h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Should john Gibson be executed?..... Ohhhh... tough one...

The UK priosn system is suffering from a series of ill considered political policies. The change in the way the mentally ill are cared for, an inablity to address the drugs problems, changes to and under funding of the probation service. All these have left us with the highest ratio of prisoners per head of population in Europe.

Prison overcrowding has put the parole system under stress with the resulting horrendous re-offending rates including murder and rape.

Prisons cost money to build and run and are another example of poor public sector peformance.

But the biggest crime must be the number of illiterate prisoners. A national disgrace.

<> (GD)

Other crimes? Um . . . what? The guy was filmed violating a baby! This proves his guilt without any doubt. No, he should not have 'additional punishment' for filming the incident. He should simply be locked away for the rest of his sorry life.

My gut feeling is - cut off his goolies (and possibly make him eat them) and then subject him to old-style execution, like where he is put on a slab in the main square and he is tortured to death with blood-thirsty hordes of the populace applauding. THAT is how strongly I feel about someone who could ever do such a thing to an innocent child. I'd want to see him DEAD DEAD DEAD, but not before he suffered a really whole lot! Piece of less than worthless scum.

But that is my gut reaction. Instead I would reasonably want and expect someone like this to be locked away for the rest of their lives.

az

Oh well, a difference of opinion, obviously.

As the guy seems to be an American, you might get your wish about him never seeing the light of day again. That country seems to be more punitive in its sentencing than any other western nation. He certainly wouldn't get a full life tarriff in the UK, even if they did throw the book at him.

I'm not sure about the chopping off of things (what good would it do?), but I think I'm with Az on this. Why would you let him back into society and take the chance of him reoffending?

Chopping things off makes SURE they never do it again.

If I could be persuaded that killers and perverts could be changed I might be in favour re-habilitation. Alas the evidence shows that they regularly re-offend, in fact if even one re-offends, then its not worth the risk.

There are evil, worthless people in this world. Why should I pay to keep them ?

And in this case I say lock him up, naked, in stocks, in a maximum security jail, so he can know what it feels like.

Then kill him.

I rarely get accused being a wishy-washy liberal.

Yep, I would kill those 3 b***teds who did that to that baby girl a few months ago.
Harsh, who cares, at least no other babies would be at risk.
No such thing as a prison you can't escape from......if staff can get in, prisoners can get out.
Cure my ar*e, you can't stop normal sexual desire in an adult so you can't stop weirdness. We had all that "Leave me alone, I have served my punishment" from a certain ex pop star recently, he then toured the world doing the same thing.

"As the guy seems to be an American, you might get your wish about him never seeing the light of day again. That country seems to be more punitive in its sentencing than any other western nation. He certainly wouldn't get a full life tarriff in the UK, even if they did throw the book at him."

Unfortunately, sexual crimes are not usually given the sort of sentencing in the US (adn in Canada) whcih they deserve. For example, where the crime is committed without a weapon, it is not considered as seriously as if the assailant used a gun. Even when the victim had a reasonable belief that they assailant carried a weapon or was in real control which might have caused the victim to believe that they would be killed if they did not comply.

The number of cases where offenders have repeatedly been charged and convicted of acts against children, the court's hands are tired as to the length of sentence that can be given. There have been any number of cases where horrifying crimes against childrn have been committed and the offender is free after a short time to go out and reoffend... often escalating his activities to murder. There have been a number of high-profile cases in the US and in Canada, where offenders have raped and murdered children and it comes to light that this person has a string of child-rapes under their belt.

Where the problem lies is in differentiating between the "sex offender" who has committed statutory rape as a juvenile because he was in a relationship which it was determined was illegal... a one-time offense, and the offender who has a long history of rape, sexual abuse, and other crimes.

Unfortunately, many court systems do not make such a differentiation and treat both the same, giving what amounts to an overly-long sentence to the former and a slap on the wrist to the latter.

Canada now has the rather unweildy "Dangerous Offender Status" which identifies offenders who, while they many have completed a sentence for their crimes are deemed too dangerous to be released on the streets.

Rather than actually change the sentencing laws, which has long been promised in Canada, the Crown must petition the courts for Dangerous Offender Status.

I don't know how many offenders have been labelled this, but it is a contentious issue which challenges the precepts that once you have done your time, you are free to go. This becomes a human rights issue. Far easier to make sentencing more severe.

Recently, in Canada, they did away with the "9-months house-arrest" sentence for offenders against children in favor of a minimum jail-time. Cold comfort for us as it was too late for the man who molested my grand-niece. It was not set retroactively and this man was free after 9-months without any strictures placed on his activities, despite the fact that for three years he had been molesting her.

Dangerous Offenders:
"Profile of dangerous offenders
According to the Criminal Code of Canada, an individual must have been convicted of a "serious personal injury offence" before an application for dangerous offender status can be made. This designation may result from a single act of brutality or from a number of offences and will result in an indeterminate sentence.

Individuals who have received dangerous offender designations will not be released by the National Parole Board until they are deemed not to pose any undue risk to the community. The cases are reviewed by the NPB seven years after designation and every two years thereafter to determine if the offender can be safely reintegrated into the community.

As of June 15, 2003, there were 334 dangerous offenders serving indeterminate sentences under federal jurisdiction. Of these, 321 are incarcerated, 12 are being supervised in the community and one has been deported. Dangerous offenders incarcerated in federal institutions represent slightly more than 2% of the total federal inmate population. Currently all of the dangerous offenders are male.

