52 Pro Death Penalty Quotes by University Lecturers II



Is Capital Punishment Morally Required? The Relevance of Life-Life Tradeoffs - Recent evidence suggests that capital punishment may have a significant deterrent effect, preventing as many eighteen or more murders for each execution. This evidence greatly unsettles moral objections to the death penalty, because it suggests that a refusal to impose that penalty condemns numerous innocent people to death. Capital punishment thus presents a life-life tradeoff, and a serious commitment to the sanctity of human life may well compel, rather than forbid, that form of punishment. Moral objections to the death penalty frequently depend on a distinction between acts and omissions, but that distinction is misleading in this context, because government is a special kind of moral agent. The familiar problems with capital punishment - potential error, irreversibility, arbitrariness, and racial skew - do not argue in favor of abolition, because the world of homicide suffers from those same problems in even more acute form. The widespread failure to appreciate the life-life tradeoffs involved in capital punishment may depend on cognitive processes that fail to treat "statistical lives" with the seriousness that they deserve.

“The evidence on whether it has a significant deterrent effect seems sufficiently plausible that the moral issue becomes a difficult one,” said Cass R. Sunstein, a law professor at the University of Chicago who has frequently taken liberal positions. “I did shift from being against the death penalty to thinking that if it has a significant deterrent effect it’s probably justified.”

Cass R. Sunstein (born September 21, 1954) is an American legal scholar, particularly in the fields of constitutional law, administrative law, environmental law, and law and behavioral economics, who currently is the Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Obama administration. For 27 years, Sunstein taught at the University of Chicago Law School, where he continues to teach as the Harry Kalven Visiting Professor. Sunstein is currently Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, where he is on leave while working in the Obama administration.

“If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murders, we have allowed the killing of innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former. This, to me, is not a tough call.”

“All over the country news stories bemoan and hype the countdown to execution number 1000, but where are the stories regarding the ripple effect of the heinous crimes that these murderers were executed for committing?”

Sunday 17 July 2011 - Marquette University Professor John McAdams, who supports the death penalty, said the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 was passed to limit the number of appeals death row inmates can make to the U.S. Supreme Court. Delays at this point, he said, might be traced to state Supreme Court justices not in favor of the death penalty.

"The average time spent on death row is about 11 years," McAdams said. "Judges that are opposed to the death penalty know how to (play) the system. They can sit on appeals for a very long time."

John McAdams, a political science professor at Marquette University, who writes regularly in support of the death penalty, argues that it is unrealistic to say penalties for lawbreaking need to be consistent. “All punishments are somewhat arbitrary, especially when you consider that most of this is decided at the county level. Because some people get off with less punishment does not mean we should ratchet down all punishments. It is impossible to deliver equal justice in every case,” he said.

John C. McAdams is an associate professor of political science at Marquette University. He earned his PhD from Harvard University in 1981. McAdams teaches courses on American politics and public policy and the John F. Kennedy assassination and has been published in the American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, Sociological Quarterly, and Law and Contemporary Problems.

Cass R. Sunstein & Adrian Vermeule Is Capital Punishment Morally Required? The Relevance of Life-Life Trade-offs 58 Stan. L. Rev. 703 (Jan. 2006) – Many people believe that the death penalty should be abolished even if, as recent evidence seems to suggest, it has a significant deterrent effect. But if such an effect can be established, capital punishment requires a life-life trade-off, and a serious commitment to the sanctity of human life may well compel, rather than forbid, that form of punishment. The familiar problems with capital punishment— potential error, irreversibility, arbitrariness, and racial skew—do not require abolition because the realm of homicide suffers from those same problems in even more acute form. Moral objections to the death penalty frequently depend on a sharp distinction between acts and omissions, but that distinction is misleading in this context because government is a special kind of moral agent. The widespread failure to appreciate the life-life trade-offs potentially involved in capital punishment may depend in part on cognitive processes that fail to treat “statistical lives” with the seriousness that they deserve. The objection to the act/omission distinction, as applied to government, has implications for many questions in civil and criminal law.

Professor Sunstein and Adrian Vermeule, a law professor at Harvard, wrote in their own Stanford Law Review article that “the recent evidence of a deterrent effect from capital punishment seems impressive, especially in light of its ‘apparent power and unanimity,’ ” quoting a conclusion of a separate overview of the evidence in 2005 by Robert Weisberg, a law professor at Stanford, in the Annual Review of Law and Social Science.

“Capital punishment may well save lives,” the two professors continued. “Those who object to capital punishment, and who do so in the name of protecting life, must come to terms with the possibility that the failure to inflict capital punishment will fail to protect life.”

