On 25/09/2011 11:26 AM, Jerry Avins wrote:

>>
>> They also should bring back the electric chair and firing squads.
>
> If executions are to have any use, they should be deterrents.
> Criminals should be hanged from a lamppost in the neighborhood where
> they lived and left dangling for all to contemplate for about a week.
> Otherwise, why risk killing someone who is really innocent?
>

There are a couple of problems with the idea of capital punishment as a
deterrent. First of all, a portion of the population do not commit
crimes because they are basically good people who know right from wrong
and do not want to do wrong. Then there are those who try not to wrong
because they are are afraid of the consequences. Then there are those
who figure that they can get away with it or just don't care if they get
caught and sent to jail. In some circles it is a badge of honour to have
been in prison.

A lot of murders are crimes of passion. People argue or have fits of
jealousy and simply aren't thinking with their brains. Deterrence does
not work on those people. However.... a lot of murders, especially
domestic murders are the culmination of an escalating pattern of
violence. There are usually preceded by incidents of lour arguing,
verbal abuse and physical abuse. They happen more frequently among
younger couples and usually happen when they are drinking heavily.

Perhaps a better way to deter murders, at least in domestic situations,
is to react more harshly to the incidents of domestic violence that
precede the murders.