bring back hanging ?
 

should we in britain bring back the death penalty for the likes of huntley and those six scumbags who murdered the 16 year old girl..?

personally i say yes, no death row, after sentence, take em out the back & do the business.....

I'd be up for the job of hangman.

No. One wrong conviction and the whole system is brought into disrepute. Time and time again the authorities have been shown to:

Not be trustworthy
Fabricate evidence
Get it wrong.

Bang up 'em up for life (meaning for the rest of their natural days) and make them work to pay for the pivilige of guaranteed accomodation, food and welfare. Execution is state-licensed murder/revenge. It can be abused. It is not justice.

if they dont admit it and theres incontravertible (good) evidence, string em up and save a fortune

Having said that...woman I know has just discovered that her stepfather has been abusing her daughter when he and his wife (the mother of the woman in question) were babysitting. :flame:

The little girl is 5.

Sick stuff.

Don't get me started... I sit on Social services panels and listen to crap like this...I also listen to the victims.
These people are people they love and trust and do not want "stringing up" no matter how much WE loath them.

Life should mean life...the whole system is about politics and money...TWPD has a point about working to pay for their keep.
Sometimes tho I just wonder how these guys would fair if they stuck em in a room on their own with a gang of mothers. Women can be vicious when their motherly instincts kick in.:devil:

personally i think murdering/rapist scumbags ought to have the same done to them...but its all to open to abuse of the system.
So, yeah lock em up for life but make it LIFE, melt the key down, no perole, cable sodding tv, ps2's etc.....ahem.

If you take someones life then you don't deserve rights

Sorry..rant over

Ant

Spot on.

By the way, does anybody else see the irony of discussing this type of topic on a forum called "idle chat"?

Women can be pretty vicious without a motherly instinct driving them. But that's a discussion for another time.

I'm not a parent - I daresay I would be baying for blood if I was and it were my child.

that may have been the case years ago when capital punishment was law, however, now we have the technology (in particular, dna) which can prove the guilt of the criminal....

Mmmm...DNA testing??? Has to be conducted by humans...still not convinced:(

Sure it can...but not always irrefutably. Forensics have been wrong and DNA profiling has also been found to be wrong. Whatever, I don't support state-sponsored murder/revenge.

i suppose the obvious question to any anti-capital punishment person would be "what if the victim (god forbid) was one of your friends or family ?

Has been.......

I'd still take the same line. Capital punishment does not deter - you only have to look at the USA to see that.

Hanging is too good for some people !

Gaffa tape and lead weights!!!!!!
and deep deep pools:cool:

Sommat like that yes ;)

I had "the pleasure" of meeting Philip Atherton (Pleasure probably the wrong word) when i worked at HMP Grendon Underwood just outside Aylesbury when i first left the Army.

I would hang that little bassa and it was DNA that nailed him, that and his confession and trying to stitch someone else up as well.

Here is a link to 18 pages of his co-accused's story including some indepth details (Not for those with weak stomachs) but good insight into how these characters work at manipulating and fabricating stories and weaving a web of decept around themselves.

http://www.innocent.org.uk/cases/mar...markcleary.pdf

Grendon is a feckin strange place, full to the brim of lifers who are sent there for profiling and rehabilitation prior to their licenses being up for review.

They do group therapy every day and the screws are encouraged to be "Hands off" and not use there batons etc when it kicks off.

I put my hands up and admit that it takes a special kind of person to work there and it was not for me, probably not the right place for an Ex Squaddie to start his Prison service career and i was gone within 6 months, after being a "Bit over zealous" one day when it kicked off.

I have worked with these people hands on all be it only for 6 months, and i am a great believer thatn they fall into 2 distinct groups fairly simple - Mad and Bad.

I voted yes with DNA evidence and non forced confessions put the bass'as to sleep or hang them.

The innocent 16 year old drug addict in Reading you mean ? the one who set the guy up who's a known drug dealer to be beaten and robbed ?

Whilst i'm not trying tocondone their actions (it was within 30m of my flat btw) you can hardly not expect some sort of reaction from the drug dealer ?

