They Need Killin' (Texas Death Penalty Related)
Rockadelic
Out Digging 13,993 Posts
This should have happened 10+ years ago......not only should this kind of scum be eradicated from the earth, it will be an added bonus if it makes other scumbags think twice before directing their murderous hate towards others.
Good riddance! One down, two more to go.
Killer in Jasper hate crime gets Sept. 21 death date
JASPER, TX (KTRK) -- The execution date is now set for one of the men convicted of dragging James Byrd Jr. to death in a racially motivated hate crime 13 years ago.
Byrd's family calls the development it's been waiting for bittersweet.
Louvon Harris, who now lives in northwest Harris County, says she expected June 7 -- the 13th anniversary of her brother's murder -- to be yet another with no news. That was until Tuesday when she got an unexpected phone call.
Harris has waited 13 years for this day.
"Thirteen is a long time," he said.
And for this phone call.
"She said well I got good news," Harris said.
On Tuesday, a judge in Jasper signed an order making September 21 Lawrence Brewer's execution date. He will be the first of two men to die for the racially motivated dragging death of James Byrd Jr. in 1998.
Harris is Byrd's sister, and she's been calling the attorney general's office every three months for years. On Tuesday, they called her.
"When she called, I felt a little peace, but then sadness, too," Harris said.
All the awful details came flooding back -- the torment, the trials, and the worst, that Harris' mother isn't alive to hear the news. Stella Byrd died last October.
"It was one of those things that she was concerned, will justice ever be served?" Harris said.
In his name, Byrd's family has hoped others learn.
"There's only one race and that's the human race and that we got to have different ideas and diversity and we all have one common denominator and we're humans," Harris said.
They have carried that message of peace around the country, all while waiting for a punishment to be carried out. Harris now knows where she'll be September 21.
"I hope to be there, not because it's going to be a happy occasion, but just to see that justice is done," she said.
That justice, she says, is neither swift nor fair.
"He'll get a lot better than my brother did. In two to three minutes, a needle go in his arm and he just slips away, and my brother was tormented for three to four hours on the road and was decapitated," Harris said.
John William King also got the death penalty. His case is still on appeal.
Sean Berry was sentenced to life and he's his most recent appeal was rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1997.
Most of Byrd's family still lives in Jasper.
Good riddance! One down, two more to go.
Killer in Jasper hate crime gets Sept. 21 death date
JASPER, TX (KTRK) -- The execution date is now set for one of the men convicted of dragging James Byrd Jr. to death in a racially motivated hate crime 13 years ago.
Byrd's family calls the development it's been waiting for bittersweet.
Louvon Harris, who now lives in northwest Harris County, says she expected June 7 -- the 13th anniversary of her brother's murder -- to be yet another with no news. That was until Tuesday when she got an unexpected phone call.
Harris has waited 13 years for this day.
"Thirteen is a long time," he said.
And for this phone call.
"She said well I got good news," Harris said.
On Tuesday, a judge in Jasper signed an order making September 21 Lawrence Brewer's execution date. He will be the first of two men to die for the racially motivated dragging death of James Byrd Jr. in 1998.
Harris is Byrd's sister, and she's been calling the attorney general's office every three months for years. On Tuesday, they called her.
"When she called, I felt a little peace, but then sadness, too," Harris said.
All the awful details came flooding back -- the torment, the trials, and the worst, that Harris' mother isn't alive to hear the news. Stella Byrd died last October.
"It was one of those things that she was concerned, will justice ever be served?" Harris said.
In his name, Byrd's family has hoped others learn.
"There's only one race and that's the human race and that we got to have different ideas and diversity and we all have one common denominator and we're humans," Harris said.
They have carried that message of peace around the country, all while waiting for a punishment to be carried out. Harris now knows where she'll be September 21.
"I hope to be there, not because it's going to be a happy occasion, but just to see that justice is done," she said.
That justice, she says, is neither swift nor fair.
"He'll get a lot better than my brother did. In two to three minutes, a needle go in his arm and he just slips away, and my brother was tormented for three to four hours on the road and was decapitated," Harris said.
John William King also got the death penalty. His case is still on appeal.
Sean Berry was sentenced to life and he's his most recent appeal was rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1997.
Most of Byrd's family still lives in Jasper.
Comments
And our murder rates up here generally run about half those in Texas - consistently, year after year. So much for making scumbags think twice.
We're glad you don't live here too.
I assume you mean "execution," not "conviction."
Yeah, we need to execute these people 3 minutes after they're convicted. A nice bullet to the back of the head, like they would do in more civilized countries. Never mind any of this sniveling about all the people on Death Row who have been exonerated years after the fact. Who cares? Never mind that the death penalty is applied in a racist fashion and that most people accused of capital murder get a rudimentary defense paid for with small change. Who cares? Executions are way cool and put hair on our national chest.
Let's put these executions on the tee-vee and make little kids watch them. That'll train the little varmints right. Hire Chuck Norris to host the show and call it "Walker, Texas Executioner."
I can hardly wait.
Right. I understand where you're coming from and I use to feel that way too until I moved in w my girl and found out our neighbors daughter was raped and killed at 7. Her moms life was ruined. I'm not sure what happened to the guy who did it because I couldn't bring it up but we live in California so he's probably still alive. Maybe even released or rehabilitated... Or more likely out to do it again.
