It seems to me that such laws punish people for associating with certain individuals who go on to commit crimes, requiring everyone to essentially be psychic or predict others' actions correctly 100% of the time to stay on the right side of the law. Either that or avoid associating with anyone.
It's insane--and certainly unjust--that a law that makes such impossible and ridiculous demands of people is considered just.
The facts of the topical case aren't that ludicrous. The link goes into enough detail where it's clear he was complicit in the murder, even if not present for the physical shooting.
Setting aside the death penalty aspect, this case is not about association - it's about explicit participation in a felony that resulted in the death of an innocent victim.
Doesn't require a psychic to determine that committing a robbery with someone whom you know to own and carry a firearm could result in a death.
From the article, the "explicit participation" isn't all that clear, and not required to be proven by the prosecution? (but it's not purely association either)
> with someone whom you know to own and carry a firearm could result in a death
In modern Texas with its 'carry' laws, this could be anyone.
Besides, given the gun lobby rhetoric, 'guns don't kill people', so a death is 'just as likely' with a knife or any other tool to hand - even stuff already in the shop. After all, if someone is intent on killing you, 'they're going to do it whether or not they have a gun'.
If you are a judge and you are in "bad" company all day, does that make you by the spirit of this law make you complicit in future crimes if you release them out into the world?
>Legal experts say his case is rare, even in Texas, the execution capital of America — and a state that allows capital punishment for people who did not kill anyone or did not intend to kill.
Forty six US states have Felony Murder statutes. I don't think this is all that rare for states with capital punishment. According to the wiki "...the death penalty may be imposed if the defendant is a major participant in the underlying felony and 'exhibits extreme indifference to human life'."
Correct! I'm not sure why Texas is being singled out here. California has this statue as well.
If you participate in the commission of a felony crime and someone dies, then you are guilty of felony murder. They have something similar in the EU (e.g. Germany has "with deadly outcomes") where you receive an extended sentence even if you never intended for that person to die.
On the other hand, there are more than 750 people on death row in California. It's not that we don't sentence them to death; it's just that we've created a system where we can't carry out the execution before they die of natural causes.
IMO, the real apparent injustice in this case is the prosecutor's use of a forensic psychiatrist who apparently has a cottage industry in testifying against defendants:
> Wood was committed to a mental health hospital after he was found incompetent. A neuropsychologist had testified that Wood was delusional, unable to grasp the issues about his case and the reality facing him...
> The writ of habeas corpus, filed in July, spotlights something else the jury did not know: the troubled history of a forensic psychiatrist whose testimony resulted in Wood’s death sentence.
> James Grigson was no stranger to capital murder cases: By the time Wood went on trial, in 1998, Grigson said he had testified in 163 such cases. Prosecutors often sought his testimony to secure the ultimate punishment for defendants. Often, they were successful, earning Grigson a nickname: “Dr. Death.”
> In 1995, three years before Wood’s trial, Grigson was expelled from the American Psychiatric Association and its Texas branch at that time, the Texas Society of Psychiatric Physicians, for predicting a defendant’s potential threat to society based solely on a hypothetical. The expulsions followed an investigation by the Texas association’s ethics committee, which cited Grigson’s “willfully narrow rendition of psychiatric knowledge.”
Obviously I don't know all the details of the case but I find it troublesome that a psychiatrist would render an opinion without examining the individual who is the object of the opinion. On its face this is unethical particularly in a situation where there's so much at stake.
I'm aware that "assessment at a distance" is frequently sought, for example, reviewing clinical info in the medical record to determine if services were consistent with billing for reimbursement. This is often a question arising with Medicare and other 3rd party payers. However that's not unethical since it's quite different from providing a diagnosis or determining the qualities of a person's functioning without examining the individual.