Adrian Vermeule , who is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, has been Professor of Law at Harvard Law School since 2006 and was named John H. Watson Professor of Law in 2008. He was a Visiting Professor of Law in 2005. His writings focus on institutional theory, and he teaches Administrative Law, Legislation, Constitutional Law, and National Security Law. Vermeule was on the faculty of the University of Chicago Law School from 1998 to 2005. There, he was twice awarded the Graduating Students’ Award for Teaching Excellence, in 2002 and 2004. Before entering teaching, he served as a clerk to Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia and Judge David Sentelle of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

We owe it to Dr. Petit and other relatives of murder victims to review the facts. If the death penalty saves lives, then execute people like Joshua Komisarjevsky. Don't just convict them. Most people weigh the costs and benefits of their actions and, for murder, the cost should be as great as possible. [Executing Murderers Saves Lives By CHRIS DESANCTIS in The Hartford Courant on Monday 17 October 2011]

Chris DeSanctis is an adjunct professor in the Department of Government and Politics at Sacred Heart University and a district 6 member of the Representative Town Meeting in Fairfield.

“In executing murderers, we declare that deliberate murder is absolutely evil and absolutely intolerable.” "What do Murderers Deserve?". commentarymagazine.com. March/April 1999

"Opponents of capital punishment describe it as a surrender to emotions--to grief, rage, fear, blood lust. For most supporters of the death penalty, this is false. Even when we resolve in principle to go ahead, we have to steel ourselves. Many of us would find it hard to kill a dog, much less a man. Endorsing capital punishment means not that we yield to our emotions but that we overcome them. If we favor executing murderers, it is not because we want to but because, however much we do not want to, we consider ourselves obliged to."

"We execute murderers in order to make a communal proclamation: that murder is intolerable," writes David Gelernter - a Yale professor who was wounded when he opened a package mailed by the Unabomer - in the April issue of Commentary. "A deliberate murderer embodies evil so terrible that it defiles the community."

David Hillel Gelernter (born 1955) is a professor of computer science at Yale University.

Life v. Death: Who Should Capital Punishment Marginally Deter?
Journal of Law, Economics and Policy, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 101-161 (2006)
http://www.cjlf.org/deathpenalty/KecklerLifeVDeath.pdf

Abstract: Econometric measures of the effect of capital punishment have increasingly provided evidence that it deters homicides. However, most researchers on both sides of the death penalty debate continue to rely on rather simple assumptions about criminal behavior. I attempt to provide a more nuanced and predictive rational choice model of the incentives and disincentives to kill, with the aim of assessing to what extent the statistical findings of deterrence are in line with theoretical expectations. In particular, I examine whether it is plausible to suppose there is a marginal increase in deterrence created by increasing the penalty from life imprisonment without parole to capital punishment. The marginal deterrence effect is shown to be a direct negative function of prison conditions as they are anticipated by the potential offender – the more tolerable someone perceives imprisonment to be, the less deterrent effect prison will have, and the greater the amount of marginal deterrence the threat of capital punishment will add. I then examine the empirical basis for believing there to be a subset of killers who are relatively unafraid of the prison environment, and who therefore may be deterred effectively only by the death penalty. Criminals, empirically, appear to fear a capital sentence, and are willing to sacrifice important procedural rights during plea bargaining to avoid this risk. This has the additional effect of increasing the mean expected term of years attached to a murder conviction, and may generate a secondary deterrent effect of capital punishment. At least for some offenders, the death penalty should induce greater caution in their use of lethal violence, and the deterrent effect seen statistically is possibly derived from the change in the behavior of these individuals. This identification of a particular group on whom the death penalty has the greatest marginal effect naturally suggests reforms in sentencing (and plea bargaining) which focus expensive capital prosecutions on those most insensitive to alternative criminal sanctions.


Charles N. W. Keckler is the Visiting Assistant Professor to The Pennsylvania State University Dickinson School of Law.

Consistent regular capital punishment for murder will reduce the murder rate. [Op-Ed: The Death Penalty in Jamaica April 17, 2012 12:06 am]

Until each prospective murderer knows that they are facing the noose of retribution, I believe that mayhem will be the rule rather than the exception. [Op-Ed: The Death Penalty in Jamaica April 17, 2012 12:06 am]

David P. Rowe (born May 8, 1959) is, a Jamaican-American lawyer, professor, media commentator and pioneer in the area of transnational law. He has spent most of his career as a litigator in Florida, along with serving as a professor at the University of Miami School of Law since 1989. He is one of the world's leading voices on the law of the Caribbean Commonwealth, and his scholarly work and quotations have appeared in periodicals around the world.

