Lethal Injection that takes too long

harleysportster
atheist
harleysportster's picture
Posts: 3359
Joined: 2010-10-17
User is offlineOffline
Lethal Injection that takes too long

A lethal injection seems to have taken longer than necessary to kill someone

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-25775287

 

Row over 'agonising' Ohio execution of killer Denis McGuire

 

US lawyers are preparing to challenge Ohio's choice of death-penalty drugs after a murderer took 25 minutes to die from a new cocktail of chemicals.

Dennis McGuire, 53, suffered an "agonising" death in violation of his constitutional rights, lawyers said.

McGuire family lawyer Jon Paul Rion says he intends to launch a legal challenge against the new drug.

Witnesses said McGuire, who raped and killed a pregnant woman in 1989, gasped for at least 10 minutes before he died.

"He gasped deeply, there was kind of a rattling, guttural sound, there was kind of a snorting through his nose," said one unidentified witness.

"A couple of times he definitely appeared to be choking."

Ohio was forced to change its lethal injection to a new two-drug cocktail after the Danish maker of the previous execution drug refused to allow its use in capital punishment.

'Failed experiment'

Mr Rion said the execution amounted to "cruel and unusual" punishment that violated the Eighth Amendment of the US constitution.

He said he would hold a news conference later to announce a legal challenge.

Analysts said it was one of the longest executions since Ohio resumed capital punishment in 1999.

McGuire's defence lawyer Allen Bohnert said his death was "a failed, agonising experiment".

"The people of the state of Ohio should be appalled at what was done here today in their names," he said.

In recent years, US states have struggled to get drugs for use in lethal injections.

Ohio officials chose to use the sedative midazolam and painkiller hydromorphone for McGuire's execution.

Federal judge Gregory Frost rejected appeals arguing that the drugs could cause excess suffering.

Berkeley University's Megan McCracken, who advises lawyers challenging lethal injection practices, told the BBC that "at the very least we can say this execution did not proceed as planned".

She said lethal drugs are not expected to act instantly, but McGuire's death "raised concerns".

"Under our constitution the question is whether the execution procedure presents a substantial risk of serious harm," she said.

"An execution that takes a long time certainly starts to implicate the eighth amendment."

 

“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
This is a good example of

This is a good example of the stupidity of politics. Lobbyists of drug manufacures are getting in the way of a dozen other options for killing a person humanely and quickly.

I just put my dog down and asked the doc about the drug. He said he used a two injection process. First he injected a large dose of a drug to sedate the animals. When he injected our dog it was like giving him valium. He calmed down. His heart stopped beating illregular. Then after a few minutes of calmness he injected a large second dose and death occured in seconds.

I understand that some drug manufacures are refusing to sell the drugs if they are used in capital punishment, but they still all the drug to be used for animals.


Beyond Saving
atheist
Beyond Saving's picture
Posts: 5520
Joined: 2007-10-12
User is offlineOffline
digitalbeachbum wrote:This

digitalbeachbum wrote:

This is a good example of the stupidity of politics. Lobbyists of drug manufacures are getting in the way of a dozen other options for killing a person humanely and quickly.

I just put my dog down and asked the doc about the drug. He said he used a two injection process. First he injected a large dose of a drug to sedate the animals. When he injected our dog it was like giving him valium. He calmed down. His heart stopped beating illregular. Then after a few minutes of calmness he injected a large second dose and death occured in seconds.

I understand that some drug manufacures are refusing to sell the drugs if they are used in capital punishment, but they still all the drug to be used for animals.

Yeah, those stupid drug manufacturers deciding to have morals and refuse to let their product be used for execution. They should just get out of Big Brothers way. If government says someone should be killed, they should be killed. Governments have such a great historical record of only killing people who deserve it. 

If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
Beyond Saving

Beyond Saving wrote:

 

.....Governments have such a great historical record of only killing people who deserve it. 

 

        Assuming the perp's guilty status is unassailasble, there are still quicker and cheaper methods to implement a speedy and almost intantaneous death than these various chemical concoctions.  A bullet, properly fired into the medulla oblongata of the human brain, is virtually instant death.   Police marksmen and military snipers know this.  A single bullet is inexpensive, too.