I have no idea if the doctor's conduct had come before the state licensing board, but it appears there would be substantial reason to consider that conduct "unprofessional" given the actions of the professional societies declaring the behavior as unethical. Normally such disciplinary action carries consider weight with licensing bodies. Most likely this avenue of doing something to keep the situation from recurring has already been explored, it would be a shame if it was overlooked.
It's troubling that his input is still considered sufficient to render a judgement. That one person was of poor moral character and has been appropriately expelled from his profession by his more reputable peers is just, proper, and generally how things are supposed to work. (My use of "supposed to work" no way implies belief in a world where "supposed to work" is equals "is how it actually works")
It astounds me that Americans think themselves to be the pinnacle of civilisation, when they still gleefully enact the death penalty. It disgusts me that this vile, barbarous country has so much power in the world.
I'm a native Texan, which I point out solely to rebut the assertion that all--or even many--Texans are in favor of the death penalty, and I very much oppose the death penalty for reasons exactly such as this. Maybe this man committed a crime; it sure seems like he did. But maybe he didn't. Or maybe he didn't in the way that the state, or the psychiatrist, or the eyewitnesses claim he did.
That's the problem with the death penalty: There are vanishingly few situations where we can be 100%, absolutely clear on whether a person did something that warrants permanently removing that person from existence.
We are a nation of laws and we are also a nation of fallible human beings. If we could be completely certain, then perhaps I would be OK with the permanence of death. But we can't, so we shouldn't be killing criminals in the name of the people or the state. Because what happens if we are wrong? What happens if we are wrong 138 times[0]?
Why have we forgotten that "[i]t is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer?"
> There are vanishingly few situations where we can be 100%, absolutely clear on whether a person did something that warrants permanently removing that person from existence.
So would you say that the vast majority of murder convictions leave at least a little room for doubt?
Yes. "Beyond all reasonable doubt" is fine for throwing someone in jail and putting the key all but permanently out of reach. But I think that, as a society, we must retain the ability to say "oh shit we fucked up very much here is the door we are very sorry please take this huge sack of cash along with our sincere apologies" if or when we discover that our legal system made a massive error.
In this day and age, were an exoneration to happen, I would also mandate that the state put up billboards in the person's home town and where the crime allegedly took place and run Internet ads and do lots of press interviews to get it out as widely as possible that someone has been exonerated.
> "Beyond all reasonable doubt" is fine for throwing someone in jail and putting the key all but permanently out of reach. But I think that, as a society, we must retain the ability to say "oh shit we fucked up very much here is the door we are very sorry please take this huge sack of cash along with our sincere apologies" if or when we discover that our legal system made a massive error.
You'll still never return lost years and decades of someone's life any more than you could return life to a dead man. You can't restore the fractured relationships, undo the pain of imprisonment.
Honestly, I think a quick death (not the insane decades-of-imprisonment-followed-by-ritualistic-execution we have now) is far more humane than life in prison.
> Honestly, I think a quick death (not the insane decades-of-imprisonment-followed-by-ritualistic-execution we have now) is far more humane than life in prison.
I think many would agree, that both systems are broken. The fix for the first is easier: Just stop it.
Then stop treating prisoners so poorly. What I read of US prisons sounds inhumane, so your last sentence comes across to me as comparing two different NaNs.
> You'll still never return lost years and decades of someone's life any more than you could return life to a dead man. You can't restore the fractured relationships, undo the pain of imprisonment.
No, but you also can't make a completely perfect criminal justice system. It is infinitely more possible to free a person from prison, pay that person many millions of dollars (or do other things to make the remainder of that person's life very easy), and otherwise let that person go back to having some kind of life...than it is to raise the dead.
> Honestly, I think a quick death (not the insane decades-of-imprisonment-followed-by-ritualistic-execution we have now) is far more humane than life in prison.
Perhaps it is for the actually-guilty. But for the actually-innocent, I do not agree because they will always have the hope and possibility of someday being freed again.