Hanging.... hmmm tough one.... imagine for a second you were on the wrong end of it in a case of mistaken identity... obviously as technology increase the odds of this goes down... but it's not impossible for a perfectly innocent person to be sentanced.

for me its clear cut. if i can only be proved 'beyond all reasonable doubt' then its life (proper life)

if if can be proved beyond 'any doubt whatsoever' hang the fukers

For me, there can be no right way of taking the life of another human. Murder is wrong, we all know that, but so is state-sponsored murder. I don't see any situation in which it is right to take a life.

The death penalty is too easy a way out for some people anyway - the likes of Huntley & Co. deserve to suffer for the rest of their lives in prison, not be spared their fate by the state.

What I would say though, is that life really should mean life, let these people rot and suffer for their sins. No release.

Martin

[Edited on 22-3-2006 by Urban996]

:puzzled:I'd make them watch Saints for a season - slower and more painful than hanging,i know i have to pay for the honour:o

Now think about this rationally for a moment, without the emotion involved.

We've been hanging, flogging, drawing and quatering, stoning people to death, maiming and beheading people in some part of the world since time began. Mediaeval methods.

Has it stopped people raping or murdering?

Of course not. You see, as ScottyB said, there is and always will be a certain percentage of people in the world who are either mad or bad. People who have become so dehumanised, either through mental illness or conditioning, that they simply can't control their primal urges to rape, abuse, beat up or murder others. These people will always form the underbelly of civilised society, there will always be a pool of people who the rest of us might view as just plain evil.

So here is the moral dilemma. By definition, we can't do anything about these people unless they commit some form of crime. We certainly can't put people in the gas chamber just because they 'might' cause some harm to sections of our society one day - a bloke called hitler tried that. So we can only act after the event, by which time it's too late for the victim.

Do we kill that person after the event then? What purpose does it serve? It won't stop other people being raped and murdered because there will always be psycopaths and perverts at large in our society. So the only purpose that taking somebody's life away from them serves is that they wouldn't be able to commit a serious crime again.

But then, so does locking them up and melting down the key.

The difference is that while human beings sit as judge and jury, while human beings perform the forensic and DNA tests, there is always room for error, or incompetence, or even plain malice. Look at how many times people in pathology labs, for example, find themselves at the centre of a shock horror investigation because simple 'routine tests' such as cervical smears or cancer tests have been cocked up by supposedly competent and trustworthy people.

Look at the number of high profile cases where a police force has 'fitted up' people who have later proved to be innocent - either because they've seized an opportunity to nail a little scroat that they've wanted to put behind bars for ages, or because there is political or social pressure put upon them for a quick result.

While there is the slightest doubt over any of the evidence, even when a conviction has been secured, you have to retain the chance to put right any mistake that you might make. If you kill someone, that possibility doesn't exist. That is the only way we can truly call ourselves civilised.

And before anybody points a finger accusing me of being a wooly liberal let me tell you a story. I've already posted a thread about what me and my family have had to put up with these last few months.

In October, my wife was attacked in the toilets of a pub in Oxford. Somebody pushed their way into the cubicle just as she had unlocked the door to leave, pushed a black cloth into her face so that she couldn't see who they were, bundled her back into the cubicle and raped her. The cloth was most likely soaked in some form of 'date rape' drug because her recollection of what happened between being pushed back inside and coming round about 20 inutes later is hazy and comes in flashbacks.

The Police haven't got enough to go on and after 3 months investigation decided to put the case on hold and just file it.

Now the thing is, thinking about that days events, I have my own suspicions about a guy that was in the pub talking to her earlier on. In my mind, he did it. I remember his face and I could make it my business to spend all my spare time travelling to Oxford to go on a vigilante hunt for him. I've been training in Karate for the last 4 years and I could probably beat that person to a pulp - maybe even kill him. But what if I get it wrong? What if the person I suspect is completely innocent? What if I get the wrong guy, just someone who looks like him? What does that make me?