Special measures to deal with dangerous offenders
Programs have recently been developed for dangerous offenders. These programs offer sexual deviancy treatment and high-intensity violence prevention programs. Mental health treatment is also available and educational programs are provided to those who lack literacy skills.

CSC is also developing motivation enhancement programs to encourage greater participation of dangerous offenders in programming and treatment." Corrections Canada: http://www.csc-scc.gc.ca/text/pblct/guideorateur/sec6_e.shtml

"The dangerous offenders legislation has been in operation in Canada since 1977. The consent of the Attorney General of the province in which the offender is tried is required to hear an application for dangerous offender status. On December 17, 1992, there were approximately 111 dangerous offenders currently under federal jurisdiction that comprised less than .5% of the total federal offender population. At that time there were four dangerous offenders on conditional release. Interestingly, from 1985 to 1992, the number of annual releases of dangerous offenders has remained constant at about one per year." Office of the Commissioner for Federal Judicial Affairs: http://reports.fja.gc.ca/fc/1995/pub/v2/1995fca0174.html

Unfortunately, only available in a cached form: http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:Wyzgm8vm8RYJ:cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Law/2004/12/02/758653-cp.html+%22dangerous+offender+status%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=8&lr=lang_en

"OTTAWA (CP) - The Supreme Court of Canada has rejected a convicted serial rapist's bid to overturn his dangerous offender designation.... The dangerous offender status means Howdle could be kept in jail indefinitely."

"the evidence shows that they regularly re-offend, in fact if even one re-offends, then its not worth the risk."
Really. Every single person convicted of murder or child molestation reoffends do they? I think I might just like to trouble you for some of this evidence you find so persuasive.

"There are evil, worthless people in this world. Why should I pay to keep them ?"
And who defines them? Who defines what is evil or worthless?

"And in this case I say lock him up, naked, in stocks, in a maximum security jail, so he can know what it feels like."
And I say lock him up out of harms way and then do everything you can to find out what makes him tick.

"at least no other babies would be at risk. "
Except that if you take the trouble to find out why they did what they did you might be able to prevent others in the future.
You kill them you won't find this out.
If you don;t find this out then others will be abused in the future.
You could have prevented that but you took the easy option. So who's fault is it if they are abused? The abuser? Or the person/society who could have prevented it?

"Cure my ar*e, you can't stop normal sexual desire in an adult"
yes you can.
"so you can't stop weirdness."
Not if you don't understand it you can't.

"We had all that "Leave me alone, I have served my punishment" from a certain ex pop star recently, he then toured the world doing the same thing."
And he is typical of all child abusers is he? Totally the same as every other child abuser?

Come on, think about this. Do you want to stop kids being abused or do you just want revenge?

<>

Can't we have both?


az

<<"Chopping things off makes SURE they never do it again".>>

Why do you think that? Sure, it means there are certain specific things they can't do again, but beyond that its just going to twist them up more.

<<"There are evil, worthless people in this world. Why should I pay to keep them?">>

Leaving aside the argument from room for doubt of guilt (because there doesn't seem to be any in this case), if you're sentencing someone to death then there's going to be a lengthy appeals process, during which they'll be locked up in a special high-security facility. I think its a fair bet this would get expensive very quickly. Have you seen how plush and expensive our courts are? Certainly there are sites based in the US claiming that the death penalty there actually costs more than life (actual, not the cut down parole version) imprisonment, although then again they would say that wouldn't they. I'm unconvinced of that, but don't think capital punishment is likely to be a major saving.

Actually I'd be in favour of forcing criminals to do some sort of work, which is not a very wishy washy liberal statement either. Only if its practical though, not if its going to cost more to organise than the benefits. Obviously for criminals who aren't dangerous community service seems to work well.

Meanwhile, on prison escapes, I can't find any hard numbers, but would have thought that the proportion would be fairly negligable.

As this is a crime that usually has little actually to do with sex (although it is often manifested as sexual abuse) but is a "power crime", "chopping things off" does nothing to curb the motivation for the crimes. It has been shown in cases where drugs are given to eliminate sexual drive and the offender merely chooses another method of infilicting pain and humiliation on their victims.

Besides, removal of the penis does absolutely nothing to remove sex-drive.

All that would happen would be to increase the anger and hatered of the offender so they would be more likely to offend in more and more serious ways.

What about removing the clangers? That should eliminate the sex drive, right?

Not that I think that should be done either, as it wouldn't solve the power problem. I just assumed that whenever anyone suggest removing stuff, the clangers are included.

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post 23

goolies = clangers


az

well, you learn something new everyday.

As I said, these crimes actually have little to do with sex and everything to do with violence, domination, and hatred.

Experts agree that chopping bits off, whatever the bits and their function, has no effect on the reason for the crime, just the method of perpetrating it.

I forgot to mention that, even without the "clangers" as you so picturequely identified them () steroids and hormones are readily available... short of removing the pituitary gland and locking the person in a small dark room for the rest of their naturals.... this would not be a solution, either.

Exactly, I agree with 2legs, Ictoan and Sigsfried - *no death penalty*! Nothing justifies execution.

<>

He's already been in prison far longer than he would have been in New Zealand... I suspect, that like John Hinckley, he'll never get out. His parole bids always fail.