# Your views on the death penalty/insanity plea



## KokosMomMom (Jul 23, 2012)

In light of the weekends events I have reviewed my opinion of the death penalty and the usage of the insanity plea.  First I will discuss the insanity plea, how can someone who used such deliberation and months of planning plead that he is too insane to stand trial? I can see if he hadn't spent months accumulating the guns, ammunition and explosives, but it was a cold deliberate act by a mad man not a crazy man.

The death penalty is normally not an avenue I would advocate but do you think in mass killings it is appropriate?


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## SeaBreeze (Jul 23, 2012)

I think the insanity plea is just an easy way out for these people.  They don't have to worry about the usual prison behavior that they may experience in jail, and they are given meds everyday too, so they can stay in 'la la land', where everything is peachy.  

_I_'m for the death penalty, and I'd like to take it a step further, and kill those creeps exactly the way they killed their victims.  In the case of child abuse and murder, these violators should endure ALL of the unspeakable torture that they put those babies or young children through.


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## OhioBob (Jul 24, 2012)

I'm all for the death penalty. Sure, it doesn't bring back loved ones. However, it puts the murderer one step closer to hell!


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## KokosMomMom (Jul 24, 2012)

SeaBreeze said:


> I think the insanity plea is just an easy way out for these people.  They don't have to worry about the usual prison behavior that they may experience in jail, and they are given meds everyday too, so they can stay in 'la la land', where everything is peachy.
> 
> _I_'m for the death penalty, and I'd like to take it a step further, and kill those creeps exactly the way they killed their victims.  In the case of child abuse and murder, these violators should endure ALL of the unspeakable torture that they put those babies or young children through.



Now see, I knew I liked you for a reason!! I believe that all criminals should be treated as they treated their victims.  I especially think anyone who mistreats children should suffer and not live in "splendor" for years.  By that I mean they have three meals a day, a roof over their head, and clothes to wear...more than some out here have...that is living in splendor when you deserve to be rotting away somewhere! Ok, I need to step off the soap box because I can keep going and going!


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## Steve (Jul 28, 2012)

We up here in Canada have abolished the death penalty.. I have NO explanation why they did it, but never the less they did..
Sometimes I wonder if a criminal who should be executed is put in prison for life isn't suffering more rather than die a martyr.. Perhaps they should put all those criminals in a special prison where the basics of life are a luxury rather than a regular prison where they have almost everything given to them.. That way suffering like they did to their victims will be for the rest of their life..................

Suffer rather than die.......

This is just my opinion but I can imagine many not agreeing with me............


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## OhioBob (Jul 28, 2012)

Steve, but once they die they will suffer more pain than they could ever endure on Earth. Keeping them alive also costs us thousands in taxes each year. Where I live, it costs up to 50,000 USD per year to house a murdered. What a waste of money!


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## SeaBreeze (Jul 28, 2012)

It is expensive to keep someone in jail, even if it's just '3 hots and a cot'.  It may not seem a very forgiving thing to do, but I imagine that those people who have had loved ones killed senselessly by these murderers, would like to see them lose their own lives as punishment.  I think killing crime would go down if the murderers knew they would get a death sentence.  I just think lying there and getting a needle in their arm to softly go to sleep is too kind for some of these monsters.


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## Knightofalbion (Aug 5, 2012)

I am against the death penalty. We are savages? Two murders don't make a right! It only reduces us/society to their level.


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## Knightofalbion (Aug 5, 2012)

There is also the spectre of miscarriages of justice. Back in the 70s we here in England had a couple of cases were men were convicted of bombing pubs (part of the IRA's terror campaign on mainland Britain) It later transpired that the police had got the wrong men. 
There was an almighty clamour at the time for them to be hanged....Just as well the UK had abolished the death penalty some years before.


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## Knightofalbion (Aug 5, 2012)

SeaBreeze said:


> _I_'m for the death penalty, and I'd like to take it a step further, and kill those creeps exactly the way they killed their victims. In the case of child abuse and murder, these violators should endure ALL of the unspeakable torture that they put those babies or young children through.



