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Justices strike down Florida's IQ rule for executions

danarhea

danarhea

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(CNN) -- Florida cannot use a hard cutoff on a convict's IQ as the sole basis for determining eligibility for execution, a divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday.

The 5-4 decision favored a Florida death-row inmate who supporters say is intellectually disabled.

The court struck down the state's requirement that a baseline "threshold" IQ score of 70 must be established before a capital prisoner can present additional evidence supporting claims of a disability.

At issue was how states may define mental retardation -- within the context of inexact IQ tests -- when determining whether convicted murderers deserve capital punishment.
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Although I am against the death penalty for many reasons, I believe that, logically, this was a bad decision. The court decided on whether numbers which define retardation were inexact enough to prevent the death penalty from being applied, when they should have decided whether or not the perpetrator knew what he was doing when he committed the murder. Retarded or not, if he knew what he was doing, and knew it was wrong, then he is guilty enough to receive the punishment, and IQ tests, whether flawed or not, should not matter at all. Period.

However wrongly decided this decision was, though, this does make the death penalty a little harder to apply. Hopefully, this is a small step towards the day when capital punishment is ended, and we are no longer in company that includes nations like Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. After all, we are not savages. We are Americans, are we not?

Discussion?

Article is here.
 
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danarhea said:
Although I am against the death penalty for many reasons, I believe that, logically, this was a bad decision. The court decided on whether numbers which define retardation were inexact enough to prevent the death penalty from being applied, when they should have decided whether or not the perpetrator knew what he was doing when he committed the murder. Retarded or not, if he knew what he was doing, and knew it was wrong, then he is guilty enough to receive the punishment, and IQ tests, whether flawed or not, should not matter at all. Period.

However wrongly decided this decision was, though, this does make the death penalty a little harder to apply. Hopefully, this is a small step towards the day when capital punishment is ended, and we are no longer in company that includes nations like Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. After all, we are not savages. We are Americans, are we not?

Discussion?

Article is here.
Click to expand...


That comparison is ****en moronic.When we start executing for being gay, a dissident, adulterer or some other crime not murder then you can make that comparison.
 
danarhea said:
Although I am against the death penalty for many reasons, I believe that, logically, this was a bad decision. The court decided on whether numbers which define retardation were inexact enough to prevent the death penalty from being applied, when they should have decided whether or not the perpetrator knew what he was doing when he committed the murder. Retarded or not, if he knew what he was doing, and knew it was wrong, then he is guilty enough to receive the punishment, and IQ tests, whether flawed or not, should not matter at all. Period.

However wrongly decided this decision was, though, this does make the death penalty a little harder to apply. Hopefully, this is a small step towards the day when capital punishment is ended, and we are no longer in company that includes nations like Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. After all, we are not savages. We are Americans, are we not?

Discussion?

Article is here.
Click to expand...

In all honesty, I'm torn over the Death Penalty and whether it is a valid sentence for certain crimes. I lean toward "no" for the following reasons: it seems to me to be more of an emotional reaction/response rather than a pragmatic punishment; there are people sentenced to death that have been and still are incorrectly found guilty (DNA evidence has proved this) and the death penalty, once carried out to completion, cannot be reversed; from a fiscal conservative point of view, studies have shown that it is more expensive and ties up the courts for years compared to the cost of a life sentence without parole, and; this can now be added to the list to be against it.

As for my reason to be for the death penalty? It's the exact same reason as my first reason I listed above to be against it. For me, it's an emotional response. Kinda - eye for an eye coupled with the emotional need to remove certain people from the gene pool. Which is, IMHO, not enough of a reason to be for it. Hence my trepidation and internal conflict over the issue.

You may have noticed that I couched the first sentence with the term "certain crimes." The reason for this, is that I feel that war crimes, such as those committed by the 9/11 terrorists and their co-conspirators such as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, those responsible for the WWII Nazi atrocities, and people like Pol Pot that commit genocide are definitely deserving of the death penalty.
 
I'd say IQ alone is inadequate. I have known people with IQs in the 70-80 range that are perfectly aware of what is right, wrong, legal, illegal. You'd also have people who are simply not good at IQ testing while thriving in other areas that could be considered intelligence.
 
danarhea said:
Although I am against the death penalty for many reasons, I believe that, logically, this was a bad decision. The court decided on whether numbers which define retardation were inexact enough to prevent the death penalty from being applied, when they should have decided whether or not the perpetrator knew what he was doing when he committed the murder. Retarded or not, if he knew what he was doing, and knew it was wrong, then he is guilty enough to receive the punishment, and IQ tests, whether flawed or not, should not matter at all. Period.

However wrongly decided this decision was, though, this does make the death penalty a little harder to apply. Hopefully, this is a small step towards the day when capital punishment is ended, and we are no longer in company that includes nations like Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. After all, we are not savages. We are Americans, are we not?

