Death is an appropriate sentence for the rape of a child…
The Supreme Court declared today in Louisiana v. Kennedy that execution is an excessive punishment for child rape, despite the “years of long anguish” for victims. Truly amazing - child rape does not warrant the death penalty.
The court’s 5-4 decision struck down a Louisiana law that allows capital punishment for people convicted of raping children under 12. It spares the only people in the U.S. under sentence of death for that crime - two Louisiana men convicted of raping girls 5 and 8. I’ll say that again - convicted of raping two girls… one was FIVE and the other EIGHT.
The ruling also categorically invalidates the imposition of death as a sentence for child rape.
Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion, “the death penalty is not a proportional punishment for the rape of a child.” His four liberal colleagues joined him, while the four conservative justices dissented.
“The opinion reads more like an out-of-control legislative debate than a constitutional analysis,” said Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal. “One thing is clear: The five members of the court who issued the opinion do not share the same ’standards of decency’ as the people of Louisiana.”
I must say that I am deeply saddened that the highest court in the United States believes that somehow imposition of death as a sentence is “too extreme” and disproportionate to the crime of raping two little girls. The effects of that rape are both irrevocable and everlasting - two variables that seemed to concern Justice Kennedy in writing the ruling.
Moreover, I was also taken back by the discussion inthe ruling that death is not a deterrent in such cases. I agree - it’s not a deterrent. Nothing deters sex crimes against children. I for one believe, however, that the imposition of death against those who would rape a child is both fair and just. It is within the bounds of society to determine which criminal acts are so severe - death is an appropriate sanction. The rape of a child is such a crime, and I would rather see the convicted put to death, than sustain their lives indefintely in prison.
I agree with the logic of Justice Alito, who said, “The harm that is caused to the victims and to society at large by the worst child rapists is grave,” Alito wrote. “It is the judgment of the Louisiana lawmakers and those in an increasing number of other states that these harms justify the death penalty.”
In general, I believe in very firm, long, sentences for child sex crimes. Rehabilitation is not an option, and these offenders are a burden to society that it need not bear merely to placate its gulit versus removing them from our midst. I believe if the Court had upheld the law in Louisiana, it would have sent a strong message nationally that child rapists get put to death, putting on notice pedophiles and others elswhere that “they would be next.”
Child predators are undoutbedly the most vile scum among our society. It is well within Society’s powers to establish the norms of conduct that make their predilictions illegal, an impose the ultimate sanction of ending their existence among us.
I also think the logic of Coker v. Georgia is incorrect. It is perfectly legitimate, and consistent with a moral set of values, to put to death convicted rapists. I believe no other sanction ensures that the rapists will not rape again, and sends the clearest signal to society that such acts are wholly morally reprehensible and will never be tolerated. At the minimum, it is clear that many states viewed child rape as particularly heinous, as they have provided for the death penalty as a sanction. Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Georgia, and Texas allowed executions in such cases if the defendant had previously been convicted of raping a child.
Our jails should not be clogged with murderers, rapists, or child rapists. They cannot be rehabilitated, and society need not spend valuable resources on them by incacerating them indefinitely. I believe that the 5-4 decision demonstrates that there is, and likely will continue to be, great division over the application of the death penalty.
I doubt very much this is the final word on this issue.
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Agreed RC. On pretty much all of it. Rehabilitation is a crock, jail time isn’t a deterrent (neither is the death sentence by the way) but at least they won’t harm any other children.
Then again, any person who rapes my child? The court system and this ruling will be the least of their problems. I got a solution to the problem right here, in my home. And we’ll just leave it at that
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I must admit - I understand that sentiment….
It is inconceivable to those of us who are parents that child rapists, molesters, and predators shouldn’t be incarcerated for long periods or alternatively executed.
This decision could in essence have the effect of parents “taking the law into their own hands” if they cannot rely on the government to ensure that such crimes are punished properly.
If the death penalty is legitimate, then I don’t really get the proportionality argument. Since I’m against the death penalty, I’ll take it, even for this heinous crime. But I don’t really feel like shouting it from the roofs.
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I agree with almost all of it. Once a rapist always a rapist and no amount of jail time is going to fix that.
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This court will continue to split alongside political ideologies–if the rape of a young child doesn’t warrant the death penalty I don’ t know what qualifies. A rapist literally kills the child in one sense–he or she will never be able to be a whole child again. Only adulthood will offer a coming to terms with what was done in my opinion. A child may subordinate that memory, but is certainly not going to forget it. The SC just issued a denial for a man who raped and murdered an 11 year old boy. The man planned the crime carefully, pretending to be a reporter doing a story on surfing, including an interview with the boy. The Kentucky case over whether lethal injection violated the “cruel and unusual” clause for punishment in the constitution. Thankfully, the court ruled lethal injection did not violate it. The boy’s parents waited through 17 years of appeals to see their son’s rapist and murderer get his just due.