Spiritual law! Suffering can only be requited by suffering. Nobody 'gets away with it'.


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## TWHRider (Aug 6, 2012)

SeaBreeze said:


> I think the insanity plea is just an easy way out for these people.  They don't have to worry about the usual prison behavior that they may experience in jail, and they are given meds everyday too, so they can stay in 'la la land', where everything is peachy.
> 
> _I_'m for the death penalty, and I'd like to take it a step further, and kill those creeps exactly the way they killed their victims.  In the case of child abuse and murder, these violators should endure ALL of the unspeakable torture that they put those babies or young children through.



Where's the "like" button.  So I hit the "reply with quote" instead.  Ditto all of that.

These people may be insane but they're not "sing-song" insane, if that makes any sense.  What many of them are, is so intelligent they view themselves as above everybody.  When they become upset by even the smallest of things, they allow their minds to visit the darkest of places and pretty soon those thoughts elevate to payback plans that ultimately become reality.

In some ways, they are like sex offenders that start out exposing themselves.  First in the front door of their home, then in their car, then in the public bathroom, then a few or several years down the road, they've got somebody in the trunk of their car in a body bag, on the way to some remote place for burial.  They are sick but then again they're not too sick to plan all that out.

The only house visible to us when the trees are full of leaves, literally sits 10 feet from our fence.  Naturally it's the only rental on this rural road.  It turns out the last renter was already a three-time convicted sex offender and the third exposure offense was committed while he was in jail serving time for the second one. I'd say his bravery certainly was escalating.

It got to where I was carrying my pistol to the barn every day, so I called my other neighbor, who's a county deputy and reported the guy.  That's when we found out he's a convicted sex offender.  My county deputy neighbor was the one who actually saw him expose himself in his front yard and promptly arrested him.

 Point-being the kid's behavior problems are going to escalate and he'll be a headliner on 48 Hours I.D. one of these days.  He was married and they were both just as pleasant to talk to as they could be. Looked normal, never any indication there was something wrong, until the day I saw him standing buck-nekkid in his side door, watching me mow the barnyard.

Just like these mass killers who were "good kids" in school and their neighborhoods and always acted normal.  You can't act normal if you're insane in that sense of the word we all immediately relate to; it shows in your thought process and your speech pattern.

I don't know what the trigger is to send these outwardly nice kids down such a dark path but they know full-well what they are doing and that insanity plea needs to be wrapped around every attorney's throat that tries to get away with it.


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## not too soon senior (Aug 28, 2012)

The death penalty, while may occasionally be found to execute the wrong person, is a much better alternative in qualifying cases to life imprisonment that costs the taxpayers an incredible amount of money each year.  There should be a limit to the number of appeals as well.  Rapidly sending the criminal through the system would save countless more money a year.


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## NickJ (Oct 23, 2012)

Insanity plea should only be allowed when a person can truly be deemed insane. Not just by slimy lawyers who want to win a case for their client. The problem is, you just can't tell these days. And so normal evil people, end up going to a nuthouse instead of the big house where they should go.


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## JaniceM (Jul 28, 2017)

First, in general, I oppose the death penalty on principle...  however, there are instances of crimes that are so horrific that I'd go along with it.

Second, though, I believe the 'defenses' should be based solely on the old M'Naghten Rule-  a) did the person know what he was doing, and b) did he know that it was wrong.  And I believe this 'test' for sanity/insanity should be the only one that applies in criminal cases.  
People these days get away with too much, because there are too many readily-available excuses.


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## terry123 (Jul 28, 2017)

SeaBreeze said:


> It is expensive to keep someone in jail, even if it's just '3 hots and a cot'.  It may not seem a very forgiving thing to do, but I imagine that those people who have had loved ones killed senselessly by these murderers, would like to see them lose their own lives as punishment.  I think killing crime would go down if the murderers knew they would get a death sentence.  I just think lying there and getting a needle in their arm to softly go to sleep is too kind for some of these monsters.


