Death Penalty Games

Death Penalty Games - Todd Strandberg - http://www.raptureready.com/category/nearing-midnight/

 

The spectacle that has become the death penalty process recently came here to Arkansas. Events were set in motion by the state announcing its plan to execute eight men within a span of 11 days. The reason for the cluster of executions was because the state needed to carry out the executions-before its supply of midazolam would expire at the end of the month. I knew the process was not going to be that simple.

 

The left has become fanatically opposed to capital punishment. They don't care if Muslims are throwing homosexuals off rooftops or stoning women to death for being victims of rape. Their compassion is for people who are guilty of coldhearted murder.

 

The chief strategy in combating the death penalty is to gum up the justice system with endless frivolous appeals. The average time it takes to put someone to death for a crime is over 20 years. Some cases stretch out over 30 years. You would think that after multiple decades of legal wrangling, there would be little doubt about a convicted murder's guilt when the time comes for their sentence to be carried out.

 

There has been a huge legal battle over how the state purchased their supply of midazolam, which is used to sedate the person being put to death. To obtain the drug, a worker for the state had to travel incognito to a distributor. When McKesson Corp, the maker of midazolam found out about the plan to use its drug in the executions, it filed for an injunction. McKesson did receive one injunction, but it was later overturned.

 

With the appeals system staffed with liberal judges committed to the anti-death penalty agenda, disruptions have become routine. One of the first judges to stand in the way of the executions was Judge Wendell Griffen. Immediately after he halted Arkansas from executing six prisoners, he participated in a protest against capital punishment outside the Arkansas governor's mansion by laying on a cot, as though he were a condemned man on a gurney. Since then he has been barred from taking up any death penalty-related cases. This type of outrageous judicial misconduct should be grounds for removing Griffin from the bench all together.

 

It didn't take long for half of the planned executions to be canceled or receive a stay because of various court decisions. But time did run out for convicted criminal, Ledell Lee. It was the first time in 12 years that Arkansas carried out the death penalty.

 

Of course the liberal media has diligently kept track of the stats on capital punishment.  They have implied we were doing well for a dozen years and then we lost our way. I could sense the dismay in the media coverage when it was announced that two killers would be executed within hours of each other. The last state that put more than one inmate to death on the same day was Texas, which executed two killers in August of 2000.

 

The last double execution in Arkansas took place last Monday April 24, ending the lives of Jack Jones and Marcel Williams. The lawyers for these convicted criminals proclaimed their clients were too fat to be put to death. Since both men had eaten themselves into poor health, the lawyers argued they may not respond to the drugs, causing them to suffer a painful death. Nevertheless, the executions went off without any major problems.

 

Since weight comes up in many death penalty cases, I can only conclude the likelihood that many of these criminals are being advised to become as overweight as possible, to try to prevent their death sentence from being carried out. (The obesity ploy may be the wrong way to get sympathy.)

 

The execution of a fourth inmate, Kenneth Williams, shows the problem of warehousing murders. One of the most common arguments used to do away with the death penalty is the suggestion that we can lock people away forever, without any chance of an innocent person being put to death.

 

Whenever a hardened criminal escapes prison, the innocent public often suffers. Williams was less than three weeks into a life term for killing a University of Arkansas cheerleader when he escaped by hiding in a load of garbage. In his short time of the run, Williams killed two people. Only now after his execution, can we be sure that his murderous rampage is over.

 

We don't have endless space in our prison system. The jails in Arkansas are so full, we have to rent space in other states to find lodging for our criminals. Every time we add a person to the prison population another prisoner has to be released. Quite often, the person being set free is someone who committed murder and was sent to prison for life. These murderers get back on the street and eventually kill some other person. As jails become a revolving door, it becomes clear that our approach to justice needs to be reexamined.

 

The following two passages of Scripture are often used to support the position of capital punishment:

 

"Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man" (Genesis 9:6).

 

"For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake" (Romans 13:3-5).

 

God does not play games with sin. Whenever He administers judgment in the Bible, He is very direct and to the point. These liberals who think they would have the God of heaven tongue-tied on judgment because they stood the moral high ground, are in for a big surprise. The Lord sees sin as such a serious matter, the death of His Son was the only way to lift punishment.

 

"For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23).