“Killing people to teach people not to kill doesn’t work.” I remember seeing that slogan on a sign that a death penalty protester was carrying while protesting the execution of a person sentenced to death and thinking, they’ve got a point …
Why do we kill killers? Think about it: if you want to teach a child not to steal, do you steal? Of course you don’t. Do we rob from robbers? No, we put them in jail. Do we rape rapists? No, we incarcerate them.
We don’t kill killers because it’s a deterrent to killing; there is no evidence that it is. We don’t kill them because it is the moral thing to do; it is not (thou shalt not kill). We don’t do it because it saves the taxpayers money; it doesn’t.
Why do we kill killers? We kill killers because it makes us feel better; it’s as simple as that.
We Americans want to exact our retribution on individuals in society who commit the most heinous crime (murder), but we don’t want their blood on our hands when we do it. We want to kill in a way that we can feel good about.
Lethal injection allows us to kill in a cold, clinical fashion that doesn’t lower us to the perpetrator’s level. We want to kill efficiently, without the blood and guts that can result from taking a human life.
We don’t want to kill the killers like they killed their victims, after all, we’re better than that. We live in a civilized society, right?
Why else do we have a Constitutional Amendment prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment and not an Amendment banning capital punishment? We want to kill, but we also want to feel good about killing.
The U.S. Supreme Court recently heard a case, Baze v. Rees, in which it was argued that lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the 8th Amendment to the Constitution. This speaks to the argument that lethal injection, as currently practiced in 35 of 36 states that administer the death penalty, is unconstitutional.
There is evidence to back up this assertion. For example, in 2005 University of Miami researchers examined post-mortem levels of sodium thiopental, the drug used to render inmates unconscious prior to administering the lethal drugs pancuronium/tubocurarine and potassium chloride to execute inmates.
The researchers found that levels of sodium thiopental were lower than that required in general surgery in 43 of the 49 deceased inmates tested. Of the inmates, 21 had levels of the drug in their system consistent with being aware of what was happening while they were being executed.
The researchers also found that in two states, Texas and Virginia, executioners had no anesthesia training and that the drugs were administered remotely without monitoring the inmate’s level of anesthesia. So, even if the inmate was visibly aware, the execution would proceed.
One can conclude then, that an inmate subjected to execution by lethal injection could actually be aware and conscious while the lethal combination of pancuronium/tubocurarine, to stop muscle movement and collapse the diaphragm, and potassium chloride, which stops the heart and thus causes death, is administered.
This would cause the inmate to experience excruciating pain and suffering in violation of the Constitution’s 8th Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment. This defeats the purpose of lethal injection: to kill humanely (isn’t that an oxymoron?) by rendering the condemned unconscious before we kill them, so that they don’t experience any pain.
Why do we want the inmates to be unconscious before we kill them? Because it makes us feel better.
Critics argue that there is a lack of scientific evidence to support the conclusion that post-mortem levels of thiopental are low in some inmates due to inadequate administration of the drug. They contend that thiopental may be redistributed from blood into tissues post-mortem, effectively lowering the concentration in the blood over time, hence the low readings.
The debate on capital punishment revolves around four primary issues: is it moral to kill, is the death penalty a deterrent, is the death penalty applied fairly across racial, socioeconomic, class and gender lines and is the death penalty financially feasible in light of alternatives, (e.g. life imprisonment).
I have argued both for and against capital punishment on all of the above grounds, depending on how I felt that particular day. Like a lot of Americans, I have ambivalent feelings about the morality of the state taking a life. I also have serious problems with how the death penalty is unevenly applied across racial, socioeconomic and class distinctions and among the states. The financial arguments both for and against capital punishment, don’t resonate with me because what value do you place on a human life?
Even the Supreme Court can’t agree on the issue of capital punishment, so for now at least, we’ll just continue to do what makes us feel better.