I agree completely SeaBreeze.


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## Camper6 (Jul 28, 2017)

We don't have the death penalty in Canada.  

But I would think those on death row thinking about it must be quite a bit of punishment.


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## Katybug (Jul 28, 2017)

SeaBreeze said:


> I think the insanity plea is just an easy way out for these people.  They don't have to worry about the usual prison behavior that they may experience in jail, and they are given meds everyday too, so they can stay in 'la la land', where everything is peachy.
> 
> _I_'m for the death penalty, and I'd like to take it a step further, and kill those creeps exactly the way they killed their victims.  In the case of child abuse and murder, these violators should endure ALL of the unspeakable torture that they put those babies or young children through.



I totally agree, Seabreeze, punish them as they punished their victims. We're much too gentle on these monsters, but only if we know without a doubt they did it.  And those who torture & kill innocent children should have a very special sentence -- can't think of anything bad enough, but whatever it is I would support it.

 It makes me sick to hear complaints as how the "way too humane injection" was torture for them, and how their client suffered.  Don't want to hear it.  So for those who may think I'm a bleeding heart liberal, I'm not!


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## Lon (Jul 28, 2017)

I don't think the death penalty is sufficient punishment for many crimes and I oppose it. There is no pain or suffering when you end life. Life at HARD LABOR would be punishment and pay for the cost of incarceration.


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## Shalimar (Jul 28, 2017)

I think capital punishment has no place in a civilised society. Besides being barbaric, sometimes the wrong person is executed. The capacity of some individuals to shrug that off horrifies me. No matter how many horrors I have seen or experienced, I refuse to become what I hate most, an advocate of murder. Slippery slope indeed, particularly when we 

advocate subjecting criminals to the same treatment meted out to their victims. Who are the monsters then? I do not live in 

an ivory tower, as long term members know, my story is gritty in the extreme. I have paid, and continue to pay a huge 
price for my humanity, but I refuse to relinquish it under any circumstances. Want revenge? Dig two holes.


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## tnthomas (Jul 28, 2017)

The insanity defense is seldom accepted by juries.   But, let's talk about insanity for just a second.  

When people do horrendous acts, the public thinks that's crazy.  Sure isn't "normal" to hack people to death.   Or, is it?

Jeffrey Dahmer, the serial killer who murdered then ate his victims.   Is that normal?  Isn't that a little crazy?

I personally wanted to see John Hinckley be put away in prison for life, for shooting Ronald Reagan. That didn't happen,  Hinckley was released  from 

institutional psychiatric care on September 10, 2016, and lives  full-time at his mother's home.  But, wasn't that all crazy, shooting Reagan over 

Hinckley's obsession with Jodie Foster?  Crazy, for sure, but not sufficient to excuse him from criminal prosecution, IMO.


Regarding the Death Penalty-  on the surface, it doesn't serve any purpose.   *Revenge*?  O.K., but revenge does not heal the 

wounds of the victim's family.  

 Revenge is only therapeutic for those with evil hearts.  

A deterrent?   Nope.   Nobody that commits / is going to commit a death penalty punishable offense ever thinks about it.   Never ever.

Sitting on death row for decades is a lot like serving a "life without parole" sentence, only a lot more expensive.

The Innocence Project has helped exonerate wrongly convicted people through the use of DNA testing.   For that reason, I feel 

that "life without" is a better sentence penalty than the death penalty.


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## Knight (Jul 28, 2017)

Insanity plea to avoid being put to death where the death penalty is used IMO would have to be evaluated case by case. Toss in beyond reasonable doubt where it is absolutely proven that the person did commit the crime, it comes down to what does society owe to that individual. What is just? 


I see no reason to prolong the life of a person that had no regard for the life of another. For those with religious objections didn't your God wipe out the lives of everyone but Noah & his family because people were not living the expected way? What is so different from society taking the life of someone that definitely isn't living to the expected standards of civil society?


