one murder. Then, after given a life sentence for that, chose to do it again three times.

Let me repeat this, because it cannot be emphasized enough – he had already gotten a life sentence, and used the clemency that the state granted him in sparing his life to do what? To kill again.

I’m generally against the death penalty, but I also think that there are some cases that warrant exceptions. This was one of them.

 

[Julia_E]

He was already serving a life sentence for ordering one murder, then he decided to order three more.

What punishment would then serve the people’s right to be protected? Three more life sentences? What on earth good would that do?

No offense, but you guys don’t seem to get it – he was under a life sentence and was STILL KILLING PEOPLE!!!

How would piling life sentence upon life sentence protect the people of California from a guy who was still cold-bloodedly murdering people from within his jail cell?

 

[GregoryPalamas]

I think if he’s no longer a danger to society because of age and physical handicaps release him. Dump him on in Uptown Chicago or some other near ghetto and let him fend for himself.

CDL

 

[Julia_E]

walstan:

Catholic and Christian morality is not negotiable, murder, either by an individual or the state is still MURDER.

There is not only one single position on capital punishment that all Catholics are obligated to hold.

See this e-letter by Mr. Keating:

catholic.com/newsletters/kke_040302.asp

Appeals to the idea that Catholic teaching condemns capital punishment, while understandable, are not sufficient.

Catholic teaching does not make a wholesale condemnation of capital punishment, the way it does with regard to abortion or other moral matters.

 

[MikeWM]

Julia E:

No offense, but you guys don’t seem to get it – he was under a life sentence and was STILL KILLING PEOPLE!

Eh? He told other people to kill people, and the other people did. He didn’t personally kill these other people. If he’s telling people he meets to kill people, put him in solitary confinement, but don’t kill him.

Mike

 

[Julia_E]

GregoryPalamas:

I think if he’s no longer a danger to society because of age and physical handicaps release him. Dump him on in Uptown Chicago or some other near ghetto and let him fend for himself.

CDL

If I were him, I would rather be given a lethal injection …

By the way, 76 year old men can still make phone calls from jail and order people murdered. They can still write letters and order people killed. Even if they are legally blind as well as deaf.

This guy had already done it before. The state had already spared his life for the first murder he ordered – and he took advantage of that in order to order 3 more lives snuffed out.

Society was not safe from this man just because he’d been locked up – not when 75% of his murder victims died while he was behind bars.

As far as I know, Catholic moral thought holds that it is licit to take the life of a would-be murderer, in order to save the life of another.

In this case, society is now safe from the possibility that this man would order another murder – again – from prison. Call it an act of societal self-defense.

 

[rlg94086]

MikeWM:

Eh? He told other people to kill people, and the other people did. He didn’t personally kill these other people. If he’s telling people he meets to kill people, put him in solitary confinement, but don’t kill him.

Mike

Mike? You’re not serious are you? Hitler didn’t personally kill millions, Osama bin Laden hasn’t strapped bombs to himself or personally flown a plane into any buildings… These two are/were brutal murderers, were they not?

BTW…ongoing solitary confinement is considered by many to be…wait for it…“cruel and unusual punishment.”