>I'm a native Texan, which I point out solely to rebut the assertion that all--or even many--Texans are in favor of the death penalty
When it comes to an action as permanent as killing a person, disapproval without preventative action (i.e., abolition) is tacit approval. So long as Texas keeps executing people, I don't see what difference it makes how many Texans are in favor of it.
>What would you like techsupporter to do? Drive down to the prisons and personally tear down the bars?
The perceived inability of one does not excuse the lack of action by the many, especially if the techsupporter's assertion is true -- that not many Texans support the death penalty.
I suspect that, given California couldn't even replace it with life imprisonment (it failed 52-48 with Prop 34 in 2012), the considerably more conservative state of Texas has at least a simple majority support for the death penalty.
>"So long as Texas keeps executing people, I don't see what difference it makes how many [Americans] are in favor of it."
Honest question: how many people are actively protesting against the death penalty in Texas? A cursory search shows one annual march and protests on the day of executions, with turnouts in the low tens.
From the outside looking in, it seems that most Texans who oppose the death penalty are either indifferent or resigned to the issue. I'd love to be proven wrong, but I find very little evidence of a credible abolition movement. Without sustained political pressure, disapproval counts for very little.
For the record I am STRONGLY opposed to the death penalty (for moral/religious reasons).
That said, I wonder if you live in the same Texas I visit each year. The vast majority of Texans support the death penalty.
A University of Texas (Austin) poll last year showed 49% of Texans support the death penalty. 26% somewhat support. That's almost 20 million Texans. While just 19% are opposed (of which just 9% strongly oppose).
1) According to the best available evidence, a sizable majority of Texans favor the death penalty.
2) If you strongly oppose the death penalty, can you provide examples of what you've done to reduce it? You've already noted that you chose to live in a way that provides financial support for the death penalty.. what are you doing to offset that? What organizations do you donate to, or volunteer with? What have you done beyond write a comment on HN? If the answer is 'nothing', then you find the death penalty disagreeable, but you are, on net, supporting it.
As to your first point, I said "many," not most, dislike the death penalty. Even at its most pessimistic, 19% strongly opposed, that's 4 million voters who are opposed. I think that qualifies as many, though perhaps it is a distinction without a difference for you. I might should not have said it.
On your second, I don't know how my personal actions are relevant here, but I will recite them for you because I am on a rebutting-of-presumptions mode today:
- You said I "chose to live in a way" that supports the death penalty. I should point out that though I am native to Texas, I no longer live in Texas. I even reincorporated my small consulting business in another state, away from Texas.
- I have provided volunteer support to the Innocence Project of Texas (I decline to specify when or what kind because I am being anonymous here).
- When I lived in State Senator Jane Nelson's district, I know that I had a reputation among her staff for writing several anti-death penalty letters and being one of the most vociferous. I know this because I became friends with a former staffer of hers and that person told me.
- I have participated in and volunteered for the political campaigns of candidates who are endorsed by the Texas Moratorium Network, a group opposed to the death penalty.
Is that sufficient? Have you packed your bags to move to Texas and vote against proponents of the death penalty yet? My vote is missing, perhaps you can take up the slack for me.
No. You are now lying. You said that 'not many' support it, but a majority do. Go re-read your original post.
I have not read beyond your first paragraph, because you clearly demonstrated that you are EXTREMELY DISHONEST in it, and there is zero value in attempting conversation with a proven liar.
If you choose to live in a place where you voluntarily pay taxes to Boko Haram, and you do not use any time, money, or energy to oppose those policies, then yes.
> There are vanishingly few situations where we can be 100%, absolutely clear on whether a person did something that warrants permanently removing that person from existence.
This is a little strawperson.
If you support the death penalty you also know innocent people will die from the death penalty.
But you support it because you believe overall less people will be removed from existence.
IE it's a deterrent. IE less criminals escape and go on the commit again. IE it costs less so more money goes to save lives in hospitals. [please don't rehash why this are faulty arguments, that's OT to the point I'm making]
This seems like an odd article to be posted here. The author has stopped posting comments and around the same time started just posting links to articles.