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## Shalimar (Jul 28, 2017)

tnthomas said:


> The insanity defense is seldom accepted by juries.   But, let's talk about insanity for just a second.
> 
> When people do horrendous acts, the public thinks that's crazy.  Sure isn't "normal" to hack people to death.   Or, is it?
> 
> ...


Well put.


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## Shalimar (Jul 28, 2017)

Knight said:


> Insanity plea to avoid being put to death where the death penalty is used IMO would have to be evaluated case by case. Toss in beyond reasonable doubt where it is absolutely proven that the person did commit the crime, it comes down to what does society owe to that individual. What is just?
> 
> 
> I see no reason to prolong the life of a person that had no regard for the life of another. For those with religious objections didn't your God wipe out the lives of everyone but Noah & his family because people were not living the expected way? What is so different from society taking the life of someone that definitely isn't living to the expected standards of civil society?


My objections are not religous, but ethical.


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## Sunny (Jul 28, 2017)

Shalimar, I completely agree with you. Given the number of people falsely convicted, it is horrendous that in this day and age we are still practicing this barbarism. Why not life without parole? Just throw away the key.

As far as the "insanity" defense, this doesn't make too much sense in the modern world. I think it's based on a very archaic definition of insanity, not knowing the difference between right and wrong. It's certainly a lot more
complicated than that.


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## fuzzybuddy (Jul 28, 2017)

As far as the death penalty, there are some, whose actions are so inhumane that they've given up the right to live with us. It's not just for killing a police man, kid, etc. It is a special death penalty trial. And no "human" evidence can be used in the trial. No one can say, "I saw him", "He's the one", etc. It all has to be forensic evidence, DNA, or tape.
The 'insane" defense is tough. Is this guy running around killing people, because he doesn't have the right molecules in the right place, or is he a SOB? I worked in psych. I've seen how meds change people. I've seen  violent, biting, punching, screaming, totally out of control people, get on the right meds and go home to care for their invalid mothers. They are the same person. Right now, we don't understand enough to know what "crazy" is? Is your non-functioning computer "guilty" of not working? I would change it to "GUILTY- BUT INSANE". The person would remain in a psychiatric facility for life.


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## Knight (Jul 28, 2017)

Shalimar said:


> My objections are not religous, but ethical.


What is ethical about keeping a person locked in a cell for the rest of their lives only to die anyway? What does society gain from supporting the health care needs, and all the other basic life support needs? 

If you mean you personally couldn't be the one to kill another after they were found guilty of killing, I can understand that. On the other hand would you defend yourself from being killed by killing? Do you see a difference in the value of your life over that of another?


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## IKE (Jul 28, 2017)

I'm also for the death penalty........I also feel that if a person is proven guilty and given the death penalty the sentence needs to be carried out within 24 hours.


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## Don M. (Jul 28, 2017)

IKE said:


> I'm also for the death penalty........I also feel that if a person is proven guilty and given the death penalty the sentence needs to be carried out within 24 hours.



I'm with you.  When there are multiple credible witnesses, or video from a security camera, etc., AND the criminal even admits his guilt, I see no need to go through endless years of appeals that do nothing but make lawyers rich.  It costs a fortune to keep one of these misfits in prison for life...our tax dollars would be far better spent on needy people who obey the law.  Only in the very rare case where this is some room for doubt, should a violent criminal be given any slack.  
There's not much I agree with in Sharia Law, but their treatment of criminals makes more sense than what we do.


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## Butterfly (Jul 28, 2017)

Um -- Sharia law?  NO!

I do, however, believe "insanity" should mean real "insanity," not "I had a really bad childhood and so I thought I'd go out and kill some folks."  I have very mixed feelings about the death penalty, but I do feel it may be merited in some of the most heinous cases -- like one we've got going on here now, involving a mother (along with her boyfriend and her sister) advertising to let others rape her 10 year old daughter for money, and then the beating death and burning of the body of the child in the bathtub (and maybe the child wasn't quite dead when that happened).  