Tuesday 29 March 2011 - Joining the debate, Bilkent University Professor Ergun Özbudun said capital punishment was abolished in the 47 member states of the Council of Europe as well as in Turkey with a constitutional amendment in 2001. Turkey would move away from the European standards with its possible return, he said.

“If you ask about my opinion as an individual, not as a legal expert, I don’t find it unjust for the execution of those who violently committed murder. These people don’t have the right to live.”

Professor Ergun Özbudun is the Professor of Bilkent University Faculty of Law (or Bilkent Law School , Turkish: Bilkent Üniversitesi Hukuk Fakültesi) is one of the faculties offering both undergraduate and graduate education of Bilkent University. The faculty , which was established in 2002 and began classes with 140 students, is now one of the youngest law faculties in Turkey. The faculty, which accept 160 undergraduate students and graduate students that are enrolled in LLM program in Law and Economics and doctorate programs in Public Law and Private Law, offers lectures in English as well as in Turkish. Bilkent Faculty of Law, which is under Dean Osman Berat Gürzumar, provides their students with a reputable legal education by its esteemed academics who have good reputation in their country. The faculty is regarded as one of the most prestigious and promising law schools in Turkey although it was founded recently.

The Anti-DP Movement Has Failed - As a social policy, the death penalty now enjoys unprecedented popularity among Americans. There is no longer any major demographic subgroup of Americans that, as a whole, opposes the death penalty. As the Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics shows, it is gaining in popularity among groups, such as Jews (72%) and Democrats (67%), which used to lag significantly behind the population as a whole in terms of support for capital punishment.

The rate of support for the death penalty among African Americans in 1976 was 44%--it is now as high as 56%. The recent spate of executions in Texas will, I predict, not decrease support for the death penalty to any significant degree, and may even enhance it.

Even the fact that crime rates have been decreasing recently has not affected its popularity to any significant degree. More and more, it is a permanent fixture of American life. It is so taken for granted that standup comedians can make jokes about it without fear of offending anybody.

The Anti-DP Movement Has Failed – Here are two stark, unpleasant facts.
(1) Most death row inmates are guilty.
(2) Many of the inmates in group #1 will falsely protest their innocence.

The Anti-DP Movement Has Failed - Cases of death row "inmates, whose supporters earnestly proclaim their innocence, but who are later shown to have been guilty all along, do astounding damage to the credibility of death penalty opponents.

The Anti-DP Movement Has Failed - The results of a 1995 poll demonstrated that, nationwide, 74 % of Americans who favored the death penalty would still favor it even when told to assume that 1 of 100 death row inmates is actually innocent.

The Anti-DP Movement Has Failed - I think part of the explanation for those results is public weariness toward the repeated bogus claims of innocence that some death penalty opponents have put forward.

The Anti-DP Movement Has Failed – People in the anti-death penalty movement must begin to realize that many of the innocence claims of people on death row are false.

The Anti-DP Movement Has Failed - A majority of the of populations in many European countries and American States, which have abolished the death penalty, favor the death penalty.

Andrew Hammel is Assistant Professor for American Law at Heinrich-Heine University in Düsseldorf, Germany. Prof. Hammel earned a B.A. in English from the University of Texas at Austin in 1991, a J.D. from the University of Houston Law Center in 1996, and an LL.M from the Harvard Law School in 2001. From 1996 to 2001, Prof. Hammel was a Staff Attorney at the Texas Defender Service, a private non-profit law firm which represents death-sentenced inmates in state and federal appeals. Prof. Hammel has taught seminars on comparative constitutional and private law of the United States and Germany, and is director of the law school’s Anglo-American Law Program. His research interests include law and society, comparative criminal law and procedure, and comparative constitutional law. His first book, Ending the Death Penalty: The European Experience in Global Perspective, was published by Palgrave MacMillan in 2010.
On Wednesday 6 April 2011, A political science professor, a minister, a philosophy professor and a lawyer gathered in Lumpkin Hall to discuss the controversial issue of capital punishment after Gov. Pat Quinn signed legislation March 9 abolishing the death penalty in Illinois -  Swenson said two amendments focus on the death penalty issue; the 8th and 14th amendments. The 8th Amendment states excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishment inflicted. Also the 14th Amendment forbids states from denying any person "life, liberty or property, without due process of law."

