but DNA evidence exonerating people on death row changed my view on the death penalty. I am not willing to take a chance on executing an innocent person.

Evidence has come to light after they were murdered by the state.

Prosecutors are looking for convictions, and not all of them care about the "truth" in a case.

The US is in the company of Saudi Arabia and Uganda on this issue.

further evidence that it should be stopped.

I'm just reinforcing the anti message.

Even rabbinical law made the conditions so onerous for the death penalty that they could not, in fact, be enacted. There is a reason for this.

In Canada, the main reasons are the three M's; David Milgaard, Donald Marshall, and Guy-Paul Morin. David Milgaard was a hitchhiker, wrongly convicted of the rape and murder of a nurse. He spent 22 years in jail. Donald Marshall was wrongly convicted of murdering a friend; he is a Mi'kmaq, and institutional racism was deemed to have been a factor in his conviction. Guy-Paul Morin was a shy, solitary man convicted and later exonerated by DNA testing; he was failed by the justice system too, mostly because he was considered a little odd by the community.

There are more of the kind, and more background at http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2009/08/06/f-wrongfully-convicted.html

In my view, the death penalty is a barbaric remnant, and is extremely fallible. It's a great way to cage minorities, too, and Canada is not immune to that urge.

Death and Justice by Mark Fuhrman.

From amazon.com:

Book Description
Publication Date: September 28, 2004

Controversy rages about capital punishment as innocent men and women are being released from death rows all over the country. Are innocent people being executed? Is capital punishment justice or is it revenge?

Into the debate steps Mark Fuhrman, America's most famous detective, and no stranger to controversy himself.

Fuhrman seeks to answer these questions by investigating the death penalty in Oklahoma, where a "hang 'em high" attitude of cowboy justice resulted in twenty–one executions in 2001, more than any other state. Most of these cases came from one jurisdiction, Oklahoma County, where legendary DA Bob Macy bragged of sending more people to death row than any other prosecutor, and police chemist Joyce Gilchrist was eventually fired for mismanaging the crime lab. Examining police records, trial transcripts, appellate decisions and conducting hundreds of interviews, Fuhrman focuses his considerable investigative skills on more than a dozen of the most controversial Oklahoma death penalty cases.

I was interested in reading the book because I had moved to Oklahoma County and had heard of the controversy of Joyce Gilchrist. I believe that one of the cases he discusses was overturned since the book came out.

When Mark Fuhrman started this project, he was pro death penalty. By the time he finished the book his viewpoint had changed.

I personally am anti-death penalty because I don't trust the justice system enough to not execute innocent people. Execution is not something that can be taken back if you find out later on the prisoner was innocent.

Remember when the Republican governor of Illinois came out against the death penalty some years ago for precisely these reasons?
Capital punishment is FINAL...and so far there seems to have been no system of determining guilt for something beyond any doubt to justify that finality.

Can the U.S still claim to be politically developed? Reggie Clemons shows us why not.

http://developmentinaction.wordpress.com/2012/09/18/can-the-usa-claim-to-be-a-developed-country-the-reggie-clemons-case-highlights-why-not/

Please share and retweet this article, my twitter is indra_bala

Thank you very much.

or is it another Mark Fuhrman?

I wanted to read the book because of the fact that he looked at death penalty cases in Oklahoma County and there have been problems with the legal system under Bob Macy and Joyce Gilchrist. All the cases covered occurred before I moved to Oklahoma and do like to read books the provide a behind the scenes look at real life people/situations. It is a very interesting book. I recently upgraded my copy to an ebook for my Kindle.

He is clear that he was, in no way, defending any of the defendants and trying to portray them as angels. He looked at the way the investigations were handled, Gilchrist and how the cases were prosecuted.

the developmentally disabled.

Despicable, IMHO.

with a combination of incredulity and disgust that we were strapping people to gurneys and injecting poison into them.

by wingnut bee readers, which outnumber dems by about 3-1. these trolls have totally taken the comment section over. unfortunately, it's my local paper, so i have to read it (for local news).

Some of them are to my post! Good gravy.............

for any reason. Applying that principle, it would never make the ultimate mistake of killing an innocent person.

Can the U.S still claim to be politically developed? Reggie Clemons shows us why not.

http://developmentinaction.wordpress.com/2012/09/18/can-the-usa-claim-to-be-a-developed-country-the-reggie-clemons-case-highlights-why-not/

Please share and retweet this article, my twitter is indra_bala

Thank you very much.