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Oklahoma Botched an Execution With Untested Lethal Injection Drugs
Daniel_Stuckey (2647775) writes "The state of Oklahoma had scheduled two executions for Tuesday, April 29th. This in spite of myriad objections that the drugs being used for both lethal injections had not been tested, and thus could violate the constitutional right to the courts, as well as the 8th Amendment: protection from cruel and unusual punishment. After much legal and political wrangling, the state proceeded with the executions anyway. It soon became clear that the critics' worst case scenarios were coming true — Oklahoma violently botched the first execution. The inmate "blew" a vein and had a heart attack. The state quickly postponed the second one. 'After weeks of Oklahoma refusing to disclose basic information about the drugs for tonight's lethal injection procedures, tonight, Clayton Lockett was tortured to death,' Madeline Cohen, the attorney of Charles Warner, the second man scheduled for execution, said in a statement. Katie Fretland at The Guardian reported from the scene of the botched attempt to execute Lockett using the untested, unvetted, and therefore potentially unconstitutional lethal injection drugs."
sciencehabit also points out a study indicating that around 4% of death row inmates in the U.S. are likely innocent.
I find it hard to believe that no one has looked into execution using Nitrogen. Something akin to an old style dive helmet with a hose near the top to feed in gas. When the time comes, switch the flow over from air to pure nitrogen. Simple, cheap, painless and there is a limitless supply of Nitrogen.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inert_gas_asphyxiation
While funny, it distracts from several serious problems in the US.
First, why does the US still allow a death penalty? Surely there are some people with mental disorders that can not maintain a life with the rest of society, but this is what Prisons and mental health institutes are supposed to be for. We tend to argue how much a prisoner costs society, but rarely discuss the morality of executing people.
Next, and relates to the first is that the Prison systems in the US have become a for profit business. The privatization of prisons has caused countless issues. Such as contracts requiring a specific capacity at all times in prisons and the exploitation of prisoners. Laws have been passed to help keep prisons at capacity and nearly everyone in the US can commit several felonies every day without their knowledge. This means that we have people in prison that should probably not be there, and we lack the capacity to keep the really socially defunct people in jail.
We could discuss other issues, such as how rehabilitation in the US really does not exist and society lacks opportunity for people motivating people to illegal activities but can save that for later. We should address why the US has the highest percentage of people in prison in the world, and why we still have executions first.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
It's more complex than that.
You face many concerns considering legal punishment: deterrent effect, risk of harm to innocents, and direct impact of punishment, to name three. These depend largely on the crime, the punishment, and the surrounding culture.
The deterrent effect, for example, has two major factors: perceived severity of the punishment and perceived threat of punishment. A weak punishment, colloquially a "slap on the wrist", carries little deterrent effect; a strong punishment carries high deterrent effect. A punishment lacks threat if it is unlikely to actually occur.
The strength of punishment comes from perception: jail time, pain, execution, fines, and how much the individual fear these personally. Some individuals do not fear prison; others fear it a lot. The poor fear fines more than the rich. Death almost universally incites terror. Pain is unpleasant, but imprisonment may destabilize personal security and provide greater fear.
Punishment carries threat when it is likely. The death penalty is a great example: in drug-riddled ghettos where criminal activity meets its abrupt end 99% by death and 1% by state execution, state execution carries no threat. In peaceful but armed suburbs, attacking someone may get you shot. Either way, someone will probably shoot you in the face before the state gets to you; if the police do catch you, they may simply provide a noose to save you from a bullet. In peaceful suburbs with low justifiable homicide rates, state action is the dominating outcome to murder; execution becomes a looming, subconscious threat.
Putting these together: the death penalty is a deterrent only where death is feared and state execution is a likely consequence of capital crime. In places where the criminal base is used to and does not fear death at a distance, state execution is a laughable thing; the first thing to consider is how to not get killed committing your crimes.
Once it's determined the deterrent effect, you have to consider other consequences. Fines and jail time can destroy lives. Executions kill people. If 4% of the executed are innocent, but executions provide such a deterrent effect as to stave off a hundred murders for each innocent executed, then that is unfortunate. If 4% of the executed are innocent, and executions provide no deterrent, then that is unacceptable.
And of course there are other considerations. I mentioned direct impact of punishment. You will want a punishment which rehabilitates criminals if repeat offense represents a larger proportion of the crime than the additional general deterrent from the next best method. Putting together further conditions, you can increase the severity of punishment as the risk of punishing innocents decreases (it's null if the punishments to innocents is dismissed on appeal 100% of the time before the time is served--increase punishment as much as you like). It gets extremely complex.
Justice is like sex: it feels good, but that doesn't make it wrong. Executing a man who stalks, rapes, and murders a woman feels immensely liberating to some; it is anxiolytic to a society who can distance themselves from the act of killing yet feel that they have participated in punishment. At the same time, such a man has earned his punishment. We may look down on people for enjoying vengeance, but we should not thus assume punishment is wrong.
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"It is no use saying, 'We are doing our best.' You have got to succeed in doing what is necessary." Winston S. Churchill.
Execution is a deterrent in many places; in others it is not. Various punishments have various effects, influenced by the culture around them. If we forgo execution to save an innocent man, but condemn two more to die, we have failed; it is necessary to accept our flaws and do what is necessary to save lives. If losing one man by our own action is unacceptable, losing two more by our inaction is not a solution; we must necessarily learn better to identify the innocent.
Support my political activism on Patreon.