"The Supreme Court has never taken the viewpoint that capital punishment is, in and of itself cruel and unusual punishment," Swenson said. "There have been four justices over the years that individually have taken that view but never the court majority."

Swenson said the court polices the issue by sorting through fairness procedures; holding themselves to a standard and proportionality reviews.

"They want to make sure that the punishment fits the crime," Swenson said.

She also said Courts hold the taking of another person's life is the only crime that justifies the death penalty.

Karen Swenson is the Assistant Professor of the Political Science department in Coleman Hall 2321 Department of Political Science, Eastern Illinois University. Dr. Swenson (J.D. Vanderbilt University; Ph.D. Ohio State) teaches courses in constitutional law and judicial politics. Her research interests focus on politics and the legal process. Her recent publications include "Understanding the Publication Process for District Court Opinions" Justice System Journal. 25:121-142 (2004) and "School Finance Reform Litigation: Why are Some State Supreme Courts Activist and Others Restrained?" Albany Law Review. 63:1147-1182 (2000). Her current research agenda includes measuring the implementation of Republican Party of Minnesota v. White. Dr. Swenson is also the pre-law advisor.
On Wednesday 6 April 2011, A political science professor, a minister, a philosophy professor and a lawyer gathered in Lumpkin Hall to discuss the controversial issue of capital punishment after Gov. Pat Quinn signed legislation March 9 abolishing the death penalty in Illinois - Grant Sterling, a philosophy professor, discussed how capital punishment can be justified on reasonable grounds.

Sterling said if someone decides to take away the liberties and freedoms of another, you have ultimately forfeited your freedoms and liberties.

"Capital punishment is not only morally acceptable, it is indeed morally required in some cases," Sterling said. "It requires that the state construct a reasonable and consistent method of executing the most heinous criminals."

Sterling said the state has an obligation not to abolish the death penalty, but rather reform the system to correct its injustices.

Professor Grant Sterling specializes in Medieval Philosophy (particularly rational theology) and Ethics (particularly ethical theory). He received his B.A. in Philosophy from Eastern Illinois University, and his PhD in Philosophy from the University of Iowa. Professor Sterling has presented papers at numerous professional conferences. He is the author of Ethical Intuitionism and Its Critics (Peter Lang Publishing: 1994), and "Libertarian Free Will and Divine Foreknowledge". He is also Secretary/Treasurer of the Illinois Philosophical Association.

The advantage of this argument is that it completely sidesteps the normative question. It doesn’t matter whether you think the death penalty is right or wrong. Everyone should support fairness and attempts to minimize wrongful execution. This can be used in support of significant reforms. For example, one can say that because of problems with local courts (e.g. corruption, lack of proper training), the SPC review process is necessary to ensure fairness in capital cases. This reform measure can be supported entirely on rule of law/procedural grounds without any invocation of fundamental rights, good and evil, or any other moral framework one wishes to drag into the discussion. [Capital Punishment in China: Ditch the Moral Argument Stan Abrams, China Hearsay | May 28, 2012, 6:13 AM] 

So, you want capital punishment? That’s fine, as long as it’s carried out properly. And by the way, once those reforms kick in, the number of cases will shrink dramatically. Everyone’s happy short term: advocates for reform see a drop in executions, while folks who support the death penalty can sleep better at night knowing that fewer innocents are being executed. [Capital Punishment in China: Ditch the Moral Argument Stan Abrams, China Hearsay | May 28, 2012, 6:13 AM] 

Stan Abrams is a Beijing-based IP/IT lawyer and law professor. 

On Wednesday 6 April 2011, A political science professor, a minister, a philosophy professor and a lawyer gathered in Lumpkin Hall to discuss the controversial issue of capital punishment after Gov. Pat Quinn signed legislation March 9 abolishing the death penalty in Illinois - Roy Lanham, the director of the Newman Catholic Center, took a religious view of the issue. Lanham discussed a sanctity and quality of life view rather than "an eye for an eye."

"The State does have the right in the name of the divine authority and as an exercise of its duty to protect the common good. The arguments for the death penalty or capital punishment are grounded in the right and duty of the state to protect its citizens from unjust aggression." Lanham said. "The question though is can this be done by prison sentence or other punitive means short of execution."

 
Roy Lanham is the director and campus minister of the Newman Catholic Center in Illinois.

