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View Full Version : Nathan Deal just murdered Troy Davis




cindy25
09-21-2011, 10:14 PM
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_GEORGIA_EXECUTION?SITE=7219&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-09-21-21-36-49

Nate-ForLiberty
09-21-2011, 10:35 PM
racially motivated execution. no doubt.

kojirodensetsu
09-21-2011, 10:38 PM
I hope this issue comes up tomorrow and Ron Paul gets to talk about it, even if it's in the form of a gotcha question.

sailingaway
09-21-2011, 10:39 PM
Guys, I left one thread on this in here, but it doesn't go in this section. I'm moving it to general politics.

wannaberocker
09-21-2011, 10:43 PM
Well if he didnt do it then hes prob in a better place now. But if he did do it, then he will prob have to answer to a higher authority.

BarryDonegan
09-21-2011, 11:00 PM
I agree with the sentiment that the state killed a man when there was obvious doubt as to his guilt, but I think it is important to raise this distinction: I was under the impression that in Georgia the Governor has absolutely no authority to stay an execution, so laying the blame on the governor rather than the entire Georgia death penalty system might be technically unfair.

Sad stuff, though, I feel you.

Rothbardian Girl
09-21-2011, 11:32 PM
Technically Nathan Deal didn't do it. In Georgia, the governor has no power to grant clemency... everything is done by some sort of parole board court. It's a shame this happened.

...oops, and as I was typing this, I noticed that Barry has said the exact same thing as I am now saying. Well, I'll back him up then. :)

jacmicwag
09-21-2011, 11:43 PM
The one and only issue I agree with Rick Perry on. The death sentence is ok by me with the appropriate appeals process. I trust my fellow citizens on this one.

Bordillo
09-22-2011, 12:36 AM
the article said obama couldn't intervene, doesn't a presidential pardon override everything?

Rael
09-22-2011, 12:37 AM
I trust my fellow citizens on this one.
LOL. Because people always make the right decisions, especially when they are overwhelmingly made up of the unemployed and other people too dumb to get out of jury duty.

Rael
09-22-2011, 12:37 AM
the article said obama couldn't intervene, doesn't a presidential pardon override everything?

This was a state prosecution.The president can only pardon for federal crimes.

Bordillo
09-22-2011, 12:40 AM
The one and only issue I agree with Rick Perry on. The death sentence is ok by me with the appropriate appeals process. I trust my fellow citizens on this one.

yea I bet that jury in 1989 Georgia was really smart and rational

Rael
09-22-2011, 12:44 AM
racially motivated execution. no doubt.

Umm, I don't support the death penalty, but the jury had 7 blacks on it, so I hardly think this was because of his race.

loveshiscountry
09-22-2011, 01:39 AM
The one and only issue I agree with Rick Perry on. The death sentence is ok by me with the appropriate appeals process. I trust my fellow citizens on this one.

Trust doesn't play a part in it. His life is his own to take, no one else should take it unless they are exercising self defense. Same with that piece of trash Brewer who just went under.

BarryDonegan
09-22-2011, 01:41 AM
Umm, I don't support the death penalty, but the jury had 7 blacks on it, so I hardly think this was because of his race.

I agree that in this case race wasn't the specific reason, but in the case of Jimmy Dennis, who I like to think of as hopefully the next Troy Davis only with a better outcome, it looks like, pending further review of the facts of the case, that he was convicted exclusively based on strangers looking at a police lineup. He had an alibi but shoddy lawyering kept that from being included as evidence, and the only one witness who claimed to see he had a gun actually was a friend of his who had been caught with drugs and was offered a chance to get out of it for saying he saw the gun. He later recanted under oath.

http://www.jimmydennis.com/

Original_Intent
09-22-2011, 02:08 AM
Trust doesn't play a part in it. His life is his own to take, no one else should take it unless they are exercising self defense. Same with that piece of trash Brewer who just went under.

Society just defended itself. I'll agree with Ron that it is racist, and that the ultimate sanction should not occur in any case where there is doubt of guilt (which obviously it does.) That being said, I do believe there are cases where guilt is conclusive, and death by lethal injection, firing squad or whatever is merciful compared to what is deserved.

kah13176
09-22-2011, 02:14 AM
The one and only issue I agree with Rick Perry on. The death sentence is ok by me with the appropriate appeals process. I trust my fellow citizens on this one.