Hang 'em and flog 'em is just a knee jerk reaction and, with all due respect, shows a paucity of thought in my opinion

Its only other purpose is revene. Revenge? Where does that get you. I think that people who take up cudgels and shout 'hang em, flog em' on behalf of the victim may not truly understand what the victims of a violent crime might want. Nothing will 'unrape' my wife, nothing will bring back the victims of murder. So what purpose does revenge serve?

Victims truly want a sense of justice that somebody pays for the agony they have wrought, but for me a true life sentence meaning that somebody spends the rest of their life in a barbaric environment where prisoners regualrly get beaten up and have to remember not to drop the soap in the showers is enough.

:(

Blinking heck Jools, that is strong stuff.

I agree with a lot that you have just posted and can see your point which you have put across intelligently and on many parts correctly.

Dont take this the wrong way but are you sure that you wanted to share the actual details of your wifes incident?

I do feel for her as it must have been and probably still is a terrible one. I can see now why it may have impacted or in some way be connected with what she is going through now.:(

Fingers crossed she will be better one day?


DC.:burn:

An eye for an eye, they have no right to any kind of life, no matter how miserable it was made for them - maybe i wouldnt pay so much tax then either.

Thanks DC. Yes we are both sure that getting this stuff out in the open is the best thing and we agreed on that decision last week.

You see, when things like this happen there is a sense of shame from a victim that has done nothing to be ashamed of. So you only tell family and a few very close friends, but then as time goes on you speak about it so much, to so many people, and a wider circle of folks get to know that something is badly wrong either intuitively or because a friend of a friend told them. After a while two things happen. A bit like telling a whopping great lie, this 'guilty' secret lurks about like a big skeleton waiting to fall out of the closet, at the same time it's such an intense thing to happen that you talk about it over and over again with family and friends until, frankly, you can't remember who you've told and to what level of detail. Secondly, you lose your sense of guilt and shame about being a victim because you realise that you have done nothing wrong, and my wife has now become defiant about it.

We decided that it would be a cathartic experience (especially in light of my wifes newly diagnosed MS) to say 'sod it, life's too short to carry around this sort of baggage, let the world know and be damned'. So now we don't have to cart around a skeleton in the closet, it can come into the open, crumble to dust and let the wind blow it away.

When I saw this post I waited untill Jools had made his last post before I replied,The reason for this is, I've known Jools for only about 3-4 years but in that time i've relised that he is one of those people that when he has something to say it's usally worth listening to.

Allthrough i'm basicly for hanging the correct people, I can see jools's point of view and I find myself agreeing with the common-sense he has written.

After talking to Jools on sunday and finding out what He ,his Wife and famliy
have been through in the last months, that the guy can still have the faith he has in mankind is truly amazing.

I have to say Jools you are one TOP bloke and a real bonus for the club

Here,here!
Agreed on all points.

I have the (mis) fortune of being a Prison Office at a CAT A Dispersal(max security) prison,in there we have the WORST of The Worst,and trust me when i tell you that what you hear on the news/read in the papers is normally only half of the sick stuff most of them have done.As Scotty B says,it is a very difficult environment to work in.More so being a father and knowing what they have done to children.I have to remain professional,despite what my views are(which i can't say!).But Just as a thought provoker,did you know it costs approx £47,000 a year per con(sorry inmate/prisoner) to keep them locked up in a maximum security prison.So the cost of keeping the 6 people just sentenced is:

20 years x 6 x £47,000=£5.64 million pounds!!!!!!

MMMmmmmm
:o

Nail 'em up. Nail some sense into 'em.

Sorry could'nt resist that. Monty Python

Can't agree more:)

why not consider the chinese (formerly Russian) approach to capital punishment, shoot them and send their families the bill for the bullet.

I'm now MAD,BAD,MAV,

for me, to be honest, I would just like to tie a rope around their necks, and drag them behind my car all the way to Germany!

what would be left of them when i get there?
just a sad face looking up i should think!

It makes me so mad to hear people defend the scum!
They Raped, They Killed, they commited , they should pay for it!
Death for doing what they do has to be the only way!

