June 2015

The Death Penalty

willOn December 23, 1991, tragedy struck the Willingham’s in Corsicana, Texas as their home became engulfed in flames. A neighbor smelled the smoke and found Cameron Todd Willingham standing outside his home soot covered and singed. Todd was screaming, “My babies are burning up!” (Grann “Trial by Fire”) as his three children were trapped inside. Todd told the neighbor to call the fire department while he attempted to break into the children’s window using a stick, but he was sadly held back by the intensity of the flames. Upon arrival, police and firefighters had to wrestle Todd down and restrain him for his own safety. Stacy Willingham had left earlier in the morning and came home to find her children had perished in the fire.

The town of Corsicana quickly began to lovingly help the family as they started a funeral fund. In that time, arson investigators began looking at what caused the fire. Due to some irregularities, the arson investigators began to suspect that Todd had actually started the fire. The other major piece of evidence against Todd was the testimony of a jailhouse informant who was promised leniency in exchange for the testimony that Todd had confessed to him. Cameron Todd Willingham was found guilty and later executed February 17, 2004.

In 2004, Gerald Hurst, an acclaimed scientist and fire investigator examined and discredited each piece of evidence and his investigation has later been supported by other individual arson investigators. The testimony from Todd’s cellmate has also been recanted. If Todd were alive today, he would be able to seek an appeal, but he can’t because he was already executed many years before. The death penalty is is an immoral permanent action and should be abolished. Life in prison without parole offers similar protections to the public and allows freeing someone if they are found innocent.

anthonyThere are hundreds of cases like that of Todd Willingham. Luckily, more of them are turning around to happier endings. Anthony Ray Hinton was recently released in April of 2015 after being on death row for thirty years. Luckily, he had not been executed before now. In Mr. Hinton’s case, he had been struggling for freedom the entire time, explaining that the revolver that police say was used in the slayings didn’t match the evidence at the scenes. Attorneys believe that racial biases and Mr. Hinton’s impoverished background worked against him getting the case overturned sooner. As much as people want to believe the system works, according to a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 4.1% of those on death row are innocent (Pilkington “US death row study: 4% of defendants sentenced to die are innocent “). During the time of the study from 1973 to 2004, only 138 were exonerated. That would mean approximately 202 innocent people were killed during that time. The death penalty is a permanent action that does not leave room to overturn mistakes later.  The option of Life Without Parole (LWOP) allows freeing the innocent and protects the public from the actual murderers held in prison.

Some proponents of the death penalty would argue that it is the only fiscally feasible method, but they are wrong when comparing the actual facts of the situation. Death penalty cases are expensive because sentencing someone requires at least two trials. There is normally a first trial that acts as a determination of guilt and a later trial that determines if the person actually deserves the death penalty. That isn’t even taking into consideration all the costs of extended appeals. According to a Duke University study, replacing North Carolina’s death penalty would save taxpayers approximately $22 million dollars in just two years (Erb “Death and Taxes: The Real Cost of the Death Penalty”). This pattern of death penalty cases costing more than non-death penalty cases is repeated across multiple studies in multiple states. The truly fiscally responsible action would be to transition to only seeking LWOP.

Other supporters of the death penalty would argue that retribution is necessary. They would argue that an “eye for an eye” is the best way to go. In the United States, it is considered murder when a person kills someone in revenge. Why is this any different when the state is the one doing it in proxy for others? If supporters really looked at that principle logically, they would realize that seeking retribution is unjust no matter who is seeking it.

Death-Penalty-Infographic_1Some proponents would save their best argument for last and say that the death penalty is the best deterrent for murder. The death penalty supporters would also be wrong in that instance. A recent study by Professor Michael Radelet and Traci Lacock of the University of Colorado found that 88% of the nation’s leading criminologists do not believe the death penalty is an effective deterrent to crime. This should not be a surprise, as murder is often a very personal crime of passion. In cases where emotions are raging, the murderer is not considering the repercussions. This does not excuse the person’s actions, but when taking that into consideration, it is obvious why the death penalty is an ineffective deterrent.