Vastet
atheistBloggerSuperfan
Vastet's picture
Posts: 13234
Joined: 2006-12-25
User is offlineOffline
Capital punishment is such a

Capital punishment is such a waste. Even if guilt is unassailable, the state shouldn't be wasting a penny on execution. They should be benefiting from the confinement of persons who cannot be permitted free reign in society, not enduring expenses.

Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
  Do you mean using the

  Do you mean using the inmates as a work force ?  I don't have a problem with that but it will still cost to take care of their physical needs.  Even the slaves of the old south had to be fed and clothed which must have cost their masters something.   Keeping them alive is also an ongoing expense.  Dead inmates no longer require care and hence they are not a financial expenditure.


iwbiek
atheistSuperfan
iwbiek's picture
Posts: 4298
Joined: 2008-03-23
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish wrote:  Do

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

  Do you mean using the inmates as a work force ?  I don't have a problem with that but it will still cost to take care of their physical needs.  Even the slaves of the old south had to be fed and clothed which must have cost their masters something.




that's precisely why the coming of capitalism always means the end of slavery. you don't have to pay any large purchase price for a new worker, the surplus labor force is guaranteed endless, and you don't have to care dick about a worker's upkeep. capitalism makes slave labor unprofitable and obsolete.


prison labor could potentially do the same for traditional capitalist labor practices, if handled the good old russian way, which is why i predict the executives and the labor unions would quickly see eye to eye long enough to try to stop it. i imagine there would be a lot of breast-beating and moralizing then about "cruel and unusual punishment."

"I have never felt comfortable around people who talk about their feelings for Jesus, or any other deity for that matter, because they are usually none too bright. . . . Or maybe 'stupid' is a better way of saying it; but I have never seen much point in getting heavy with either stupid people or Jesus freaks, just as long as they don't bother me. In a world as weird and cruel as this one we have made for ourselves, I figure anybody who can find peace and personal happiness without ripping off somebody else deserves to be left alone. They will not inherit the earth, but then neither will I. . . . And I have learned to live, as it were, with the idea that I will never find peace and happiness, either. But as long as I know there's a pretty good chance I can get my hands on either one of them every once in a while, I do the best I can between high spots."
--Hunter S. Thompson


Vastet
atheistBloggerSuperfan
Vastet's picture
Posts: 13234
Joined: 2006-12-25
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish wrote:  Do

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

  Do you mean using the inmates as a work force ?  I don't have a problem with that but it will still cost to take care of their physical needs.  Even the slaves of the old south had to be fed and clothed which must have cost their masters something.   Keeping them alive is also an ongoing expense.  Dead inmates no longer require care and hence they are not a financial expenditure.

The American system tends to have people on death row for 20+ years. So it really costs taxpayers millions of dollars per inmate to kill them. Might even cost more than life in prison, though I'm not interested in comparing numbers.
Whether it does or not, you're paying to take care of them until you kill them anyway. For decades in many cases. What's the difference?

Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
Vastet wrote:ProzacDeathWish

Vastet wrote:

 

The American system tends to have people on death row for 20+ years. So it really costs taxpayers millions of dollars per inmate to kill them. Might even cost more than life in prison, though I'm not interested in comparing numbers. Whether it does or not, you're paying to take care of them until you kill them anyway. For decades in many cases. What's the difference?

  

The appeals process for condemned prisoners is a grindingly slow affair.  Finding some way to legally expedite the execution would be the logical approach.  The whole legal / judicial system is just a game anyway, not really about justice.   It's about "winning".


Jeffrick
High Level DonorRational VIP!SuperfanGold Member
Jeffrick's picture
Posts: 2446
Joined: 2008-03-25
User is offlineOffline
To Prozac and Vastet

                      Just when I'm ready to give up on A death penalty along comes some deviant who deserves the ultimate penalty. In Canada we had Clifford Olsen & Paul Bernardo in the US of A John Gacy & Ted Bundy.  How else can you punish such multiple killers?  The death penalty is NOT a deterrent, it is a punishment. So stick them on death row and let them watch the appeals and the clock tick down to the actual death chamber.   The longer the wait the more terrorizing it is for such cowards.  Bundy and Gacy waited 10 years before death,  others waited longer, let 'em wait, I want to be sure. Olsen died of natural causes,  Bernardo is still with us;  how is that Justice?            

 

"Very funny Scotty; now beam down our clothes."

VEGETARIAN: Ancient Hindu word for "lousy hunter"

If man was formed from dirt, why is there still dirt?