Hashem Dezhbakhsh (Emory University Law Professor) and Joan M Shepard Shepherd (Assistant Professor at Emory School of Law). "The Deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment: Evidence from a 'Judicial Experiment'". January 11th, 2006 - We use panel data for 50 states during the 1960-2000 period to examine the deterrent effect of capital punishment, using the moratorium as a 'judicial experiment.' We compare murder rates immediately before and after changes in states' death penalty laws, drawing on cross-state variations in the timing and duration of the moratorium. The regression analysis supplementing the before-and-after comparisons disentangles the effect of lifting the moratorium on murder from the effect of actual executions on murder. Results suggest that capital punishment has a deterrent effect, and that executions have a distinct effect which compounds the deterrent effect of merely (re)instating the death penalty. The finding is robust across 96 regression models.

"Does Capital Punishment Have a Deterrent Effect? New Evidence from Postmoratorium Panel Data". 2003 - Our results suggest that capital punishment has a strong deterrent effect; each execution results, on average, in eighteen fewer murders—with a margin of error of plus or minus ten.

Hashem Dezhbakhsh is the Emory University Professor and Chair of Economics. Hashem Dezhbakhsh's areas of expertise include econometrics, the oil market, financial markets and volatility, and economics of crime-always important subjects but perhaps never more than in these current times. Dezhbakhsh's articles have appeared in leading econoimc journals and his research has been cited in dozens of newspapers and magazine both in the United States and abroad. On the Emory campus, Dezhbakhsh not only chairs the department of economics, he also serves as director of undergraduate studies. Dezhbakhsh is one of Emory College's most respected and honored teachers. In 1999, Dezhbakhsh received the Emory Williams Distinguished Teaching Award and in 2008, he was honored with the Cuttino Award for Excellence in Mentorship.

Emory University Law Professor. "Capital Punishment and the Deterrence of Crime", written testimony for the House Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security. 21 Apr. 2004 - "Recent research on the relationship between capital punishment and crime has created a strong consensus among economists that capital punishment deters crime. Early studies from the 1970s and 1980s reached conflicting results. However, recent studies have exploited better data and more sophisticated statistical techniques. The modern studies have consistently shown that capital punishment has a strong deterrent effect, with each execution deterring between 3 and 18 murders. This is true even for crimes that might seem not to be deterrable, such as crimes of passion."

"DETERRENCE VERSUS BRUTALIZATION:CAPITAL PUNISHMENT’S DIFFERING IMPACTS AMONG STATES" Joanna M. Shepherd - "if policymakers in the no-deterrence states have goals other than deterrence, such as retribution, then they might continue capital punishment,despite the absence of deterrence. In the many states, however,where executions not only fail to deter but also cause additional murders of innocent people, policymakers might think twice before permitting statesponsored revenge that, in effect, kills innocent bystanders."

Joanna Shepherd Assistant Professor of Law Analytical Methods, Law and Economics, Torts Joanna Shepherd teaches Torts, Law and Economics, Analytical Methods for Lawyers and Statistics for Lawyers. Before joining Emory, Professor Shepherd was an assistant professor of economics at Clemson University. Much of Professor Shepherd's research focuses on topics in law and economics, especially on empirical analyses of legal changes and legal institutions.

Regarding "The Monitor's View" of April 23 2012, "Death penalty's fatal flaw": As a punishment more punitive than preventive, more costly than compassionate, the death penalty harks back to a different time in our nation. Yet we should pause before we assign a simplistic "cost-benefit" analysis to those who still support it: lawmakers, police, and, yes, victims.


For some individuals whose lives have been touched by violence, the death penalty is justice even as it might be vengeance. Empathizing with those individuals who have suffered may, in the long term, reduce further suffering.

Mark Porrovecchio is the Assistant Professor rhetoric in Oregon State University.

Huang Juei-min, a law professor at Taichung's Providence University, is among several scholars who opposes abolition. "Those who are placed on death row have committed cruel crimes. They should face the consequences," Huang said.


"When human rights organizations are calling for protecting the rights of murderers, who cares about the families of their victims?"

Huang Juei-min a law professor at Taichung's Providence University in Taiwan.

Monday 18 April 2011 - According to Professor Kayhan Mutlu from Middle East Technical University, the EU should not have an effect on Turkish decision-making when it comes to changing criminal laws. "Every country has its own social, economic and political structure," he explained. "Therefore, criminal law should be independent, unless it is ignoring basic human rights and democratic principles."

Kayhan Mutlu is the Professor at the Department of Sociology, Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey.