Also he isn't posting any comments to any of the articles he is posting....
His twitter feed isn't mentioning anything like this...
I wonder if his account is still under his control?
I am neither Texan nor American, so this is an outsiders perspective:
What I do not get is how the EU can just blatantly ignore this. When one of our politicians travels to an Arab country or to China and does not address the human rights situation clear enough, he or she will be bashed. When Turkey starts talking about reintroducing capital punishment the instant reactions are that this will end the negotiations about EU membership. Capital punishment is a hard line for the EU, if your country has it, it is not considered to value human rights and is out, no further questions asked.
The only people really criticizing the US here (in Germany) are usually haters, who glorify Russia.
It cannot be about the money either, because China is an important partner, too. They have to put up with our obligatory human rights talk every time, while the US has not.
They can't. The EU requires its members not to extradite anyone to the US if there's any possibility that a death sentence might be applied. On the other hand, China has a whole lot more human rights issues than the US.
The US holds itself to higher standards. It tries to get Europe to fight wars together in the name of these standards, so it should be held accountable. China is corrupt to the core, they do not claim anything else and nobody expects anything different.
I am not saying that we can or should do anything about it, just that we have to point these things out if do not want to lose our face.
I think if he's found not guilty he deserves some kind of compensation. You can't just keep somebody in limbo like that, knowing they will "die soon" for years. It is mental torture. What he's going through now is arguably worse than being found guilty. You can't justify that. They're punishing him and his family repeatedly.
I think this is a perfect example of the US completely getting it wrong. If states can't get it right, I think the ability to arbitrarily punish serious crimes should be dissolved to upper government. Why it makes a difference what state you're in is beyond me. I thought it was something they were phasing out of.
I think this is a perfect example of the US completely getting it wrong. If states can't get it right, I think the ability to arbitrarily punish serious crimes should be dissolved to upper government. Why it makes a difference what state you're in is beyond me. I thought it was something they were phasing out of.
Because if it were all handled at a higher level, there is a very good chance these types of policies would be in place for more people. Also, it would take more effort to change them. Concentration of power is not good, didn't you see star wars?
The reason it takes such effort to change things at the top is a problem that needs sorting in it's own right. There's a lot of corruption.
Why do you think these policies would be in place for more? I this rubbish would be gone, weed legalised and it would make it easier to change the political system. In the UK the decentralised part of government is the worst bit.
48 comments
[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 118 ms ] threadIt's insane--and certainly unjust--that a law that makes such impossible and ridiculous demands of people is considered just.
Doesn't require a psychic to determine that committing a robbery with someone whom you know to own and carry a firearm could result in a death.
In modern Texas with its 'carry' laws, this could be anyone.
Besides, given the gun lobby rhetoric, 'guns don't kill people', so a death is 'just as likely' with a knife or any other tool to hand - even stuff already in the shop. After all, if someone is intent on killing you, 'they're going to do it whether or not they have a gun'.
Forty six US states have Felony Murder statutes. I don't think this is all that rare for states with capital punishment. According to the wiki "...the death penalty may be imposed if the defendant is a major participant in the underlying felony and 'exhibits extreme indifference to human life'."
If you participate in the commission of a felony crime and someone dies, then you are guilty of felony murder. They have something similar in the EU (e.g. Germany has "with deadly outcomes") where you receive an extended sentence even if you never intended for that person to die.
> Wood was committed to a mental health hospital after he was found incompetent. A neuropsychologist had testified that Wood was delusional, unable to grasp the issues about his case and the reality facing him...
> The writ of habeas corpus, filed in July, spotlights something else the jury did not know: the troubled history of a forensic psychiatrist whose testimony resulted in Wood’s death sentence.