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
  My feelings about capital

  My feelings about capital punishment have become somewhat ambivilent.   If the crime is hineous enough and guilt is *beyond dispute ( *captured on surveilence video, eye witnesses, etc  ) then perhaps they should be executed.  My fallback plan is to imprison them for life but to make their sentence a literal hell on Earth, something that is like what is experienced in Russia's worst prisons / gulags.  Their prisons make death a welcome alternative compared to what's in store for them on a daily basis.


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
  And speaking of Canada, I

  And speaking of Canada, I saw a news item from Calgary that infuriated me.  A two year old husky had its mouth taped shut and it slowly starved to death and a short time later a cat was found nearby with its head completely enveloped in tape so that it died of suffocation. 

 

  Animal cruelty is a crime that literally brings out the killer instinct inside me.  I would be absolutely Islamic in my style of punishment.  On first offense, both arms of the perpetrator would be surgically removed at the shoulder so that he / she could never again repeat their crime.  If somehow they were later caught doing anything even remotely related to animal cruelty then both their legs would be the next to be amputated in a hospital.  I could even step it up from there...


harleysportster
atheist
harleysportster's picture
Posts: 3359
Joined: 2010-10-17
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish wrote:  And

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

  And speaking of Canada, I saw a news item from Calgary that infuriated me.  A two year old husky had its mouth taped shut and it slowly starved to death and a short time later a cat was found nearby with its head completely enveloped in tape so that it died of suffocation. 

 

  Animal cruelty is a crime that literally brings out the killer instinct inside me.  I would be absolutely Islamic in my style of punishment.  On first offense, both arms of the perpetrator would be surgically removed at the shoulder so that he / she could never again repeat their crime.  If somehow they were later caught doing anything even remotely related to animal cruelty then both their legs would be the next to be amputated in a hospital.  I could even step it up from there...

Animal cruelty makes me want to be ten times more violent towards the offenders for some reason. 

“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
harleysportster wrote:Animal

harleysportster wrote:

Animal cruelty makes me want to be ten times more violent towards the offenders for some reason. 

 

     I've never enjoyed hunting because I don't like to kill things or cause an animal to suffer.  I'm even trying to go back to being a vegetarian so that I'm not a complete hypocrite, but yes there is something about cruelty to animals that deeply depresses me and makes me want to respond in a way the would make the abusers shiver in absolute fear as to what I would do to them.  But I wouldn't allow them to die. 

   I better stop here or I'm going to start sounding like Pin Head from the Hell Raiser movies.  But no, it wouldn't be pretty what I had in store for them.


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
Beyond Saving wrote:Yeah,

Beyond Saving wrote:
Yeah, those stupid drug manufacturers deciding to have morals and refuse to let their product be used for execution. They should just get out of Big Brothers way. If government says someone should be killed, they should be killed. Governments have such a great historical record of only killing people who deserve it. 

I also wan't speaking about "Big Brother". I was talking about politics of the situation. Either this is an issue of morals or its an issue of money. I guarantee this is an issue of money. Pay those drug companies enough money and their morals will disappear.

I also wan't speaking about the right or wrong of executing people. Personally, I'm one to throw them in to a cell with out tv, no weight set, no magazines and force them to live a life like that in the Black Dolphin. I don't believe convicted murderers and rapists should be allowed to have the same rights as I have; they have forfeited their rights when they commited crimes against society.


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish wrote:Beyond

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

Beyond Saving wrote:

 

.....Governments have such a great historical record of only killing people who deserve it. 

 

        Assuming the perp's guilty status is unassailasble, there are still quicker and cheaper methods to implement a speedy and almost intantaneous death than these various chemical concoctions.  A bullet, properly fired into the medulla oblongata of the human brain, is virtually instant death.   Police marksmen and military snipers know this.  A single bullet is inexpensive, too.

It's also very messy.


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
Vastet wrote:Capital

Vastet wrote:
Capital punishment is such a waste. Even if guilt is unassailable, the state shouldn't be wasting a penny on execution. They should be benefiting from the confinement of persons who cannot be permitted free reign in society, not enduring expenses.

Do you have statistics on this?


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish wrote:Vastet

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

Vastet wrote:

 

The American system tends to have people on death row for 20+ years. So it really costs taxpayers millions of dollars per inmate to kill them. Might even cost more than life in prison, though I'm not interested in comparing numbers. Whether it does or not, you're paying to take care of them until you kill them anyway. For decades in many cases. What's the difference?