Injustice to civilians could be deemed as the highest level of violence and extraordinary crime. [Prosecution of petty criminal cases: The death of civilian justice The Jakarta Post | Fri, 01/13/2012 5:17 PM | Opinion]

A serious lack of justice really shocks our human consciousness since a great deal of people lose their basic right to peace and security. [Prosecution of petty criminal cases: The death of civilian justice The Jakarta Post | Fri, 01/13/2012 5:17 PM | Opinion] 

Donny Syofyan is a lecturer at the Faculty of Cultural Sciences of Andalas University. He majors in English literature. He pursued his master degree at the University of Canberra, Australia in 2008 on human resource management and took his second master degree at Gadjah Mada University on literary studies in 2010. Despite his background in English literature, his interests have been wide and varied. His articles have been published in various newspapers and journals. While he writes articles on English literatures on a routine basis for Singgalang daily, his op-ed pieces on various contemporary issues can be found in The Jakarta Post, The Jakarta Globe, The Korea Times, The Japan Times, The Kathmandu Post, The Brunei Times, Koran Tempo, Bisnis Indonesia, Singgalang, Padang Ekspres, and Haluan.

According to a Gallup Poll survey of one year ago, 64 percent of Americans favor the death penalty. This is down from 20 years ago when the number was 76 percent. It is still a majority, but shrinking. Although the arguments for the cessation of the death penalty have merit — that it is racially biased, unfairly administered, does not reduce crime and does not allow for a do-over for the innocent once the execution is carried out — I still believe the death penalty should remain on the books. [People Who Murder Should Be Put To Death By FRANK HARRIS III Posted: The Hartford Courant on Sunday October 16, 2011]

I believe people who murder should be put to death. [People Who Murder Should Be Put To Death By FRANK HARRIS III Posted: The Hartford Courant on Sunday October 16, 2011]

Frank Harris III is a professor of journalism, chair of Journalism Department at Southern Connecticut State University and advisor for the campus newspaper, The Southern News. He is also a columnist for the Hartford Courant where he writes on a mosaic of issues. Prior to joining the Courant, he wrote the award-winning ''In my own Words'' Sunday column for the New Haven Register for 10 years. Prior to that, he penned a column for The City Sun, a weekly newspaper in Brooklyn, N.Y. His writing has appeared in over 50 newspapers and magazines ranging from the New York Times to USA Today to the Chicago Tribune to the Los Angeles Times. He has authored two books, The Craft of Quoting and In My Own Words. He also has co-authored a book on journalism titled, The Media: Freedom and Power: an examination of freedom of expression in America. He has recently completed research work titled ''When the teacher is different from the student: The effect of Race & Ethnicity on student Learning.'' A graduate of The University of Texas and Southern Illinois University, Harris hails from Waukegan, Ill. He lives in Hamden, Conn.

"If no crime deserves the death penalty, then it is hard to see why it was fitting that Christ be put to death for our sins and crucified among thieves. St. Thomas Aquinas quotes a gloss of St. Jerome on Matthew 27: ‘As Christ became accursed of the cross for us, for our salvation He was crucified as a guilty one among the guilty.’ That Christ be put to death as a guilty person, presupposes that death is a fitting punishment for those who are guilty." Prof. Michael Pakaluk, The Death Penalty: An Opposing Viewpoints Series Book, Greenhaven Press, (hereafter TDP:OVS), 1991

Michael Pakaluk is an associate professor of philosophy at Clark University in Worcester, MA, received his A.B. and later Ph. D. from Harvard, studying under W.V. Quine and John Rawls.He is the author of several books and many scholarly articles in various areas of philosophy, including Other Selves: Philosophers on Friendship, the Clarendon Aristotle volume on Nicomachean Ethics, and, most recently, Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics: An Introduction, published by Cambridge University Press. His work has played a major role in the recently renewed philosophical attention to the notion of friendship in ethics and political theory. He is the Director of the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy and a Founding Member of the American Public Philosophy Institute. Dr. Pakaluk has been a visiting professor or scholar at Brown, St. Andrews, Cambridge and Harvard. He is currently working on a new translation of the Nicomachean Ethics, as well as a treatise on philosophical issues concerning the family.

What Professor Robinson does not report is that the abolitionist movement is the sole reason for the higher-than-expected expense and lower-than-expected deterrent value of capital punishment. The death penalty is expensive because abolitionists level costly appeals – even in cases where they know the condemned is guilty and has had a fair trial.

