CAPITAL PUNISHMENT

Gas Chamber method of execution . . .

“Man is but half a God,

he can take a life but

he cannot create one.” 

Alex Hutchins circa the 60’s

Capital punishment, also called death penalty, execution of an offender sentenced to death after conviction by a court of law of a criminal offense. Capital punishment should be distinguished from extrajudicial executions carried out without due process of law. The term death penalty is sometimes used interchangeably with capital punishment, though imposition of the penalty is not always followed by execution (even when it is upheld on appeal), because of the possibility of commutation to life imprisonment.

Lethal injection method of execution . . .

Death row signifies the place (often a section of a prison), that houses individuals awaiting execution. The term is also used figuratively to describe the state of awaiting execution ("being on death row"), even in places where no special facility or separate unit for condemned inmates exists. After individuals are found guilty of an offense and sentenced to death, they remain on death row during appeal and habeas corpus procedures, and if those are unsuccessful, until execution. Due to the complex, expensive and time-consuming appeals procedures mandated in some jurisdictions, e.g. the United States, before an execution can be carried out, prisoners may wait years before execution; the time between sentencing and execution has increased relatively steadily between 1977 and 2010, including a 22% jump between 1989 and 1990 and a similar jump between 2008 and 2009. In 2010, a death row inmate waited an average of 178 months (or close to 15 years) between sentencing and execution. Nearly a quarter of deaths on death row in the U.S. are due to natural causes.

According to the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union), “the death penalty is discriminatory and arbitrary and inherently violates the Constitutional ban against cruel and unusual punishment.”  The ACLU goes on to say that it “opposes the death penalty in all circumstances, and looks forward to the day when the United States joins the majority of nations that abolish it.”

Animal method of execution . . .

Death Penalty Myths
Myth #1: The death penalty is not a deterrent to murder.

Myth #2: The death penalty is not reserved for the worst criminals regardless of their race or class.

Myth #3: Victims’ families do not all want the death penalty.

Myth #4: The Bible does not call for the death sentence when it says “an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth.”

Myth #5: The death penalty costs more than life in prison.

Myth #6: Executions are not common throughout the world.

Electrocution method of execution . . .

Global Methods of Execution  

Animals

Boiling to death

Breaking back

Breaking wheel

Buried alive

Burning

Brazen Bull

Crucifixion

Decapitation

Disembowelment

Dismemberment

Drawing and quartering

***Electrocution

Falling

Flaying

Garrote

***Gas

***Hanging

Immurement

Impalement

Keelhauling

***Lethal injection

Pendulum

Poisoning

Sawing

Scaphism

***Shooting

Slow slicing

Stabbing

Starvation / Dehydration

Stoning

Strangulation

***Execution methods used in US

I find it curiously interesting that while much has been written on the methods of execution and its pros and cons, very little has been written on the psychological state-of-mind of the executioner or its impact over time. 

Firing squad method of execution . . .

How easy or how difficult is it to watch

a man or a women being executed?

How easy or how difficult is it when it is you who has to flip the switch or push the button?

Guillotine method of execution . . .

How does the executioner feel executing

another person year after year after year?

Could a religious person be an executioner or does it take an atheist?

Hanging method of execution . . .

Is it easier to execute someone if you do not

have to watch the effects of what you are doing?

In the “ideal” Christian world, is taking another person’s life ever justified?

Draw and Quartering method of execution . . .

I remember reading years ago a study that was conducted at one of our “leading” Universities where residents of the local town were collected and one-by-one put in rooms where they were asked to turn a knob that gave currents of electricity to a person in the adjoining room (who was an actor).  Despite the cries of pain, the local resident would turn the knob to a lethal dose as long as the researcher was willing to take full responsibility for any injury to the electrocuted person in the adjoining room.

Crucifixion method of execution . . .

Conclusion:  Any average person, male or female, would reluctantly do what was done to the Jews in Nazi Germany as long as two conditions were satisfied:

1. They did not have to witness the pain inflicted on the test subject
2. Someone else was willing to take responsibility for their actions

But, what does this analogy have to do

with Capital Punishment in America anyway?

States with death penalty in tan . . .
click to enlarge