Naturally, the most fun and insights were to be had in the breaks and at lunch. I express my gratitude for the great hospitality and attention these experts afforded an amateur.
In no order.
1) New Jersey prosecutors are at will employees. They cross the boss, they are at a loss.
2) Decriminilization of adult pleasures was common ground. I disagreed, advocating the buyer have a license revoked after getting in trouble from losing control of the pleasure. I may write a more detailed argument latter.
3) As an extreme utilitarian, I advocated all crime become strict liability crime, and that sentencing address the person, less the act. Each conviction stands in for dozens and hundreds of crimes, for which the criminal has virtual immunity.
4) There was an objection to allowing suing prosecutors and judges. The lawyers could support such litigation but only for misconduct, not for negligence. They are too busy. Naturally, all productive members of society are busier than they are and should have their immunities for the same reason, too busy.
5) No one knew that "reasonable" meant, "In accordance with the New Testament." They explained that the reasonable person had to be a fictional character to maintain the objectivity of the standard. If one could think about how a friend with great common sense would have behaved, it becomes a subjective term.
6) Inculpatory ignorance of non-criminal law may serve as a defense outside of a criminal trial. No one knew the case law in a regulatory dispute.
7) We argued the death penalty. Knowledge of the date is cruel. The method is kind, being less and more briefly painful than the deaths of 90% of us. There is a distressing error rate.
Sunday, June 1, 2008
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3 comments:
The error rate with the death penalty is very low.
First, there is no proof of an innocent executed in the US, at least since 1900.
The evidence for truly innocent folks sent to death row shows that about 25 people have been so wrongly convicted, or about 0.3% of those so sentenced since 1900. Of those, they have all been released upon post conviction review.
Can we do better. Probably. But, the death penalty is, very likely, the most accurate of criminal sanctions.
The claims that the actual innocents sentenced to death row is much higher is, quite simply, a fraud, easily seen with a little bit of fact checking.
As any remedy does, the death penalty likely has a dose-response curve. Too little does not work, and too much is toxic. The current obstruction by the lawyer is driven by job generation and lawyer rent seeking. Its benefits and toxicity remain unknown until tested at varying numbers.
The vast majority of dying patients would choose execution as less cruel than their clinical symptoms, agonizing, humiliating, and prolonged over months. Why should a morally reprehensible person get a death that is far kinder than that of 90% of ordinary people?
The sole cruelty of the death penalty is the date. No one has the date of death, even those with a terminal illness. That is a kindness owed to the condemned. In Japan, there is no set date. The condemned learns of the time of execution at the time of execution. That is as most of us will learn of the date of our death. No appellate claim has used this idea. That cruelty can easily be changed by statute.
Most of us are deterred from crime by the idea of the arrest. These criminals, one assumes cannot be deterred.
The main use of the death penalty should be for attrition of ultra-violent, repeat offenders, that have failed to respond to punishment, medications, and the other remedies available.
I would support the count of 1, 2, 3 convictions for violent offenses, you're dead. Some murderers I would send home. Intoxication would not be allowed as an excuse. It should be an aggravating factor, since it would show the likelihood of loss of control from drinking.
I estimate that 10,000 executions would markedly drop all crime by attrition of the ultraviolent birth cohort, both male and female.
Lastly, money is life. Every penny of value in the economy came from the labor of a person. Let's assume the value of human life in the market is $6 million. I would count 1, 2, 3, for money or destruction of property crimes exceeding that amount in damage. Take out $18 million, you're dead.
The death penalty should not be thought of as a punishment. It should be thought of as an expulsion.
I made an error: I wrote:
The evidence for truly innocent folks sent to death row shows that about 25 people have been so wrongly convicted, or about 0.3% of those so sentenced since 1900.
Correction: Should be since 1973, not 1900.
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