Put simply, the abolitionist wants to get rid of the death penalty regardless of guilt and regardless of process. And the impact of these endless appeals is predicable: It undermines the deterrent capacity of the death penalty. - The Death Penalty Does Not Deter Liberals 2 May 2011

If the liberal reader cannot understand why a fifteen year delay between crime and punishment undermines deterrence then just try this little two-step experiment: 1) The next time your fifteen-year old breaks a rule tell him he will be grounded when he turns thirty. 2) See if you can count to ten before he decides to recidivate. - The Death Penalty Does Not Deter Liberals 2 May 2011

Dr. Robinson also says that the death penalty “poses a serious risk to innocent people.” I have a similar concern with abortion. I think it might pose a pretty serious risk to innocent people. So, for me, the solution lies in the appellate process.

Here’s my plan: When a woman decides to abort, opponents of abortion should be able to file appeals on behalf of the baby. If we can just drag out the process for fifteen years or more then, who knows, we might be able to reduce the risk abortion poses to innocent people. - The Death Penalty Does Not Deter Liberals 2 May 2011

''Among other things, this report shows us that the death penalty does not deter crime,'' said Professor Baumgartner. ''We haven't executed anyone since 2006, and the murder rate has gone down. If the death penalty isn't making us safer, why do we cling to this punishment?''

Baumgartner failed to mention that the crime rate rose every single year between 1967 and 1977 when there were no executions in America. He also failed to mention that after eighteen years of increases the crime rate finally leveled off in 1978. That was the year after the death penalty made a comeback in America. - The Death Penalty Does Not Deter Liberals 2 May 2011

Robinson also asserts that innocent people are being wrongly sentenced to death. He notes that seven people have been exonerated and freed from North Carolina's death row since 1973. I’m glad he chose the year 1973 as a reference point. Since then, no wrongfully condemned person has been freed from a North Carolina abortion clinic. The criminal justice system is broken but, look, the health care system works just perfectly!

In recent years, the abortion rate has been dropping slightly – as has been the murder rate. Imagine if abortion were mired in racial bias or threatened the lives of innocent people. Then both logic and sanctimonious professors would defy its continued use. - The Death Penalty Does Not Deter Liberals 2 May 2011

Mike Adams is a criminology professor at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. Mike S. Adams was born in Columbus, Mississippi on October 30, 1964. While a student at Clear Lake High School in Houston, TX, his team won the state 5A soccer championship. Mike Adams graduated from C.L.H.S. in 1983 with a 1.8 GPA. Mike Adams was ranked 734 among a class of 740, largely as a result of flunking English all four years of high school. After obtaining an Associate's degree in psychology from San Jacinto College, Mike Adams moved on to Mississippi State University where he joined the Sigma Chi Fraternity. While living in the fraternity house, his GPA rose to 3.4, allowing him to finish his B.A., and then to pursue a Master's in Psychology. In 1990, Mike Adams turned down a chance to pursue a PhD in psychology from the University of Georgia, opting instead to remain at Mississippi State to study Sociology/Criminology. This decision was made entirely on the basis of his reluctance to quit his night job as member of a musical duo. Playing music in bars and at fraternity parties and weddings financed his education. Mike Adams also played for free beer. Upon getting his doctorate in 1993, Adams, then an atheist and a Democrat, was hired by UNC-Wilmington to teach in the criminal justice program. A few years later, Adams abandoned his atheism and also became a Republican. He also nearly abandoned teaching when he took a one-year leave of absence to study law at UNC-Chapel Hill in 1998. After returning to teach at UNC-Wilmington, Adams won the Faculty Member of the Year award (issued by the Office of the Dean of Students) for the second time in 2000. After his involvement in a well publicized free speech controversy in the wake of the 911 terror attacks, Adams became a vocal critic of the diversity movement in academia. After making appearances on shows like Hannity and Colmes, the O'Reilly Factor, and Scarborough Country, Adams was asked to write a column for Townhall.com. Today Mike Adams enjoys the privilege of expressing himself both as a teacher and a writer. Mike Adams is also an avid hunter and reader of classic literature. Mike Adams published his first book, Welcome to the Ivory Tower of Babel, in 2004. His second book, Feminists Say the Darndest Things: A Politically Incorrect Professor Confronts "Womyn" On Campus, was published in 2008.

Dhaka, Sept 13 2012 (ANI): Eminent Bangladeshi economist, Abul Barakat, on Thursday called for handing down death sentences to war criminals.


Speaking to reporters here, Barakat said war criminals had committed crimes against humanity.


"As a freedom fighter I know what they have done and we are spending lot of time to prove what they have done. I don't think there is a need for any proof. My expectation is simple- death sentence to these war criminals, because they have committed crimes against humanity, and I don't think it should be tolerated," Barakat said.