No television in jail ! no rights! just leave them in **** for several years, then shoot ,hang, kill them in public!!!!!!!!!!
or am i going soft in my old age?:smug:

if you can't say something positive, don't say anything ;)

I nearly deleted what follows and went to bed....but what the hell.....It's what I think......

Most of us who inhabit this island, while not perfect little angels, generally abide by the written and unwritten rules of an organised and basically tolerant society.

There are also an unsung number of people who are genuinely lovely, kind, thoughtfull and trusting and will always see the good in others. Sometimes we are lucky enough to meet them or know them and wonder with envy how they can live their lives so happily and serenely.

Then there are those who either have demons within them or are part of a graduated league of nasty to absoloutely evil people who enjoy hurting those who should be allowed to live their lives in peace.

Can you imagine a society where you could allow your elderly mother or your wife to walk home at midnight if she wished and know that she would be absoloutely safe? Why can't we have a society which enables your little girl or boy to go to the park on his or her own?

If we trebled our police and customs force and number of prisons we could get close to this utopia......but there is one thing stopping it.

This government and others before it regards crime as a business. It provides employment for criminals, politicians, policemen, prisons, hospitals, probation officers, social workers, insurers, security firms, lawyers, judges, car and electrical manufacturers and sellers and all of the infrastructure surrounding the industry of crime.

Just think about the tax revenue from all of the above. Who pays for it all in money,pain and fear?

You and I

Night night..sleep tight.

Phil

Bang on mate!!!! well said

that would fund a lot of hospital beds, or help cancer research or keep an air ambulance going for a while etc etc etc.......

Jools
Nothing I can say really, you two really have had it tough. I suppose there isnt much more that can go wrong really.

I have been locking up cons for 10 years, I have dealt with every type of criminal going like Jasper in that time and agree with scotty B. I even dealt with an animal rights terrorist who tried to blow up a cancer research shop next door to my wifes Fathers Italian Resaurant once.
The sad thing is when I started I looked at all these child molesters, rapists and murderers with discust but also a little bit of interest. You read about these people in the papers and conjure up this immage about what they are like and they are usually nothing like what you expected.
They look like people you know and could be anyone. However appalled you are at first you change and I would say become deaf to what people have done. If you dont then you cant do your job properly. I have to say hand on heart that I treat all cons the same to a certain extent. I treat them fair, give them only what they are intitled to under prison rules etc and never trust a single thing about any of them. One spin off is that I look for the bad in every one now and am very untrusting. I would say that I am a good judge of character and can usually conclude someones character after 5 minutes of chat.
Prisons can be god awful places for some people and be a living hell, but I would say for most it is no prblem and for some it is fantastic. Prisoners have a social structure like any group of people and depending on what your place is in that structure is everything. Under the Human Rights Bill prisons have become a whole lot easier for prisoners and the rights are stacked against the staff these days. It can seem that what ever is tough for them is against their rights and this can be frustrating, I can only see this getting worse as time goes by. It may come as a supprise for some but prisons only run with the cooperation of the prisoners. Underfunding and penny pinching has seen staff cut etc making them even more powder cake environments with the prisoners having the upper hand these days. Anyway people locked up for life meaning life become even more dangerous in my oppinion as they have nothing to loose so think nothing of hurting anyone who gets in their way. I have thought about the death penalty for some people that I have come accross and to say that there are certain crimes, and where there is no question of gilt that the death penalty is appropriate is flawed. To be convicted is supposed to be no question of gilt. Jurrors are directed by the Judge that to find someone guilty there must be no question in there mind of inocense. However we have found time and time again that some people are let down by the system by being mistaken identity, fitted up by dodgy police etc. Once someone is executed it is to late to say sorry for the mistake. Imagine being someone wrongly convicted, imagine being executed knowing that. Imagine the family finding their mother, father, son or daughter was executed for nothing. If you make one rule for one it has to aply to all, and that is where the problem. This is why all prisoners get treated the same by me because you never know who is guilty for sure or not(I mean they are all inocent in prison according to them anyway).:puzzled: