China Says Serious Polluters Will Get the Death Penalty

formaggio writes "According to the Xinhua News Agency, the Chinese government is now allowing courts to punish those who commit environment crimes with the death penalty. The new judicial interpretation comes in the wake of several serious environmental problems that have hit the country over the last few months, including dangerous levels of air pollution, a river full of dead pigs, and other development projects that have imperiled public health."

Comments

Good? More like "Good Luck"

[Penguinisto]

I seriously doubt it will be implemented against any company or person that is sufficiently connected to the PRC government - this list would include pretty much every existing big company HQ'd in China.

Now potential competitors to the aforementioned companies, and anyone who the PRC government doesn't like? Oh hell yes it'll be implemented - even if the offender has to get a little governmental 'assistance' in generating pollution sufficient to warrant execution.

Re:Good? More like "Good Luck"

[femtobyte]

Excessively harsh penalties tend to be counter-productive because they are almost never carried out

Tell that to the people China executed over industrial-scale adulteration of milk with melamine in 2008:

A number of criminal prosecutions occurred, with two people being executed, another given a suspended death penalty, three others receiving life imprisonment, two receiving 15-year jail terms,[6] and seven local government officials, as well as the Director of the Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) being fired or forced to resign.

(from Wikipedia)

Just because the government of our Megacorporate States of America would never dream about enforcing substantial penalties against our industrialist overlords for mass-murdering in the name of profit, doesn't mean China won't.