Otherwise, life should mean LIFE, not parole after however long, and not "maybe we'll change our minds later," but really life in prison.


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## Sassycakes (Jul 28, 2017)

SeaBreeze said:


> I think the insanity plea is just an easy way out for these people.  They don't have to worry about the usual prison behavior that they may experience in jail, and they are given meds everyday too, so they can stay in 'la la land', where everything is peachy.
> 
> _I_'m for the death penalty, and I'd like to take it a step further, and kill those creeps exactly the way they killed their victims.  In the case of child abuse and murder, these violators should endure ALL of the unspeakable torture that they put those babies or young children through.




I agree with you 100%.  I am also for the death penalty and I also believe that in cases where children have been abused or murdered ,the killer should suffer a long and painful death. I don't think they should go peacefully. I think they should be stabbed over and over again while getting blood transfusions so it lasts as long as possible and they experience great pain.


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## nvtribefan (Jul 28, 2017)

I oppose the death penalty primarily on economic grounds.  It is indeed less expensive to house someone for life than to bear the cost of automatic and protracted appeals.


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## Camper6 (Jul 28, 2017)

> not too soon senior;1196]The death penalty, while may occasionally be found to execute the wrong person, is a much better alternative in qualifying cases to life imprisonment that costs the taxpayers an incredible amount of money each year.



As long as it's you that doesn't get executed.



> There should be a limit to the number of appeals as well.  Rapidly sending the criminal through the system would save countless more money a year.


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## Camper6 (Jul 28, 2017)

nvtribefan said:


> I oppose the death penalty primarily on economic grounds.  It is indeed less expensive to house someone for life than to bear the cost of automatic and protracted appeals.



The only way I could agree with the death penalty is that it is a deterrent.


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## Trade (Jul 28, 2017)

I'm all for the death penalty. In fact I'd like to see us go back to Medieval style executions for the more heinous crimes.

I'm a liberal. 

But I'm not a bleeding heart liberal.


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## tnthomas (Jul 28, 2017)

nvtribefan said:


> I oppose the death penalty primarily on economic grounds.  It is indeed less expensive to house someone for life than to bear the cost of automatic and protracted appeals.



Agreed.  If there were a deterrent value to the death penalty, then it would be worth doing.

Revenge is the only tangible 'benefit' to the death penalty, but only satisfies those with an evil heart.


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## Sunny (Jul 28, 2017)

Doesn't anyone remember that story in the news a few years ago about how DNA testing proved that a huge number of prisoners on death row in Texas were actually innocent?  Most of them were African American, which undoubtedly had something to do with their convictions. They let them all go.


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## Wayne (Jul 29, 2017)

I sure do not approve of 3 hots and a cot for years on appeals for prescribed crimes totally approve of it.


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## 911 (Jul 29, 2017)

Steve said:


> We up here in Canada have abolished the death penalty.. I have NO explanation why they did it, but never the less they did..
> Sometimes I wonder if a criminal who should be executed is put in prison for life isn't suffering more rather than die a martyr.. Perhaps they should put all those criminals in a special prison where the basics of life are a luxury rather than a regular prison where they have almost everything given to them.. That way suffering like they did to their victims will be for the rest of their life..................
> 
> Suffer rather than die.......
> ...



Karla Homulka should have been a candidate for the death penalty.


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## 911 (Jul 29, 2017)

Here in Pennsylvania putting up a temporary insanity defense is difficult. Although I have investigated and heard of other cases where the cause of death would lead one to believe that the murderer was crazy, lawyers and defendants sometimes confuse temporary insanity with a crime of passion defense. For example; a man walks into his bedroom unexpectedly and sees his wife in bed with another man. Without hesitation, he reaches into his nightstand drawer and pulls out a gun and blasts one or both of them killing one or both.

The defendant and his attorney come to court and claim temporary insanity, instead of a crime of passion. Not all states have a crime of passion defense available as a plea. I have seen judges very quickly dismiss their plea, which then usually forces the defense to immediately appeal. Can you say trial delayed?


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