Death+Penalty+Podcast

Podcast Script Nathan Meyer, Kenny Fenske, Alex LaCombe

Nathan- Tyler McDonald- __Anchor__ Kenny- Cartman Bolt __Interviewee (agrees)__ Alex- Bobby Jones __interviewee (disagrees)__ (Intro music) Nathan- Hello and welcome to SLI News, I’m Tyler McDonald with the inside scoop on the death penalty. To start off, the death penalty is federal punishment issued for serious cases such as homicide, or multiple homicides. In the US, there are currently 34 states that use the death penalty, Texas being the highest at 405 cases using the death penalty since 1976 to 2008. Currently in the United States, lethal injection is the most commonly used method of executions, making up 84.5% of all the death penalties in the US. Today we have two guests with us today who will explain their point of view on the death penalty. Our first guest is Cartman Bolt, a US. Representative from Texas. Hello, Cartman welcome to SLI News.

Thanks for having me it’s my pleasure.

So what is your view point on the death penalty?

Well I agree with the death penalty.

So could you tell me what are some of your reasons for supporting it?

Well, I have many reasons for why I support the death penalty. The first reason that I support the death penalty is that no justice system can be correct 100% of the time. There is room for human error so mistakes will be made but that’s when they rely on DNA tests or other f orensic tests for prooof or disproof. The risk of making a mistake on the final judgment is very small but it can still happen. This is the reason why the justice system has a higher standard for death penalty cases.

Ok, is there more?

Yes, my next reason is that crimes of multiple 3rd degree rapes, torture to human, homicides, and multiple homicides are proven to happen less often since the death penalty has been established.

Interesting

My third reason is that some of the people who don’t support the death penalty say that it doesn’t honor the human dignity. This is wrong it is actually the complete opposite. The death penalty honors human dignity. It treats the defendant as a type of person that is able to control his fate. It doesn’t treat him like trash or garbage laying on the street. . Also some say that the methods of execution are painful and are an inhumane. But this also is not true because all types of execution are quick and almost painless. With the leathal injection, they inject a numbing chemical so that the person does not feel pain.

My last reason for supporting the death penalty is that people fear death more than anything. So the death penalty deters criminals more than life in prison. We have to execute murderers as long as we can to protect the communities from future murders.

Ok Cartman thank you for coming by and sharing your point-of-view with the audience today.

My pleasure Tyler. Our next guest is Bobby Jones he is a local priest.

Hi Bobby thanks for being at SLI news.

Thank you Tyler it’s an honor being here.

So are you against or for the death penalty?

Honestly Tyler I am against the death penalty.

Why are you against it Bobby?

Well, I have a couple reasons that I’m against it. The first reason is that the death penalty cost too much. It cost about 37 million dollars just for one execution, because of all the legal fees it takes to sentence or defend someone that could go on death row. It cost less just to put someone in jail for life. My second reason is that I find that it violates the 8th amendment.

Why is that?

Because the death penalty is a cruel and unusual way to kill someone. They either hang you inject you with a ton of drugs and they have the electric chair.

Ok. Do you have any other reasons?

Of course, I think that it is not a very good deterrent because they try to scare criminals but crimes just stay the same nothing goes down. The percentages in the crimes in America have not gone down just because some states have the death penalty now. Another reason is that they are racist about the death penalty. Almost 1/3 of African Americans are in the death row for something and some of those people are innocent. 71 % of the people on death row are African American, 53 % are white people, 12% are Latino, and the other 2% are- other races.

My last reason is that there is a good chance that there are people that are innocent in the death penalty line. The government can easily make a mistake on the DNA and let the real criminal get away. As an example: in 2003, Madison Hobley, Aaron Patterson, Stanley Howard and LeRoy Orange were sent to death row on the basis of "confessions" extracted through the use of torture by former Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge and other Area 2 police officers in Chicago. They were pardoned by outgoing Governor George Ryan, who also commuted the remaining 167 death sentences in Illinois to life imprisonment.

Wow, those are some pretty serious facts. Well, thank you Bobby for giving us some input on the disagreements of the death penalty.

Yep, no problem, thanks for having me.

Nathan: And that’s the ending for our discussion on the Death Penalty. But as we look as the death penalty, and overriding question comes up; Is it right to execute someone for their actions? This is a question that, as we just heard in this podcast, can be answered in many ways. Hopefully, you can use the information you learned in this podcast to create your own opinion on the death penalty (pause) All of our resources can be found on our blog at www.Death-penalty101.blogspot.com. We would like to thank Cartman Bolt, and Bobby Jones for coming down to the studio today. This is Tyler McDonald with SLI News, be sure to tune into our next podcast. Goodbye.

 [] [] []