  

The appeals process for condemned prisoners is a grindingly slow affair.  Finding some way to legally expedite the execution would be the logical approach.  The whole legal / judicial system is just a game anyway, not really about justice.   It's about "winning".

It's about money.

I have a friend who was offered 10 years by the state and he has a public defender. He basically threw up his hands and asked how soon could he get out if he was a model prisioner. He's looking at 2-3 years if things go well. Is he guilty of his crime? Yep. Does he deserve to be thrown in a jail cell for 2-3 years? No.

Recently a local politician got drunk and wrecked the car he was driving at 90mph in a 45 zone. He killed the person in the car with him. Jail time? Nope. Going to prision? Nope. What punishment did he get? A fine for exceeding the speed limit. Why? Because he is buddy buddy with some one special. Also, it got really quiet in the local papers/tv. No one is reporting on this so you know they paid all the local papers to bury the story.

 


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
digitalbeachbum wrote: It's

digitalbeachbum wrote:

 

It's also very messy.

 

                                             So is childbirth.  


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
Jeffrick wrote:Just when I'm

Jeffrick wrote:

Just when I'm ready to give up on A death penalty along comes some deviant who deserves the ultimate penalty. In Canada we had Clifford Olsen & Paul Bernardo in the US of A John Gacy & Ted Bundy.  How else can you punish such multiple killers?  The death penalty is NOT a deterrent, it is a punishment. So stick them on death row and let them watch the appeals and the clock tick down to the actual death chamber.   The longer the wait the more terrorizing it is for such cowards.  Bundy and Gacy waited 10 years before death,  others waited longer, let 'em wait, I want to be sure. Olsen died of natural causes,  Bernardo is still with us;  how is that Justice?

Bundy was a psychopatic killer; he welcomed death.

The thing which would have really tormented him was if at his death, the viewing room was completely empty.


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

digitalbeachbum wrote:

 

It's also very messy.

 

                                             So is childbirth.  

Not from what I remember, besides my kid didn't come out of a vagina at 850m/s


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish wrote:  My

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

  My feelings about capital punishment have become somewhat ambivilent.   If the crime is hineous enough and guilt is *beyond dispute ( *captured on surveilence video, eye witnesses, etc  ) then perhaps they should be executed.  My fallback plan is to imprison them for life but to make their sentence a literal hell on Earth, something that is like what is experienced in Russia's worst prisons / gulags.  Their prisons make death a welcome alternative compared to what's in store for them on a daily basis.

I toss around this stuff in my head all the time. What punishment fits the crime? How long? When are they truly remoseful? Can you let them back in to society?


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish wrote:  And

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

  And speaking of Canada, I saw a news item from Calgary that infuriated me.  A two year old husky had its mouth taped shut and it slowly starved to death and a short time later a cat was found nearby with its head completely enveloped in tape so that it died of suffocation. 

 

  Animal cruelty is a crime that literally brings out the killer instinct inside me.  I would be absolutely Islamic in my style of punishment.  On first offense, both arms of the perpetrator would be surgically removed at the shoulder so that he / she could never again repeat their crime.  If somehow they were later caught doing anything even remotely related to animal cruelty then both their legs would be the next to be amputated in a hospital.  I could even step it up from there...

lol.


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
digitalbeachbum wrote:Not

digitalbeachbum wrote:

Not from what I remember, besides my kid didn't come out of a vagina at 850m/s

 

      Phfft. Surgeons don't move their scapels at 850 m/s either, yet the patient still bleeds, sometimes copiously.   Besides my point was about what dispatches a prisoner quickly and relatively painlessly not whether it violates your desire to be fastidious.

 

  PS, do you avoid having bowel movements because that can be kind of messy, too ?


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
digitalbeachbum wrote:Not

digitalbeachbum wrote:

Not from what I remember, besides my kid didn't come out of a vagina at 850m/s

 

   Amniotic fluid and placentas  ...yum yum ! ( ..and don't forget to bring a mop )


Vastet
atheistBloggerSuperfan
Vastet's picture
Posts: 13234
Joined: 2006-12-25
User is offlineOffline
digitalbeachbum wrote:Vastet

digitalbeachbum wrote:

Vastet wrote:
Capital punishment is such a waste. Even if guilt is unassailable, the state shouldn't be wasting a penny on execution. They should be benefiting from the confinement of persons who cannot be permitted free reign in society, not enduring expenses.

