Jan. 5
USA:
Even killers don't deserve to die
THANKS TO the Globe for pointing out good reasons to oppose the death
penalty ("Cruel and more unusual," Editorial, Dec. 28). Left unmentioned,
however, was any argument against a common justification for execution:
murderers deserve to die because they freely choose to kill. Were we to
take a fully scientific, cause and effect view of the genesis of a
killer's character, motives, state of mind, and situation, we would no
longer suppose that he could have done otherwise given his genetic and
environmental history, and his current circumstances, internal and
external.
This view doesn't diminish the moral gravity of the offense or the
necessity to protect society, but it calls into question the free will
justification for retributive punishment. As psychologists Joshua Greene
and Jonathan Cohen conclude in their 2004 paper, "For the law,
neuroscience changes nothing and everything": "Free will as we ordinarily
understand it is an illusion generated by our cognitive architecture.
Retributivist notions of criminal responsibility ultimately depend on this
illusion."
Give up the illusion, and we've got another good reason to oppose the
death penalty: Killers don't deserve to die.
THOMAS W. CLARK----Somerville; The writer is director of the Center for
Naturalism.
(source: Letter to the Editor, Boston Globe)
OREGON:
Oregon justice suggests death penalty review
An Oregon Supreme Court justice has recommended that the court review the
constitutionality of the death penalty.
Justice Martha Walters wrote in a concurring opinion on a Portland case
that the court should consider Oregon's experience with the death penalty
and again examine its constitutionality.
Her recommendation came as the court affirmed the aggravated murder
conviction and the death penalty for Michael Andre Davis.
Although Davis had been a suspect since the November 1991 killing of a
couple at a Portland hotel, prosecutors didn't have enough evidence to
convict him until 2005.
(source: Associated Press)
FLORIDA:
2 face death penalty in family's killing
Prosecutors in West Palm Beach, Fla., say they'll use fingerprints found
on a turnpike toll card to link 2 men to the slayings of a family of 4.
Federal death penalty trials are to begin this week for Daniel Troya and
Ricardo Sanchez Sr., charged with the execution-style shooting deaths of
Yessica Escobedo, 25, and Jose Luis Escobedo, 28, and their 2 sons.
Yessica's arms were wrapped around the bodies of 4-year-old Luis Damien
and 3-year-old Luis Julian when the family's bodies were found Oct. 13,
2006 along the Florida Turnpike in Port St. Lucie, the Palm Beach (Fla.)
Post reported Monday.
Fingerprints on a toll card found in the Escobedos abandoned Jeep led
police to Troya and Sanchez, who allegedly knew Jose Escobedo through drug
runs he brokered between Texas and Florida, police said.
The family's Jeep was found 3 days after the killings about 70 miles from
the crime scene, police said.
Troya and Sanchez have said they were 50 miles from the crime scene at the
time of the shootings, said their lawyer, Donnie Murell.
(source: United Press International)
