Arkansas Death penalty...

OK! I have a question.

So putting aside the rights and wrongs of Capital Punishment, I read today that two long term Death row prisoners were executed by lethal drug. The plan is/was? to execute 11 in total as the expiry date on the drug was close.
The defence for one of them argued that it could be painful and inhumane as one of the prisoners is immune to one of the drugs used. I have also read in the past that some executions were botched and prisoners suffered great pain .

So my question is, (and again I stress I do not wish to get into a debate about the rights and wrongs of capital punishment) why the need for a complex cocktail of drugs when there is medication readily available? Morphine, heroin, Opiates etc that when injected in large amounts results in loss of consciousness and ultimately pain free death seem an obvious choice.
Even the 'assisted suicide' clinic in Switzerland can ensure a pain free peaceful death so why is death by lethal injection in the US so fraught with risk? Are there any chemists on here.can explain?

 

I'm sure their crimes were inhumane and painful for the victims.

I'm not advocating the death penalty but I'm not going to worry about someone on Death Row either.

 

You clearly have more faith in the US justice system than I do. Most of the men Arkansas are planning to execute or have already executed never had a fair trial. Many of them have mental impairments or illnesses. Oh, and most of them are poor and black.

 

Does that mean they are innocent straight away then?

 

I didn't comment on the guilt or innocence and neither did the OP. Nor did I comment on the death penalty itself. I'm just saying I'm not overly concerned if people who are executed suffer or not.

 

Apparently one of the two executed was so overweight that his legal team appealed that he would suffer during a lethal injection.

Errr........so what? These people don't give a damn how much their victims suffer, so why should they be entitled to a pain-free death?

 

If there is zero doubt of their crime and it's serious enough, they deserve the death penalty. Obviously you have to be completely sure because if you get it wrong there is no going back. But in this country the likes of Ian Huntley, Roy Whiting, Levi Bellfield etc don't deserve even a prison life. Can add Arthur Collins to the list if he's found guilty now he's been caught with this acid attack.

 

Derek Bentley, Ruth Ellis, Timothy Evans, George Kelly, Mahmood Mattan were all wrongly hung in the UK. The Birmingham six, Guildford 4 and a load of others later found innocent (or the conviction was unsafe) would have been if the penalty hadn't been revoked.

 

Great!! So every single post has been about the rights and wrongs of capital punishment which is EXACTLY what I said in the OP it was not about. I was merely curious about the reasoning behind complex cocktail of drugs whilst there is stuff that addicts regularly OD on that result in unconsciousness followed by death especially if taken in very large amounts.

 

The OP said he didn't want to get into a debate about Capital punishment.......so guess what !

 

Why do you believe that Ruth Ellis was wrongly hung?

 

No, it means you dont execute people on shitty evidence.

 

I have no idea. Probably something to do with retribution/money.

 

Doesn't seem to be much doubt about the guilt of the two in question. The issue appears to be whether they should be executed, which the OP did not intend to discuss.

 

I was speaking in general, not specifically about these two people.

 

West of Memphis!

 

If she was on trial now, her mental state due to the recent miscarriage (probably caused by the victim punching her in the stomach) might have seen her spending a long time in a mental institution rather than a life sentence for murder. There is doubt over her mental capacity at the time - although she did pass the tests *at the time*, psychiatry has come a long way since then and from the outside, she looks to have been suffering from some form of depression. The appeal into her conviction was later dismissed in 2003, but two other British women convicted of murder within a couple of months of her were not executed for similar crimes.

It might have been revenge, it might have been cold-blooded, she might have been insane. Not saying either way, but she might not face a conviction for murder and a mandatory life sentence *now*.

 

Back on track. Ignoring the rights or wrongs of tbe death penalty. It seems to be handled poorly as the Op says there are more efficient and more humane ways to do things. I guess the process is more concerned with 'retribution' than efficiency or humanity.

 

Why not just shoot them in the head?

 

Because Arkansas, like most of the ex-Confederate states in the U.S, is a backwards shithole populated by gun toting, bible-bashing, racist morons.

Or something.