Good post. Good remarks from Jindall. best, Kay
I certainly am Angered by the liberal “justices’ ” decision to not allow the Death Penalty to Child Rapists. Today’s Innocent children seem to
have no voice with our courts,today.Look at the Rotten Rapist Bastards they’ve actually set free like that Illegal in New Jersey whom murdered a few college students & RAPED a 5 year old little girl ! Rapists(whether of adults or children),Murderers,Pedophiles,Parents who commit Filicide(Cold Blooded Murders of their own children) Need to suffer the Death Penalty. and I Personally Do NOT like the 3 Strikes & Your Out rule for these people,either.For them,it shoulf be 1 Strike(the Initial time) and you’re out-Period! Three Strikes just gives them 2 more chances to do such evil. In my opinion,as far as this overcrowding situation goes in our Prisons,that is solvable,too. If Everyone of the above
Monsters were not only Rightly sentenced to die,but were put to death without much delay,there’d be More than enough room for the less dangerous criminals. The courts must help the Police Protect the Innocent,ESPECIALLY children!
There are people who oppose the death punishment in general. If you are against the death punishment in general, this logically means that you are against it in this particular case. Maybe those judges just want to repeal death punishment at all, that’s why they made this decision.
I am opposed to the death penalty for any crime, not because I feel for the criminal, but because we are not God. In a perfect world, with perfect witnesses, with perfect prosecutors who will not fabricate evidence then the death penalty is a good way to keep the scum of society from repeating their crimes. It’s a known fact that for every 7 people put to death in this country one has been freed or sentence commuted for reasons relating to false or erroneous conviction.
It’s bad enough that most people cannot accurately see what has transpired before them, police will pressure witnesses to say what will convict someone, and prosecutors often fabricate evidence for political purposes (as we saw in the Lacrosse case). I do not trust the eyewitness accounts of adults let alone children. I do not trust our flawed justice system. I do not trust cops, prosecutors or judges. Does this mean I do not want a nation of laws and a court system to administer it? No, it just means we have to put up with a terribly flawed and imperfect system and hope that given enough time, evidence will eventually come up to free the innocent of which there are tens of thousands in our prisons now. I do not want to molly-coddle criminals but once we put someone to death, there is no rectifying a mistake. If we truly believe that life is precious, then we cannot allow ourselves to be so callous toward other human beings as to presume absolute knowledge of his guilt or innocence.
The problem with the death penalty is that most Americans have never been through the justice mill, have never seen cops “convince” witnesses as to who perpetrated the crime, have never seen prosecutors hide exculpatory evidence, have never seen witnesses lie on the stand, have never seen a jury deliberate on a murder case (except on TV) and have no clue how flimsy, flawed, imperfect, fabricated the whole thing really is. Most of the time, if a man spends a few years in jail for something he did not do, no big deal, he’s still alive.
But when you’re dead, oops, doesn’t do you any good. If I were a perfect person I wouldn’t bother with death for a child-rapist, I would stuff razorblades up his pee-hole. But I’m not a perfect person. Neither are witnesses, cops, prosecutors, judges.
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Besides the embarrassment for and stupidity of all parties overlooking the death penalty application for child rapists in military law, within Kennedy v Louisiana, SCOTUS makes this blunder, as well:
“the court rested its condemnation of executing the rapists of children largely on what it described as a trend away from the use of death to punish such crimes both here and abroad.”
Just the opposite is true, at least as far as the US is concerned.
The state laws imposing the death penalty option on child rape cases were relatively new and a number of states were actively considering passing such laws in their states, as well.
It could be argued that we were seeing an evolving trend towards them.
By outlawing such laws, was SCOTUS, wrongly and intentionally, stopping a new evolving standard which would have become a national consensus, absent SCOTUS’ interference?
The newest “constitutional” guide for SCOTUS? The preemptive stopping of evolving standards and, thus, national consensus.
SCOTUS’ evolving standards doctrine and the national consensus “standards” are both prone to this type of constitutional perversion - the alchemy of highly strained legal arguments derived from personal opinion.
How bad could this new SCOTUS interference be?
There was a national consensus for the death penalty for child rape cases.
See Jim Lindgren’s, A “National Consensus” in Favor of the Death Penalty for Child Rapists”
http://volokh.com/posts/1214447764.shtml
And a July, 2008 National Poll
By a 55 - 38 percent margin, voters favor the death penalty for a person convicted of raping a child. Women and men are consistent in their support.
http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x1295.xml?ReleaseID=1194
Another example of SCOTUS’ phony consensus and evolving standards doctrine is this,
A phony ‘consensus’ on youthful killers
by Jeff Jacoby in a Boston Globe op/ed
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/03/06/a_phony_consensus_on_youthful_killers/
NOTE: As a firm adherent to the reality that incentives matter to people, including criminals, I was concerned that if the sanction options were equal for child rape and child murder that some rapists would be more prone to murder their victims. Therefore, I was not a proponent of the death penalty for child rape.
copyright 1998-2008 Dudley Sharp
Permission for distribution of this document, in whole or in part, is approved with proper attribution.
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters
e-mail sharpjfa@aol.com, 713-622-5491,
Houston, Texas
Mr. Sharp has appeared on ABC, BBC, CBS, CNN, C-SPAN, FOX, NBC, NPR, PBS , VOA and many other TV and radio networks, on such programs as Nightline, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, The O’Reilly Factor, etc., has been quoted in newspapers throughout the world and is a published author.
A former opponent of capital punishment, he has written and granted interviews about, testified on and debated the subject of the death penalty, extensively and internationally.
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