Guest 690- Registered: 10 Oct 2009
- Posts: 4,150
23 September 2010
20:3872176A 42 year old woman is due to be executed by lethal injection in Virginia, U.S. at 2am our time in the morning. She hired 2 hitmen to kill her husband and his son in order to collect $200,000 dollars of insurance money. Though the two hitmen who done the murder have been sentenced to life imprisonment with no parole, the woman is to be executed because she planned it all. Her appeal has been turned down. Two innocent men had their lives taken away, to finance someone`s want of money. Execution`s have been debated on here before, so what about this one then? The planner is to pay with their life, not the actual killer`s.
Tell them that I came, and no one answered.
Jan Higgins
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,835
23 September 2010
21:2772184To be honest I have no real opinion on this case, I do not know enough about it.
This is America after all, where life is often taken because they wave guns around like toys and it seems any idiot can own one.
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
23 September 2010
21:4072190i have studied the case, it was a typical american trial, the evidence presented was not contested well by a cheap attorney for the defence.
the defendant would have probably been aquitted over here.
Jan Higgins- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,835
23 September 2010
22:2672204Aquitted for hiring a couple of hitmen, I doubt it, if true she would receive a prison sentence.
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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Guest 649- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 14,118
23 September 2010
22:3372207Years ago in the UK and it was in my life,that if you was carrying a gun and someone was killed by a person with you who also had agun you both would be executed,of even if only one of you had the gun both would be executed.
Keith Sansum1
- Location: london
- Registered: 25 Aug 2010
- Posts: 23,890
23 September 2010
22:5472209I fully understand this is the USA but still I don't agree wih taking of someone's life.
ALL POSTS ARE MY OWN PERSONAL VIEWS
23 September 2010
23:3072212The State, taking someone's life, in cold blood, is always wrong.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
24 September 2010
03:4072215I am unsure when Vic was born but according to my research it was in 1861 that murder became the only offence for which the death penalty was used in peacetime. For that crime the judges were, however, bound to impose it, and the juries could only add a recommendation for mercy for the Home Secretary and the Court of Criminal Appeal to consider when the conviction was being appealed against. In 1868, a notable reform was made when the gallows were placed inside prison walls, inaccessible to the public. During the war treason was used but have I have failed to find any reference to the 'carrying of the gun offence' to which Vic alludes to above.
Here is the definitive list of offences during 'Vics lifetime'
any murder done in the course of or furtherance of theft;
any murder by shooting or by causing an explosion;
any murder done in the course or for the purpose of resisting or avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest, or of effecting or assisting an escape or rescue from legal custody;
any murder of a police officer acting in the execution of his duty or of a person assisting a police officer so acting;
in the case of a person who was a prisoner at the time when he did or was party to the murder, any murder of a prison officer acting in the execution of his duty or of a person assisting a prison officer so acting;
two or more murders on different occasions (Duff 1961:184).
In fact the death penalty had a detrimental effect as juries would often err on the side of caution and a 'reasonable doubt' and not find the accused guilty for fear of the death penalty being imposed ... so it failed to continue as a deterrent.
Vic this is such an important issue that one must get ones facts right before spouting forth and not look at history through your 'rose tinted glasses'!
I am against the death penalty.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
24 September 2010
04:5972216Sounds as if she is getting the just and proper sentence she deserves.
Interesting that the actual hit men are not being executed. Plee barganing perhaps, providing the evidence to find the woman guilty. She did plan it after all....
24 September 2010
06:4072219FYI, the woman also had learning difficulties. Good old USofA.
Keith Sansum1- Location: london
- Registered: 25 Aug 2010
- Posts: 23,890
24 September 2010
06:5272223I'm with MAREK on this one
ALL POSTS ARE MY OWN PERSONAL VIEWS
Guest 649- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 14,118
24 September 2010
08:1972226What I said was right you are reading it wrong look at it again,and a policeman was killed when he stoped two men and the one who did not shot him was exeuted because he was there and also had a gun. That was not the only case at that time which the person who did not do the killing was exeuted, I see it was you again Marek saying I was wrong anything to have a dig at me,but please carry on mate.
24 September 2010
08:3772228Vic, I think you are referring to the Derek Bentley case. Details here:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Bentley_caseGuest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
24 September 2010
08:3972229Vic the case to which you refer contained the anomaly in the English law was indeed the lack of a concept of 'diminished responsibility' between 'criminal insanity' and guilt when the murderer had not been insane, but not in a normal mental state either, the jury could only find him guilty and send a recommendation for mercy to the Home Secretary. This problem got enormous publicity late in 1952, when a sixteen-year-old Croydon boy, Christopher Craig, murdered a policeman during a burglary attempt. His accomplice, the nineteen-year-old Derek Bentley, had been held by the police for a while by the moment Craig fired the fatal shot, but they were both found guilty of the murder. The case became even more outrageous when Craig escaped hanging because of his age, but Bentley, under arrest when the murder was committed and mentally on the level of a child, was sentenced to death. The sentiment of the public was clearly on his side, and petitions for mercy were signed by huge numbers of people, including 200 MPs from all parties. But the Home Secretary, Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe, was known for being exceptionally blunt towards murderers' appeals, and even the pleas of his fellow Conservative politicians in the name of political expediency failed to convince him. Bentley was hanged in January 1953 . Later that year, the Gowers Commission released its extensive report, one not fulfilling the wishes of the Government. If there was to be any reform in death penalty law, it concluded, it should be the abolition of capital punishment. Again no action whatsoever was taken by the Government, and executions went on.
You will note that this murder falls under para's 3 and 6 above and he did not get executed simply cos he carried a gun.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 649- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 14,118
24 September 2010
08:4772231Thank you both for that and yes that was the case,but there were others,one was for high treson ,I am am not siting here with any Ref/books but I know it to be true.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
24 September 2010
08:5272232setting fire to her majesties dockyards used to be a capital offence, was still on the statute book long after the death penalty was abolished.
might still be there, just forgotten about.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
24 September 2010
08:5372233It's not all reference books an old colleague and friend knew Craig and Bentley and gave me the inside story so to speak. 'Lord Hawhaw' was executed for high treason to which I referred to in para 1 of my so-called dig at you.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
24 September 2010
09:0472235Howard
The use of death as punishment, already known from the earliest history of Britain, reached its all-time peak in the 18th century, when Parliament continuously enlarged the already long list of capital crimes. Finally over two hundred offences were punishable by death, among them stealing in a shop to the value of five shillings, stealing anything at all privily from a person, sending threatening letters, sacrilege, and cutting down a tree. Starting in the 1820s, this 'bloody code' was gradually repealed, partly owing to the general rise of humanitarianism and enlightenment, but also because juries were less and less willing to convict people for theft and other minor felonies if that meant they were to die
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 649- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 14,118
24 September 2010
09:0472236Lord Hawhaw was one but also someone set fire to a shipyard to,but I will have to look that one up when I have time,anyway I am off out I look forword to our next chat,and we are still coming over at some point,but I am waiting to go back into Hospital and that is the hold up at this time,we are hoping to get round all the UK over the next year or two,and most of the Islands around it.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
24 September 2010
09:1772239Vic
Let me know when you have dates as some hotels have great offers for oap's during the off season and hopefully I will be fit enough to take you to the German underground hospitals and bunkers.The musuem, the castles the vineyard,devils hole,wolf caves the old water mill to mention but a few local attractions.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)