Do you have statistics on this?

I can get them, but freedom of information requests tend to cost money. I'm sure plenty of second hand sources are available. Here's one:

Death penalty costs California more than $300m per execution

Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

digitalbeachbum wrote:

Not from what I remember, besides my kid didn't come out of a vagina at 850m/s

 

      Phfft. Surgeons don't move their scapels at 850 m/s either, yet the patient still bleeds, sometimes copiously.   Besides my point was about what dispatches a prisoner quickly and relatively painlessly not whether it violates your desire to be fastidious.

 

  PS, do you avoid having bowel movements because that can be kind of messy, too ?

Actually my diet is nearly perfect. My poop comes out in one log and is clean and with out any mess.

If you are having dietary issues try increasing the amount of veggies and fruits up to 3x the amount of meat you are eating.


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish wrote:

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

digitalbeachbum wrote:

Not from what I remember, besides my kid didn't come out of a vagina at 850m/s

 

   Amniotic fluid and placentas  ...yum yum ! ( ..and don't forget to bring a mop )

 

 


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
Vastet wrote:digitalbeachbum

Vastet wrote:
digitalbeachbum wrote:

Vastet wrote:
Capital punishment is such a waste. Even if guilt is unassailable, the state shouldn't be wasting a penny on execution. They should be benefiting from the confinement of persons who cannot be permitted free reign in society, not enduring expenses.

Do you have statistics on this?

I can get them, but freedom of information requests tend to cost money. I'm sure plenty of second hand sources are available. Here's one: Death penalty costs California more than $300m per execution

Interesting.

I did some minor research on the web and couldn't find how much would it cost to keep them alive for life. Sure the amount of time they live is varied, but trying to incarcerate a serial murderer must be different than a drug pusher.


Vastet
atheistBloggerSuperfan
Vastet's picture
Posts: 13234
Joined: 2006-12-25
User is offlineOffline
Unless I'm wildly mistaken,

Unless I'm wildly mistaken, the prisons in which people on death row await sentence are completely separate entities from those in which convicts await release.
But unless a prisoner is a 'terrorist' or a legitimate and chronic threat to other prisoners and staff, serial killers and substance abusers do tend to be housed together. There are so many more convicts than prisons can hold that it isn't feasible to separate one type of convict from another unless it is absolutely necessary.

Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.


ProzacDeathWish
atheist
ProzacDeathWish's picture
Posts: 4147
Joined: 2007-12-02
User is offlineOffline
digitalbeachbum wrote:  If

digitalbeachbum wrote:

 

 

If you are having dietary issues try increasing the amount of veggies and fruits up to 3x the amount of meat you are eating.

 

             Actually I am trying to go to a mostly vegetarian diet for ethical reasons but still supplementing it with powdered whey or egg protein.  I even bought a food processor /  blender.  So far so good.


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
ProzacDeathWish

ProzacDeathWish wrote:

digitalbeachbum wrote:

 

 

If you are having dietary issues try increasing the amount of veggies and fruits up to 3x the amount of meat you are eating.

 

             Actually I am trying to go to a mostly vegetarian diet for ethical reasons but still supplementing it with powdered whey or egg protein.  I even bought a food processor /  blender.  So far so good.

That's cool.


digitalbeachbum
atheistRational VIP!
digitalbeachbum's picture
Posts: 4895
Joined: 2007-10-15
User is offlineOffline
Vastet wrote:Unless I'm

Vastet wrote:
Unless I'm wildly mistaken, the prisons in which people on death row await sentence are completely separate entities from those in which convicts await release. But unless a prisoner is a 'terrorist' or a legitimate and chronic threat to other prisoners and staff, serial killers and substance abusers do tend to be housed together. There are so many more convicts than prisons can hold that it isn't feasible to separate one type of convict from another unless it is absolutely necessary.

All the more reason to legalize weed, review all cases, then let go the non-violent criminals.

I have a friend who just got word he is going away for ten years. His crime? He had visited a website which had underaged pictures on it. Unknowningly he had them on his system. He said he doesn't have the money to defend himself so he is using a public defender. How much time did the defender spend on his case? Very little. He meets with the lawyer in a few days and then two days later he has to go to trial.

Who is in the prisions? Mostly poor people. Rich people get out.