Should more men like Todd be executed? Should more men like Anthony Ray Hinton barely escape the hangman’s noose due to racial biases? Is it better that the innocent should die in the name of retribution? A rational and compassionate person should say no to these questions. Life is too precious to throw away due to an imperfect system.

Works Cited

Erb, Kelly. “Death and Taxes: The Real Cost of the Death Penalty.” Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 22 Sept. 2011. Web. 25 June 2015.

Grann, David. “Trial by Fire.” The New Yorker. The New Yorker, 7 Sept. 2009. Web. 25 June 2015.

Pilkington, Ed. “US Death Row Study: 4% of Defendants Sentenced to Die Are Innocent.” The Guardian. Guardian News and Media Limited, 28 Apr. 2014. Web. 25 June 2015.

 

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Tech Sights for my Ruger 10/22

I  had the M1 Replica sights from E. Arthur Brown. They looked really good but I had difficulty with the sloppiness of the movement on the front sight. Some lock tight would have fixed that but I didn’t really plan to keep them too long. The lack of adjustment was also a No-Go. I liked the sight picture I got with them over the factory sights but it was mostly a cosmetic improvement. When you do a comparison the Replica sights do resemble the M1 Carbine sights more.

I just got around to replacing the Replica sights with TSR100 Sights. They are a Father’s Day gift from my wife. I like the TSR100 due to them having a similar adjustment to the M16. I also like having the ability to flip the rear sight for longer range targets. The TSR200 Sights also look nice but I prefer having the flip rear sight on the TSR100 over the adjustable rear elevation on the TSR200.

For those that haven’t seen my rifle before, I also have an M1 Carbine Tribute Stock on it. I like that a whole lot. It feels very good in weight and fits nicely against my shoulder. It also looks darn good with the classic look and sling. The stock is so solid, I feel like I could buttstroke someone in a pinch without harming the rifle.

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Laws and Agency

Should a predominantly LDS community use its majority voting power to make laws that reflect its religious beliefs? When addressing this question, members of the church should consider if their answer would be the same if they were asked this concerning an area dominated by followers of Islam, Judaism, or any other religious belief that does not reflect their own. While it may seem good to the majority, laws like this can be seen as tyrannical to the minority. There are three good reasons a Latter-Day Saint should oppose creating laws which only reflect personal religious belief.

First, the rights of an individual need to be protected against the power of the majority. A person should be free to make choices as long as those choices don’t involve aggression or fraud against others. Most of the laws a community makes really only work to protect against those types of dangers. A law crushes individual liberty when it is made not to protect against those dangers but its only use is to enforce a religious code. Some members of the Church would say the creation of the laws is only there to guide people to do the right thing. The founding fathers foresaw this desire and ratified the Bill of Rights to the Constitution to help codify protections for minority groups to practice or not practice religion as they see fit.

Another good point is that Latter-Day Saints should first examine the principle of agency. LDS.org defines agency as “the ability and privilege God gives us to choose and to act for ourselves.” This gift was so important that it was one of the central principles dividing those in the War in Heaven. A third of the host of Heaven followed Lucifer in support of giving up this gift to him and they were ultimately cast out. With this gift we are “free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil” ( Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 2:27). Some Latter-Day Saints have said there are times agency needs to be enforced. This is an obvious contradiction and perversion of the way the Lord would have us do things.

The third reason Latter-Day Saints should oppose enforcing personal religious belief is that they should look to whose example they are following. When we look at the methods of influencing others we can see that the Lord’s way is through persuasion and love. The way of force has been the way of Lucifer from the beginning as he has always “sought to destroy the agency of man” (Pearl of Great Price, Moses 4:3). When a government creates laws which don’t protect the citizens but it enforces a moral code, this is following the example of Satan. There really is no counter argument which can support the position of following the example of Satan.

Members of the Church want to share the happiness of the Gospel with others. This can’t be done through the might of law enforcement. Righteous followers of the Lord should use their influence to encourage having laws which protect liberty and use their own personal influence to encourage moral behaviour in others.

 

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