Perry boasts about how many executions he oversaw. I don't care if you killed Hitler. It's a human life you took, and though the justification is up for debate, it's something that you shouldn't be proud of. Further, the number of people Texas executed is a significant statistical outlier. Ben Franklin said its better to let 100 guilty people go than to kill 1 innocent person. Don't you think just ONE of those executed could've been innocent? It's not like every court actually takes reasonable doubt seriously.

kuckfeynes
09-22-2011, 03:04 AM
I will never understand how murdering only murderers somehow makes it not still murder.

John F Kennedy III
09-22-2011, 03:51 AM
Nathan Deal couldn't do anything about it. Also is there a discussion of the evidence in this case? I caught some of the news today but I don't know much about it. From what I do know it seems like they executed a man when there were very serious doubts about his guilt. I only support the death penalty when it is beyond a shadow of a doubt that the person is guilty.

Graeme
09-22-2011, 06:31 AM
A couple of thoughts on this.

First, Yeah, as others said, Nathan Deal couldn't have done a thing. The legislature in GA has taken that power from the governor and handed it to a parole / pardons board.

Second, Tory Davis didn't shoot one man that night, he shot two. The evidence of the actual rounds were inconclusive, but the shell casings at both scenes matched. The first guy was shot in the face. The second, Mark MacPhail, was shot in the head and heart as Troy stood over him.

Third, there were 9 eyewitnesses, and yes, 7 of them did recant. But, they only recently recanted, they refused to be cross examined by any prosecutor, and they only seemed to recant when death penalty abolitionists contacted them and put pressure on them to "do the right thing."

All that aside, the state should not have the right to kill someone, even if they don't like him. Troy Davis was of no further risk in prison. For those that say he's in a better place, well, that may be true, but it may also be false. We don't know what lies after death, nobody has ever come back from an execution.

fisharmor
09-22-2011, 07:02 AM
If the cops had simply gunned him down in the street, nobody would have had anything to say about it.
Since that seems to be where official procedure is heading, perhaps they're smarter than we give them credit for.

phill4paul
09-22-2011, 07:19 AM
I use to be a defender of the death penalty. However, as time goes by and I examine it I no longer can support it. There has been too many cases where innocent men have languished in jail for 20+ years only to be cleared of all charges. I, at this point, do not believe that the State should have powers not held by individuals. As far as the argument that citizens should not have to pay for the 'upkeep' of those convicted I believe the cost to be minimal in erring on the side of future justice.


“Capital punishment is the most premeditated of murders, to which no criminal’s deed, however calculated can be compared. For there to be an equivalency,
the death penalty would have to punish a criminal who had warned his victim of the date at which he would inflict a horrible death on him, and who, from that
moment onward, had confined him at his mercy for months. Such a monster is not encountered in private life.”

— Albert Camus

Cowlesy
09-22-2011, 07:33 AM
A couple of thoughts on this.

First, Yeah, as others said, Nathan Deal couldn't have done a thing. The legislature in GA has taken that power from the governor and handed it to a parole / pardons board.

Second, Tory Davis didn't shoot one man that night, he shot two. The evidence of the actual rounds were inconclusive, but the shell casings at both scenes matched. The first guy was shot in the face. The second, Mark MacPhail, was shot in the head and heart as Troy stood over him.

Third, there were 9 eyewitnesses, and yes, 7 of them did recant. But, they only recently recanted, they refused to be cross examined by any prosecutor, and they only seemed to recant when death penalty abolitionists contacted them and put pressure on them to "do the right thing."

All that aside, the state should not have the right to kill someone, even if they don't like him. Troy Davis was of no further risk in prison. For those that say he's in a better place, well, that may be true, but it may also be false. We don't know what lies after death, nobody has ever come back from an execution.

That was after MacPhail was coming to the aid of a homeless man being pistol-whipped by Troy Davis after he refused to give Davis a beer.

I love how 9 people go "Yep definitely him" but then after the abolitionists/naacp/rev. al make their collective case that this is really about counterpunching a corrupt system, do 7 of them recant.