> James Grigson was no stranger to capital murder cases: By the time Wood went on trial, in 1998, Grigson said he had testified in 163 such cases. Prosecutors often sought his testimony to secure the ultimate punishment for defendants. Often, they were successful, earning Grigson a nickname: “Dr. Death.”
> In 1995, three years before Wood’s trial, Grigson was expelled from the American Psychiatric Association and its Texas branch at that time, the Texas Society of Psychiatric Physicians, for predicting a defendant’s potential threat to society based solely on a hypothetical. The expulsions followed an investigation by the Texas association’s ethics committee, which cited Grigson’s “willfully narrow rendition of psychiatric knowledge.”
I'm aware that "assessment at a distance" is frequently sought, for example, reviewing clinical info in the medical record to determine if services were consistent with billing for reimbursement. This is often a question arising with Medicare and other 3rd party payers. However that's not unethical since it's quite different from providing a diagnosis or determining the qualities of a person's functioning without examining the individual.
I have no idea if the doctor's conduct had come before the state licensing board, but it appears there would be substantial reason to consider that conduct "unprofessional" given the actions of the professional societies declaring the behavior as unethical. Normally such disciplinary action carries consider weight with licensing bodies. Most likely this avenue of doing something to keep the situation from recurring has already been explored, it would be a shame if it was overlooked.
That's the problem with the death penalty: There are vanishingly few situations where we can be 100%, absolutely clear on whether a person did something that warrants permanently removing that person from existence.
We are a nation of laws and we are also a nation of fallible human beings. If we could be completely certain, then perhaps I would be OK with the permanence of death. But we can't, so we shouldn't be killing criminals in the name of the people or the state. Because what happens if we are wrong? What happens if we are wrong 138 times[0]?
Why have we forgotten that "[i]t is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer?"
0 - http://tcadp.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/TXDPFactSheet01-...
So would you say that the vast majority of murder convictions leave at least a little room for doubt?
In this day and age, were an exoneration to happen, I would also mandate that the state put up billboards in the person's home town and where the crime allegedly took place and run Internet ads and do lots of press interviews to get it out as widely as possible that someone has been exonerated.
You'll still never return lost years and decades of someone's life any more than you could return life to a dead man. You can't restore the fractured relationships, undo the pain of imprisonment.
Honestly, I think a quick death (not the insane decades-of-imprisonment-followed-by-ritualistic-execution we have now) is far more humane than life in prison.
I think many would agree, that both systems are broken. The fix for the first is easier: Just stop it.
Also, many countries have banned life imprisonment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_imprisonment#Reform_or_ab... .
No, but you also can't make a completely perfect criminal justice system. It is infinitely more possible to free a person from prison, pay that person many millions of dollars (or do other things to make the remainder of that person's life very easy), and otherwise let that person go back to having some kind of life...than it is to raise the dead.
> Honestly, I think a quick death (not the insane decades-of-imprisonment-followed-by-ritualistic-execution we have now) is far more humane than life in prison.
Perhaps it is for the actually-guilty. But for the actually-innocent, I do not agree because they will always have the hope and possibility of someday being freed again.
When it comes to an action as permanent as killing a person, disapproval without preventative action (i.e., abolition) is tacit approval. So long as Texas keeps executing people, I don't see what difference it makes how many Texans are in favor of it.
"So long as Texas keeps executing people, I don't see what difference it makes how many [Americans] are in favor of it."
The perceived inability of one does not excuse the lack of action by the many, especially if the techsupporter's assertion is true -- that not many Texans support the death penalty.
I suspect that, given California couldn't even replace it with life imprisonment (it failed 52-48 with Prop 34 in 2012), the considerably more conservative state of Texas has at least a simple majority support for the death penalty.
>"So long as Texas keeps executing people, I don't see what difference it makes how many [Americans] are in favor of it."
I agree wholeheartedly.
