Should we restore the death penalty?
BArry PeTTS (letters) repeats the well-worn argument against capital punishment that an innocent person could be hanged.
True, there were two in the past, derek Bentley and Timothy evans, who should not have been hanged. But that should not be a reason for the clearly guilty to be spared the rope. Those convicted of multiple murders should definitely hang. Past examples could have been Moors murderers Ian Brady and Myra hindley, triple police killer harry roberts, dennis nilsen, Black Panther donald neilson and Peter Sutcliffe, the yorkshire ripper. The cost of keeping these monsters incarcerated should be considered. In the case of Brady, this is said to have amounted to £10 million.
The death penalty was effectively abolished in the 1960s under labour home secretary James Callaghan. for that reason, I swore I would never vote labour when I reached voting age.
williAM SpiRe, london n17. I ConCur with Barry Petts that the restoration of the death penalty might lead to innocent men and women being executed — but only if important safeguards were not introduced. If capital punishment was reintroduced, judges would have to be given the discretion to impose, instead, a lifetime custodial sentence if the guilty verdict was based largely on circumstantial evidence, leaving the
opportunity open for fresh information to come to light that might exonerate the prisoner.
This enlightened policy would have resulted, for example, in Timothy evans — who was wrongly accused of murdering his wife Beryl and infant daughter Geraldine at their home in notting hill and was hanged in 1950 — receiving a prison sentence and not the death penalty, which was also later meted out to the true killer, John reginald Christie, evans’s downstairs neighbour at 10 rillington Place.
I agree with Peter hitchens (Mail) that the fear of executing innocent people is advanced as an excuse, not a reason, for not restoring the death penalty. Charles dickens once opposed capital punishment on the grounds that all human beings are capable of reform. he later changed his mind, becoming convinced that some were incorrigibly evil and hanging them was appropriate.
I agree with dickens. Where there is no doubt about someone’s guilt (fred West, harold Shipman and Ian huntley, for instance), they should receive the death penalty and good riddance. I believe the public would support its restoration by a sizeable majority, with the one caveat outlined above.
peteR henRiCK, birmingham.
I AM against the death penalty. I firmly believe that juries would be less likely to convict those guilty of terrible crimes if they thought their decision could result in the death of the person in front of them. The result would be more guilty offenders going free.
h. thoMpSon, newcastle upon tyne.