It's easy to be compassionate toward something you're removed from but if that happened to you or someone close to you I'm pretty sure you'd be singing a different song.
I hope I'm not that weak. I don't think I am.
I'm not motivated by compassion for actual murderers. I don't care about them at all. I'm concerned about living in a decent society that doesn't behave in sick and stupid ways.
The death penalty is sick, stupid and pointless and even worse than that as it's applied in this country.
It should be pretty easy for you to find out what happened to the guy you're talking about if you really care all that much. But I guess you haven't bothered, so I have to conclude that you really don't care all that much. So before you draw conclusions about how you think I would act examine your own posturing.
Food for thought on the subject:
http://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/ctnj.php/archives/entry/op-ed_murder_victims_mother_suggests_the_big_picture_is_more_important/
http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/dthrow.htm
If you're going to use the bible to guide your morals you can't pick and choose.....or does "Thou Shalt Not Kill" somehow supercede "An Eye For An Eye"? .
As long as we have scumbags that tie a man to a truck and drag him until he is decapitated solely because of his skin color I will support the Death Penalty on a case by case basis.
And in this case, with this evidence and the scope of this crime...I support it one zillion percent.
If that makes me morally inferior or Un-Christian like, so be it.
My only problem with this case is that justice wasn't swift enough and the cost of housing this sub-human for 13 years could have put two law abiding folks through 4 years of college.
Lex Talionis
Mr. Byrd's family supports this execution and the execution of the other two scumbags who killed their brother/son.
Why should the above Mother's opinion mean any more than theirs?
Carry on.
I think these threads/debates are more about self righteousness and defending/expressing personal morals than changing anyone's mind.
Execution, median cost = $1.26 million. Non-death penalty cases through to the end of incarceration, median cost = $740,000.
(Based on a study in Kansas: http://www.amnestyusa.org/our-work/issues/death-penalty/us-death-penalty-facts/death-penalty-cost).
Bottom line for me is the hypocrisy of the position that "It's okay for us to kill you, but not for you to kill anyone." A society that sends this message is inherently fucked imo.
And the reality of the death penalty is that blacks (especially) or hispanics who kill whites are executed in an extreme disproportion to all other convicted murderers in the US. So in condemning this one racist act of Lawrence Brewer, you would happily support a racist system and condone the occasional execution of innocents. Pretty fucked up, me thinks.
Well, you started it. Fist pumps for bloodlust! Hooray! Kill!
Theologically speaking Thou Shalt Not Kill does supersede An Eye For An Eye.
And for Christians, Turn The Other Cheek supersedes An Eye For An Eye.
My current feeling is that even though some people deserve to die I do not want the state to have that authority.
Also, I believe we should Do Onto Others...
Which brings up the current death penalty brouhaha in Oregon. Inmate on death row is asking that appeals stop and he be put to death for the crimes he admits to.
There are plenty of studies that show that the Death Penalty actually costs less than LWOP.
Of course these are statistics presented by Pro-Death Penalty organizations just as your Kansas study was done by an anti-Death Penalty group. If you would seriously like to read an opposing study you can find many, including this one here....
http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/dp.html
What you call "Fistpumps for bloodlust" I call "Justice Being Served" and the celebration of this may be morally scrutable but is definitely on the side of the law.
Not being a Christian I don't believe that only God can judge people.
We as a society have to judge people by their actions and our society has determined that these Jasper jack-offs no longer deserve to live with the rest of us.
And I support that decision and am glad to see the victim's family getting a modicum of satisfaction from it.
I respect anyone who is morally against the Death Penalty.....and don't expect to be able to change their opinion.
Can you respect someone who supports it?
If we want to add historical accuracy to that, "an eye for an eye" is not from the Bible, though it's referred to in it. It's from the Code of Hammurabi, which predates the Bible by centuries, at least.
That said, I have mixed feelings about the death penalty as well. I'm somewhat inclined to agree with Rock's notion of using it on a (carefully weighed) case-by-case basis.
The thought of Christians doing unto me that which they would have me do unto them is repulsive. I know that this so called "Christian" moral is actually Confucian in origin, but still I'd have hoped we'd have moved beyond assuming the desires of everyone around us coincide with our own and forcing our own ideas on them.
I also agree however that the state should not have the power to decide on capital punishment. The closest surviving relative should make the decision, as well as carry it through.
Sorry, but I can't justify the death penalty by pointing to one scumbag and saying, "Dude has it coming." Lots of dudes have it coming. That doesn't make it a good policy.
I'd much rather take the needle than spend the rest of my life in a maximum security prison in Texas, by the way. It's not even a close decision.
Maybe so, but the fact is that support for the death penalty goes up and down in this country all the time. It has gone down over the past decade as case after case has been overthrown by DNA testing, for example.
I'm not willing to trade the execution of the occasional innocent so DP fans can have the occasional jizzfest over the death of a real scumbag. Texas gets to avenge James Byrd, fine, but who is going to avenge this guy?:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/09/07/090907fa_fact_grann
No one. Texas murdered him collectively, so they get to skate and move on to the next party at the fence.
That "study" made me laugh out loud. The section where they work out the respective costs is ludicrous in the extreme.
http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/dp.html#D.Cost
They're positing 50 years per life sentence and just 6 years on Death Row per death sentence. Talk about cooking the books!
Precisely the reason emotion has no place in logic.
I've read too many Byron Coley reviews or something.