Quite large numbers of people have been judicially murdered who later turned out to be innocent, including, so it now seems, Dr Crippen. That's all the argument I need to convince me it is a wrong thing to do. The discussion about what to do instead belongs elsewhere.

Incidentally, isn't that an annoying Scientology advert on your blog? Now they should be shot at dawn, as they all believe they are going to live for a billion years, as long as they pay enough to to owners of the cult.

Personally my view is that life imprisonment should mean life. Not 15 years, to be let out on good behaviour. Far better to lock someone up in the starkest and most miserable of conditions and throw away the key than to execute them. Their should be more rehabilitation schemes to free up prison space for people who commit the worst crimes that would probably warrant execution in the States (for example).

I feel execution releases an individual from any obligation to reflect upon and live with what they have done. It isn't a punishment anymore.

it is a difficult subject really because of the what if's that will always be involved however I think sometimes capital punishment is needed for example these people who admit to crimes and are totally insane to admit they will do it again if thats the case then time to flick the switch

i think that in this day and age, people convicted solidly (due to evidence including DNA,) on a pre-meditated murder charge should serve time on a basic 'death row' style wing, before execution.
Sentences no longer fit the crime. More often than not ofenders get a slap on the wrist in the form of a community punichment order or suspended sentence, and those that DO get locked up go to cushy prisons with all sortss of great facilities and only have to serve about 2 thirds of their sentence before they can get early release!!!

My brother was killed by a drunk driver. I do not want the driver to be killed. I want him in prison. For life. I want him in a 6ftx6ft concrete box. No exercise. Bread, water and vitamins to keep him alive given to him every day. A toilet that is just a hole in the ground. No sink, no wash basin, nothing nice, no visits from family or friends, no tv, no christmas, no birthday, no sex. He has no rights. He lost them all when he took my brother. I want him to live out his natural life locked away.

He was banned from driving for three years, which he ignored, and fined £750, which he paid a £1 a week. He was four times over the limit. He doesn't remember anything about hitting my brother.

I hate him with every ounce of my body but I don't want him dead.

There was one alternative in the past when "Deportation" was the founding of Australia.

Consider, if you will, a modern variation. The premis being that the environment each of us shares is, to say the least, a cosy option and not dissimilar to that inside a prison with the "freedom" element removed.

Suppose the "prisoner" were in a foreign place where people look and behave differently and use a language other than english. Suppose the "prisoner" had some really hard work to do each day before he/ she had access to basic food or a place to sleep under cover.

What I am thinking of is service overseas in a developing country but under a specifically controlled regime in some location where escape might be possible but would probably lead to a far greater hardship than the one being endured under the existing regime.

There might also be a way forward to encourage the longer serving "lags" into being in charge of the others. Perhaps this would be something for everyone to look forward to as it would have more priviledges but more sanctions too if one slipped from grace by one's deeds or lack of them in such a position.

A closed society which, together, works for the good of others less priviledged. A society who is exposed to how others have to live on a daily basis, a constant reminder of what each member of this society has foresaken because of their illegal activities (murder and other lesser but none the less violent activities). A close society in which they can make a new start and one which promises to reward them for their labours but only on a scale which relates to the lesser standards which prevail in their current location rather than those "back home".

For the victims friends and relations there is the knowledge that the perpetrator(s) now have a much harder existance than before yet there will be some good come out of it. A local water supply; A school building for a village; The detritus of flood, earthquake or famine tidied away in an orderly fashion leaving the real residents more time on their hands to pick up their lives as best they can. A cross fertilisation of minds between those who have nothing and those who did sometime in the past but have a lesson to learn that has been set by their former society based upon the extent and nature of their crime.