Discussion?

Article is here.
Click to expand...

Insofar as it reduces the amount of executions and our ability to apply the death penalty I agree with your sentiment.
 
danarhea said:
Although I am against the death penalty for many reasons, I believe that, logically, this was a bad decision. The court decided on whether numbers which define retardation were inexact enough to prevent the death penalty from being applied, when they should have decided whether or not the perpetrator knew what he was doing when he committed the murder. Retarded or not, if he knew what he was doing, and knew it was wrong, then he is guilty enough to receive the punishment, and IQ tests, whether flawed or not, should not matter at all. Period.

However wrongly decided this decision was, though, this does make the death penalty a little harder to apply. Hopefully, this is a small step towards the day when capital punishment is ended, and we are no longer in company that includes nations like Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. After all, we are not savages. We are Americans, are we not?

Discussion?

Article is here.
Click to expand...

I oppose the death penalty for many reasons, one of them being that as a society, we can do better. Killing people who kill people doesn't make sense to me, and besides, it's too easy. Many long, healthy years to contemplate one's crimes is preferable. That's what I wanted for Timothy McVeigh--a long, healthy life in isolation 23 hours out of four and with the walls of his cells plastered with the pictures of his victims.
 
Deuce said:
Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Nigeria, Congo, China, Sudan.

And the United States of America. Bastion of freedom and justice.

Executions of juveniles since 1990 | Amnesty International
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1.Juvenile means someone under 18 years of age, it does not mean toddler.Nor does Juvinile mean someone who doesn't understand the difference between right and wrong.
2.The US only executes people for premeditated murder. The other countries execute people for crimes that are not even murder or even crimes in this country.
3. Thanks to supreme court judges citing foreign law instead of the constitution minors are no longer allowed to be executed.
 
jamesrage said:
1.Juvenile means someone under 18 years of age, it does not mean toddler.Nor does Juvinile mean someone who doesn't understand the difference between right and wrong.
2.The US only executes people for premeditated murder. The other countries execute people for crimes that are not even murder or even crimes in this country.
3. Thanks to supreme court judges citing foreign law instead of the constitution minors are no longer allowed to be executed.
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Yes, we do a ****ty thing less often. Hooray!

In the end, I'm against executing anybody, much less executing a minor. It all started after hearing about a guy who got executed. The crime he was convicted of was murder-by-arson. Of his own children. After he was executed, nine fire experts reviewed the report from the original fire marshall. All of them concluded the fire was not arson. It was accidental. He didn't murder his children. This man spent years going through appeals, and court after court found him guilty of murdering his own children. A father, suffering the worst fate any parent can suffer already, spent years imprisoned, with the tortuous state of knowing you are innocent and nobody believing you. A fire investigator sent a letter to the governor's office asking for clemency, stating there wasn't evidence of arson. Ignored. And then the father was executed.

Our justice system can't be perfect. But jail sentences can be overturned. Death can't.
 
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danarhea said:
Although I am against the death penalty for many reasons, I believe that, logically, this was a bad decision. The court decided on whether numbers which define retardation were inexact enough to prevent the death penalty from being applied, when they should have decided whether or not the perpetrator knew what he was doing when he committed the murder. Retarded or not, if he knew what he was doing, and knew it was wrong, then he is guilty enough to receive the punishment, and IQ tests, whether flawed or not, should not matter at all. Period.

However wrongly decided this decision was, though, this does make the death penalty a little harder to apply. Hopefully, this is a small step towards the day when capital punishment is ended, and we are no longer in company that includes nations like Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. After all, we are not savages. We are Americans, are we not?

Discussion?

Article is here.
Click to expand...

I'm against the death penalty myself, but I would think that if a person is smart enough to kill someone he's smart enough to be killed.
 
danarhea said:
Although I am against the death penalty for many reasons, I believe that, logically, this was a bad decision. The court decided on whether numbers which define retardation were inexact enough to prevent the death penalty from being applied, when they should have decided whether or not the perpetrator knew what he was doing when he committed the murder. Retarded or not, if he knew what he was doing, and knew it was wrong, then he is guilty enough to receive the punishment, and IQ tests, whether flawed or not, should not matter at all. Period.

However wrongly decided this decision was, though, this does make the death penalty a little harder to apply. Hopefully, this is a small step towards the day when capital punishment is ended, and we are no longer in company that includes nations like Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. After all, we are not savages. We are Americans, are we not?

Discussion?

Article is here.
Click to expand...

The court asserted that a fix number level was not optimal. The links between mental retardation, IQ level, and mental capicity are not best served by a rigid set number.

You are, in a sense, are arguing what the court ruled.
 
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