From the outside looking in, it seems that most Texans who oppose the death penalty are either indifferent or resigned to the issue. I'd love to be proven wrong, but I find very little evidence of a credible abolition movement. Without sustained political pressure, disapproval counts for very little.
If the death penalty is unjust, inhumane, and unequally applied, isn't it also then both crual and unusual?
The standard we apply in our justice system is not one of popular opinion.
That said, I wonder if you live in the same Texas I visit each year. The vast majority of Texans support the death penalty.
A University of Texas (Austin) poll last year showed 49% of Texans support the death penalty. 26% somewhat support. That's almost 20 million Texans. While just 19% are opposed (of which just 9% strongly oppose).
https://texaspolitics.utexas.edu/set/support-death-penalty-f...
2) If you strongly oppose the death penalty, can you provide examples of what you've done to reduce it? You've already noted that you chose to live in a way that provides financial support for the death penalty.. what are you doing to offset that? What organizations do you donate to, or volunteer with? What have you done beyond write a comment on HN? If the answer is 'nothing', then you find the death penalty disagreeable, but you are, on net, supporting it.
On your second, I don't know how my personal actions are relevant here, but I will recite them for you because I am on a rebutting-of-presumptions mode today:
- You said I "chose to live in a way" that supports the death penalty. I should point out that though I am native to Texas, I no longer live in Texas. I even reincorporated my small consulting business in another state, away from Texas.
- I have provided volunteer support to the Innocence Project of Texas (I decline to specify when or what kind because I am being anonymous here).
- When I lived in State Senator Jane Nelson's district, I know that I had a reputation among her staff for writing several anti-death penalty letters and being one of the most vociferous. I know this because I became friends with a former staffer of hers and that person told me.
- I have participated in and volunteered for the political campaigns of candidates who are endorsed by the Texas Moratorium Network, a group opposed to the death penalty.
Is that sufficient? Have you packed your bags to move to Texas and vote against proponents of the death penalty yet? My vote is missing, perhaps you can take up the slack for me.
I have not read beyond your first paragraph, because you clearly demonstrated that you are EXTREMELY DISHONEST in it, and there is zero value in attempting conversation with a proven liar.
I haven't donated to any anti Boko Haram orgs. Does that mean I support murdering children?
This is a little strawperson.
If you support the death penalty you also know innocent people will die from the death penalty.
But you support it because you believe overall less people will be removed from existence.
IE it's a deterrent. IE less criminals escape and go on the commit again. IE it costs less so more money goes to save lives in hospitals. [please don't rehash why this are faulty arguments, that's OT to the point I'm making]
Also he isn't posting any comments to any of the articles he is posting....
His twitter feed isn't mentioning anything like this...
I wonder if his account is still under his control?
What I do not get is how the EU can just blatantly ignore this. When one of our politicians travels to an Arab country or to China and does not address the human rights situation clear enough, he or she will be bashed. When Turkey starts talking about reintroducing capital punishment the instant reactions are that this will end the negotiations about EU membership. Capital punishment is a hard line for the EU, if your country has it, it is not considered to value human rights and is out, no further questions asked.
The only people really criticizing the US here (in Germany) are usually haters, who glorify Russia.
It cannot be about the money either, because China is an important partner, too. They have to put up with our obligatory human rights talk every time, while the US has not.
I am not saying that we can or should do anything about it, just that we have to point these things out if do not want to lose our face.
I think this is a perfect example of the US completely getting it wrong. If states can't get it right, I think the ability to arbitrarily punish serious crimes should be dissolved to upper government. Why it makes a difference what state you're in is beyond me. I thought it was something they were phasing out of.
Because if it were all handled at a higher level, there is a very good chance these types of policies would be in place for more people. Also, it would take more effort to change them. Concentration of power is not good, didn't you see star wars?
Why do you think these policies would be in place for more? I this rubbish would be gone, weed legalised and it would make it easier to change the political system. In the UK the decentralised part of government is the worst bit.