quote:
Originally posted by Barry the Sprout:
And for your final point - I will try and remember they are criminals. You try and remember they are people.
Fair Enough.
I've already agreed that Life Imprisonment is the better choice for Ms. Mallard. Since she doesn't have a history of killing people, it IS possible that she may NOT present a future danger to society... but she SHOULD spend the REST of her life paying for the cold-hearted decision to let this man slowly bleed to death in her house.
AFA my "..remember they are CRIMINALS" statement, that was a generalized rant directed at how our court system treats criminals. Lawyers try to convince the judge that it isn't their clients fault that they broke the law...rather the blame lies with society itself. That argument is just total and complete BULL CRAP in my opinion.
Anyway, that's a topic for a different thread.
Finally, I disagree that EVERYBODY is redeemable. We've seen too many cases here in America of sociopathic serial killers that are totally UN-redeemable. Ted Bundy, by his own admission, killed over 100 young girls during his lifetime. Wayne Gacy killed young boys and buried them under his house. Jeffrey Dahmer even ate his victims.
The fact is, there are some people that WILL present a constant threat to society as long as they are allowed to live.
Ted Bundy was once put in jail more on 2-3 different occasions before finally being caught and sentenced to death in Florida. In fact, he had been in jail for over 2 years just prior to the killing spree at the soririty house in FL that got him captured for good. Up until that time, he had killed his victims one at a time (except for one documented case where he captured and killed 2 girls at the same time)
But after being "cooped-up" for over 2 years, he simply couldn't exercise that much control anymore and had to literally go on a killing spree.
We have a saying here in the South that applies to people like that...
"He needed killin'" Some criminals are simply too dangerous to leave alive.
So I stand by the practicality of my previous argument...but I agree with you that it does not apply in this specific case.