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Originally posted by CortexBomb I think it's important to note here that I'm not saying the case is completely clear cut; but that's exactly my point, a lot of people who're killed aren't clearly "evil" enough to deserve death.

Let me get this straight ... this guy just up and hijacks this woman's car, knocks her uncouncious, and then kills her later while she's unconscious. Proceeds to drive her car around, gives out the presents that she bought and uses her credit cards, then dumps her body in the desert. Then afterwards, he says he "made a few mistakes" (what he made a mistake in getting caught?) rather than expressing regret or remorse over what he has done? So this isn't evil? Somebody needs to kill at least 2-3 people before they are considered evil? The only claim you're making in his defense is that he's a)black and b) he killed a semi-rich white woman and c) the claims of him using martial arts to kill her is semi-dubious. Don't you think these arguments are examples of reverse discrimination? He admitted to killing this woman. It was not an accident. There was malice involved. Are we supposed to exempt him from the death penalty just because he's black and he killed a rich woman? That's the basic argument you're making about why we should believe his claims of "innocence".

Haha by the way ... if he just got out of prison for burglarly and escalated to murder after he got out what possibly makes you think he could ever have the chance for rehabilitation? It didn't work in the past. The remorseless bastard deserved what he got.

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Originally posted by occrider Let me get this straight ... this guy just up and hijacks this woman's car, knocks her uncouncious, and then kills her later while she's unconscious. Proceeds to drive her car around, gives out the presents that she bought and uses her credit cards, then dumps her body in the desert. Then afterwards, he says he "made a few mistakes" (what he made a mistake in getting caught?) rather than expressing regret or remorse over what he has done? So this isn't evil? Somebody needs to kill at least 2-3 people before they are considered evil? The only claim you're making in his defense is that he's a)black and b) he killed a semi-rich white woman and c) the claims of him using martial arts to kill her is semi-dubious. Don't you think these arguments are examples of reverse discrimination? He admitted to killing this woman. It was not an accident. There was malice involved. Are we supposed to exempt him from the death penalty just because he's black and he killed a rich woman? That's the basic argument you're making about why we should believe his claims of "innocence".

My point is that the only thing you can definitively accuse him of having intent on is hijacking a car and knocking a woman out.

I don't think it's clear that he had intent to kill the woman, and though hijacking is far from virtuous behaviour, it's not exactly death penalty material for most people, even most proponents of the death penalty.

Yes, he had intent to hijack, but intent to hijack is far from intent to murder IMHO. You say he admits to murdering her, while yes, he *did* admit to murdering her, but as I said, it's not clear when and how that statement came about. If the inspectors told him he'd killed the woman then it isn't exactly an admission of intent to say that, yeah, I killed her with that hit, it's just a statement of the facts.

And my point on him being black, and having attacked a rich woman is that these are the people who are disproportianately getting killed, and it makes *me* stop and pause for a moment and consider the ramifications of the death penalty being applied *far* more regularly to a minority group in our country.

Basically what's going on when something like that is happening is that you're either forced to believe that:

A) Black people are more vicious by nature, and they commit more crimes.

or

B) The system is unfairly targetting black people for execution.

Now call me a liberal, but I'm inclined to lean B...and because of that I think it's a valid thing to bring up that this was just another in a long line of black people being executed in Texas for doing something to a white person while a white person, with similar charges, would be much less statistically likely to be executed, make of that what you will I suppose...

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Originally posted by occrider Haha by the way ... if he just got out of prison for burglarly and escalated to murder after he got out what possibly makes you think he could ever have the chance for rehabilitation? It didn't work in the past. The remorseless bastard deserved what he got.

And wouldn't you say that that fact is more an idictment of the jail system than it is of the individual who gets put into it?

I agree, our jails need to be vigorously rethought, and new, more effective methods need to be used so people are able to function effectively when they get outside.

Look at the scenario, guy gets out of jail, has no car, has no home, has no job, so he starts wandering down the road in the miserable heat. After a while he snaps, jacks a car, and kills a woman.

Now tell me if you think this would have happened if you had jails that had trained him for a new job while he was inside, had a job set up for him when he got out, along with a home near said job that was subsidized so he could afford it with the money he was making at the new job.

You could have something like that set up for a 3-5 year window after people get out so that they could readjust to "normal" life, and this is just one easy example, I'm sure if the "experts" took a few days out of their busy calenders they could come up with numerous other, and likely even more effective methods.

In short, I think when you have people regularly having issues with re-offending after getting out of jail then it's clearly the system that's at fault, and not just a few vagrants. Jails are supposed to be for more than punishment, but they're clearly not doing what they should be, preparing people to re-enter the world at the end of their sentences.

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Originally posted by CortexBomb Look at the scenario, guy gets out of jail, has no car, has no home, has no job, so he starts wandering down the road in the miserable heat. After a while he snaps, jacks a car, and kills a woman.

i know you dont think thats an excuse but still that is no reason to go and try to help set up jobs/housing and such for criminals who get out. thats such a cop out. if the guy/gal doesnt want to change themselves no one else can help them. they have got to want a job and house, and honestly there probably is already enough they can do in jail to ensure that by the time they get out. i know for a fact, criminals in jails are allowed to take college courses and earn degrees of all kinds, they can surf the web and try to find some decent living areas... i mean sheesh in jail they probably have plenty of free time as it is. jails also offer anger managment and other classes to help the inmates but the inmate themselves has to volunteer to go to them, no one forces them... coming back to the original point, if that guy from texas really wanted to better his life he could have done that but instead threw it out the window, he was given a chance to change his life and he didnt.

hehe (this thought just popped into my mind) its kinda like africa, you can help and flood them with money all you want, but if they themselves arent willing to straighten themselves out all the extra help is meaningless.

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