The Islamist groups in Bangladesh want to scrap "secularism" as a state principle in the Muslim-majority country.

 

Barakat also urged the central government to expedite the trial process of war criminals.

 

"I think that the whole process of the trial should be expedited and within this year, at least five of the war criminals should be sentenced to death," he added.

Further, he said, that the spirit of secularism has been tarnished due to the delay in the punishing of war criminals.

 

"I sincerely believe that this country was born as a country which, by birth, will be secular and this secularism and spirit of secularism was tarnished because of not punishing these war criminals," Barakat stated.

Abul Barakat is an eminent economist from Bangladesh and Professor of Economics in Dhaka University. 

Death by firing squad spotlights old execution method By Nicholas Riccardi, Los Angeles Times Updated: 10:11 AM 6/18/2010 - "The anti-death-penalty people think it's barbaric, and the pro-death-penalty people think it detracts from capital punishment. But when you think of all the methods, the firing squad would be the most dignified. Someone's standing up and facing their death."

 

Monday 25 April 2011 - "Within the history of the death penalty, this is a very big deal. We've never had a situation like this, ever," she said. "We've never run out of gas for gas chambers or rope for hanging or electrical equipment for electric chairs."

Deborah W. Denno is the Arthur A. McGivney Professor of Law at Fordham University School of Law. She received her B.A. from the University of Virginia, her M.A. from the University of Toronto, her Ph.D. in criminology from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and her J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, where she was the Managing Editor of the University of Pennsylvania Law Review. Prior to joining the Fordham Law faculty in 1991, Professor Denno clerked for Anthony J. Scirica, now Chief Judge of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, and worked as an associate at Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett. At Fordham Law School, she primarily teaches criminal law, criminal procedure, torts, and various seminars on advanced criminal law topics including rape and social science evidence. Professor Denno was a member of the United States Sentencing Commission’s Drugs/Violence Task Force, and has visited on the faculties of Columbia Law School and Vanderbilt Law School. She has also been a Visiting Professor of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School, a Visiting Senior Fellow at the School of Advanced Study at the University of London, and a British Academy Visiting Professor at the London School of Economics. In 2007, the National Law Journal selected Professor Denno as one of its “Fifty Most Influential Women Lawyers in America.” Professor Denno has published on a broad range of topics relating to criminal law, criminal procedure, social sciences and the law, and the death penalty, including the constitutionality of execution methods. In the Supreme Court’s recent execution methods decision, Baze v. Rees, 128 S. Ct. 1520 (2008), Chief Justice Roberts's plurality opinion and the concurring opinions of Justices Alito, Stevens, and Breyer together cited four different articles by Professor Denno. Chief Justice Roberts cited a fifth article, Testing Penry and its Progeny, 22 AM. J. CRIM. L. 1 (1994), in two separate opinions in 2007. In Testing Penry and its Progeny, Professor Denno performed an empirical analysis of the bio-social factors that correlate with an increased likelihood of violent crime to evaluate the Texas courts’ application of the Supreme Court decision in Penry v. Linaugh, 492 U.S. 392 (1989). Professor Denno has also initiated cutting-edge examinations of criminal law defenses pertaining to insanity, rape law, gender differences, consciousness, biological and genetic links to crime, drug offenses, jury decision-making, and the impact of lead poisoning. Currently she is working on a book-length project analyzing the neuroscientific correlates of criminal intent and conduct. Professor Denno was a co-editor of, and contributor to, the ENCYCLOPEDIA OF CRIME AND JUSTICE (2nd ed. Macmillan, 2002). In addition to her varied publications, she has engaged in wide-ranging quantitative criminological research. For nearly a decade, she directed one of the country’s largest longitudinal studies of biological and sociological predictors of crime in the capacity of Senior Research Associate at the Sellin Center for Studies in Criminology and Criminal Law, University of Pennsylvania. Professor Denno detailed the results of this study in her book, BIOLOGY AND VIOLENCE: FROM BIRTH TO ADULTHOOD (1990). Criminologist Marvin E. Wolfgang, in his foreword to the book, noted that Professor Denno had “mastered the language of medical science, quantitative analysis, and sociological concepts to such an extent that in her person there is an interdisciplinarity that many of us have called for in criminology over the years.” A paperback version of this book was published in 2007. Additional examples of Professor Denno’s research include her contributions to a nationwide study of plea bargaining at the Georgetown University Law Center and to the New Jersey Office of the Public Defender’s study on disparities in the application of the death penalty. Professor Denno is often quoted in the media and has appeared on numerous television news reports.