Hello Dr. D'Cruz, I must admit that this and the previous post was the first that I have read from you. I do not know your stance on other issues, but I find you views below as absolutely primitive, to be mild. Firstly, biblical style or not, the mode makes no difference when one is sentenced to death. Moreover, the death penalty does exist in India and that was not a deterrent enough for the killers of Mandar (nor were their Gods). Your argument that crime rate is higher in US than in India simply because of the manner of execution is baseless.
Re the death penalty, to argue with you as a Christian, don't you think you are violating the 10 commandments? Don't you think you are acting as God when you decide who should die and who should live? What happened to forgiveness? We cannot use contraception because sperm cells will die, but we can kill criminals as we please because they violated the code, right? There is no doubt that the death penalty is an effective deterrent. But so is Autocracy an effective & efficient form of governance. But both these violate some basic sense of human morality (theistic or atheistic). I am not saying that you and Floriano (who prefers Autocratic style governance & policing) do not have morals, just that you are speaking through your emotions, without thinking clearly. We do not have the moral right to kill criminals, and we do not have the right to deprive the general publics freedoms within the law. Unfortunately, this is my only argument. I cannot explain why it is against basic morality, it just is, according to me. >From an effectiveness point of view, although it will be long before we reach that of Death penalty, we can try harder in other ways to curb crime. Firstly, Law can be a very powerful deterrent, more than one's God. The problem lies the enforcer's of the law, and with the people who think they can get away from them, even if they are actually wrong. In India, a majority have little faith in the police & Law. And for good reason. But I feel it is a misconception. I do not have the time to find statistics, but my guesstimate is that a lot more crimes are solved, and criminals punished than not. It is only because the media focuses on cases like Jessica Lal and the likes, which gives the impression that the Police and Judicial system are unreliable. One of the principles of Criminology is that there's no such thing as the perfect crime. If the Police are empowered with state of the art Criminology education and forensic tools for one, most cases would be solved. This would increase the faith in policing, and thus increase the deterrence. Then there's the issue with corruption, within the police force and the Judicial system. If we can put in place systems to increase transparency and curb corruption (like e-governance, etc), the prospective criminals with connections would think twice. This is easier said than done, but it makes more sense than your biblical measures! Secondly, we have to study the causes of crime in order to prevent it. Read the following document which is a good primer to this subject: www.preventingcrime.net/library/Causes_of_Crime.pdf >From the Scientific perspective, many crimes of Violence and Lust are committed by dysfunctional deviants, who need Psychological help. People around potential criminals need to recognise their dysfunctions and strongly encourage them to seek help, before they do cross the line. Thirdly, it would probably be a good idea to introduce the subject Ethics (which includes morality) in high school itself, not as a text book subject with a final examination, but as a class which you can pass through attendance, participation, individual seminars and continuous evaluation. All these measures put together may almost be as effective as the Death Penalty, perhaps even more, if lucky. Crimes should not go unpunished, and should be as stern as it can get within the bounds of human morality. Life imprisonment with no possibility of parole (literally no possibility) is almost as scary as getting sent off to the next life. As Selma said in an earlier post, (and I paraphrase) the purpose of prison is for the individual to reflect upon one's crime, and to keep him from further harming society, etc. And finally, I would just like to say that Mandar's killers were extremely stupid but were mal-intentioned and deserve the full force of ethical law, if the events did happen as they confessed. Firstly, they planned it all in 3 days and expected to get away with it. I am still trying to digest the fact that some were against the fact of asking too much money, (ie not be so greedy) but all reached a consensus to kill him. This is unless the killing was just an accident or unintentional when they had panicked when Mandar started to scream. Regards, Aristo. Forgive me if I sound a little incoherent as I have stayed an hour after my shift to type this mail, and I have no time to proof read as I have to leave within the minute. Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2006 22:47:06 -0400 From: CARMO DCRUZ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Goanet] Effects of Public Executions on Homicide Rates To: [email protected] Ever since my post on imposition of the death penalty in Goa by biblcal style public Cruxifiction on the cross and harvesting of the criminals' organs so that many Goans with chronic ailments may live (since all life esp that of innocent people is sacred), I have been inundated by queries from a number of holier than thou Goenkars who are more pro-criminal rights than victims rights and with that kind of attitude are inadvertently contributing to the deteriorating law and order situation in Goa. Well here are some facts as a result of cursory internet research: The Homicide Rates in countries with strigent public, biblical style executions of murderers (per 100K heads of population) is Saudi Arabia - 0.4 / 100000 UAE - 1/100000 This is quite an impressive record for the volatile part of the world called the middle east ! The Homicide Rate in India which has strict gun laws (and where executions are private)=4 / 100000 The Homicide Rate in the US which has liberal gun laws (where executions of convicted murderers are semi-private and conducted luxuriously through IV injection) = 6.8 / 100000 With facts and stats like this dont you think that Rohan Pai Dungat (19), Sheikh Nafiyaz Mamlekar(19), Shankar Lalta Tiwari (22), all from Vasco, Ryan Francisco Pinto (20) from Ucassaim and Al-Saleha Gani Beig (20) of Bicholim who have have been charged with the brutal murder of Mandar Surlakar, should be subject to fast track justice through our courts and sentenced to public cruxifiction and their organs harvested for transplant so that many more innocent Goans get a longer lease on life ?. I feel sorry fr the well-to-do parents and families of the above youth - they will be horrified at these suggestions and at the thought of what awaits their murderers if these measures are instituted in Goa - However, if these biblical measues were instituted a few months back when I suggested them for Fr. Eusebio's killers, Ryan and the others might have thought twice before committing such a ghastly murder - Mandar Surlakar may have been still alive and so many lives may not have been disrupted. _______________________________________________ Goanet mailing list [email protected] http://lists.goanet.org/listinfo.cgi/goanet-goanet.org
