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I’m pretty sure the debate on Capital Punishment has come to a close– for multiple reasons– but one of the points I was attempting to make has so vividly been made.
I had made the point that there are times where people know that a certain action warrants the death penalty. And this man has helped to prove this point:
Police want to see him die in prison but under the country’s law the maximum sentence – even for double murder – is 15 years. That can be reduced to ten for good behaviour.
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One letter read: “You must have known when he went on holiday to Thailand that he was messing around with children. Your sick paedophile husband should kill himself.”
Now, on the face of it you could say that the police are arguing for a life sentence. However, there’s no mercy in these words– they want him to die, they just want to torture him first for all that he did to his kids:
Detective Inspector Polzer said: “We want to see this man die in prison. It will take a lot longer than ten years for his victims to recover from what he put them through.
It’s not mercy they’re wanting to show. They want him to hurt, to enact revenge, to drag him through a bit of what he did to his kids. They truly believe that he deserves death for his actions, and yet they want him to live in the agony he showed to his kids.
There’s no way he would suffer the same agony as the children did anyway. It can’t even come close to the physical and emotional horrors they experienced. The police department’s idea of revenge fails on that point.
Christine @ Serenity How?s last blog post..Saturday? More Like Scattered Day
I was thinking the exact same thing, Christine. In my opinion, prison’s primary purpose is not to exact revenge, make the criminal remorseful, or prepare them to re-enter society as law-abiding citizens. Its purpose is protecting the public. Anything after that is a secondary priority. Just get these guys off the streets so they don’t harm anyone else.
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@Christine @ Serenity How?: You’re right. Prison would be much too comfortable compared to what he did to his kids. My wife suggested locking him in a 5×5 cell for the rest of his life.
@AG: If the “debt to society” is so big that these people should never see the light of day again, why fund them in prison giving them television, personal fitness, education, etc. I’m not meaning to be as crass as this sounds, but if a given “wrong” deserves never coming back into society, it would be merciful to let the man die. Prolonging his life in a prison is equivalent to extracting some kind of revenge, even if it’s not equivalent.
Prolonging his life in prison is also cruel to his victims, I believe. I know it sounds harsh, but to allow someone to serve out a life sentence in some way lessens the severity of what he did and I think devalues the lives of those he damaged.
Christine @ Serenity How?s last blog post..The Ways of the Lawn – Part 2