I also don't think he should have been executed, but that's because I think rotting away in prison for another 60 years is far worse a sentence than just getting it over with.

wannaberocker
09-22-2011, 08:40 AM
That was after MacPhail was coming to the aid of a homeless man being pistol-whipped by Troy Davis after he refused to give Davis a beer.

I love how 9 people go "Yep definitely him" but then after the abolitionists/naacp/rev. al make their collective case that this is really about counterpunching a corrupt system, do 7 of them recant.

I also don't think he should have been executed, but that's because I think rotting away in prison for another 60 years is far worse a sentence than just getting it over with.

Rep +.

But id disagree on the idea that i want tax payer money going to have this guy in prison for life. As painful and costly as the 20 year long appeals process is, its still better than having to pay for him for 40 or 50 more years.

wannaberocker
09-22-2011, 08:43 AM
yea I bet that jury in 1989 Georgia was really smart and rational

Thats like saying "yeah i bet 1700's founding fathers were real smart and rational". Time and geography has no hold on intelligence or rationality.

goldencane
09-22-2011, 09:12 AM
Rep +.

But id disagree on the idea that i want tax payer money going to have this guy in prison for life. As painful and costly as the 20 year long appeals process is, its still better than having to pay for him for 40 or 50 more years.

Just FYI, the death penalty ends up being way more expensive than keeping a person alive for life. You can do an internet search and find plenty of studies on the subject.

wannaberocker
09-22-2011, 09:26 AM
Just FYI, the death penalty ends up being way more expensive than keeping a person alive for life. You can do an internet search and find plenty of studies on the subject.

You mean because of the number of appeals and all?

brandon
09-22-2011, 09:45 AM
I will never understand how murdering only murderers somehow makes it not still murder.

There's an important distinction to be made between killing and murder. Killing is just that: intentionally ending someone elses life. Murder is a legal term, that encompasses just a subset of killings, as defined by the state.

The state is fine with killing. It's problem is with murder.

Graeme
09-22-2011, 09:46 AM
State says it's okay to kill this guy: It's not murder. State doesn't say it's okay: It's murder. IN short, the state chooses who its enemies are, and can authorize anyone to kill them.

dbill27
09-22-2011, 11:17 AM
Governments shouldn't have the power to kill for many reasons. That being said, this saddened me for way different reasons. This guy was obviously guilty, he murdered innocent lives. It was a slow news cycle and cnn needed a story so now everyone thinks this guy was innocent and feels sorry for him. I feel horrible for the families of the murdered for having to watch this bs on television. If you want to have a death penalty debate then fine, but don't paint a monster in a pretty light.

Graeme
09-22-2011, 11:30 AM
Governments shouldn't have the power to kill for many reasons. That being said, this saddened me for way different reasons. This guy was obviously guilty, he murdered innocent lives. It was a slow news cycle and cnn needed a story so now everyone thinks this guy was innocent and feels sorry for him. I feel horrible for the families of the murdered for having to watch this bs on television. If you want to have a death penalty debate then fine, but don't paint a monster in a pretty light.

That's my case here. There are better, more innocent people that can be used to show the death penalty is racist, horrible, and wrong. It doesn't make it right used in this case or the James Byrd murder case yesterday... but people are far less sympathetic to killers being killed in their name than they are to completely innocent people being killed in their name.

Voluntary Man
09-22-2011, 11:40 AM
DEATH BY GOVERNMENT . By R.J . Rummel

read it, and if you still favor capital punishment, we'll talk.

in theory, i have no problem with the death penalty. in practice, it is administered by the wrong entity. granting the state the power to execute its own citizens places us all in grave danger.

to my thinking, let a jury sentence a man to death; then, if no member of the victim/s's family is willing to execute the sentence, commute the sentence to life without parole, until a family member steps forward. until then, it is just too dangerous for our govt to employ professional hangmen.

read the book.

Graeme
09-22-2011, 11:56 AM
The victim's family in this case was all too willing to throw the switch, push the button, pull the trigger, light the fuse, etc.

Voluntary Man
09-22-2011, 12:00 PM
The victim's family in this case was all too willing to throw the switch, push the button, pull the trigger, light the fuse, etc.

good enough for me. as long as our creepy uncle doesn't get to do it.