Not a way to go
January 30th, 2009by andy 
Getting killed isn’t something I really like thinking about. It’s something I like to sweep to the back of my mind if at all possible. Some people don’t have that option though. Some people get killed by their governments. The US are particularly open about the way they kill people, and how their final hours are actually spent.
I got hold of some data and the results are quite chilling. I wonder if Mr Obama is aware of these facts.
No Family. No TV.
In 19 US states, once you have been given the death sentence, you are not even allowed to see your family. Ohio grants you the privilege of seeing your family through glass. No contact though. That would be too human I guess.
Most states allow access to a television, but not all. New Jersey, Oklahoma, Texas and Utah deny this basic pleasure to the people that they kill. Why?
Even access to a lawyer is not guaranteed. Several states don’t even allow this.
They lock you up for around 23 hours a day too, unless you are in Idaho where you can expect to be locked up 24 hours a day.
And then there’s Texas. Who had killed 407 people when this research was carried out. They also deny their death row prisoners pretty much every privilege there is. They must be special people, Texan penitentiary staff.
Quite barbaric, don’t you think?
Death Row Conditions in the US
| TV | Family Access | Training | Work | Solid Door | Group Activity | Lawyer | Isolation | Killed Since '76 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alabama | yes | yes | yes | yes | not sure | 38 | |||
| Arizona | yes | 23 hrs | 23 | ||||||
| Arkansas | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 17 | ||||
| California | yes | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 13 | |||
| Colorado | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 1 | ||||
| Conneticut | yes | limited | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 1 | |||
| Georgia | yes | yes | yes | yes | 21 hrs | 42 | |||
| Idaho | yes | yes | yes | 24 hrs | 1 | ||||
| Illinois | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 12 | ||||
| Indiana | yes | yes | yes | yes | 19 | ||||
| Kansas | yes | yes | 23.5 hrs | ||||||
| Louisiana | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 27 | |||||
| Mississippi | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 9 | |||||
| Missouri | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | no | 66 | ||
| Nevada | yes | yes | yes | yes | not sure | ||||
| NJ | through glass | yes | yes | 22/23 hrs | |||||
| New Mexico | yes | 1 | |||||||
| NY | yes | yes | 23 hrs | ||||||
| N Carolina | yes | yes | yes | 8 hrs | 43 | ||||
| Ohio | yes | semi contact | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | 9-21 hrs | 26 |
| Oklahoma | yes | yes | yes | 87 | |||||
| Oregon | yes | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 2 | |||
| Pennslyvania | yes | yes | yes | yes | 22/23 hrs | 3 | |||
| S Carolina* | yes | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 39 | |||
| South Dakota | yes | yes | 1 | ||||||
| Tennessee* | yes | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 4 | |||
| Texas | yes | 23 hrs | 407 | ||||||
| Utah | yes | 23 hrs | 6 | ||||||
| Virginia | yes | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 101 | |||
| Washington | yes | yes | yes | yes | yes | 23 hrs | 4 | ||
| Wyoming | yes | yes | yes | 23.5 hrs | 1 | ||||
| TV | Family Access | Training | Work | Solid Door | Group Activity | Lawyer | Isolation | Killed Since '76 |
Thanks to deathpenaltyinfo and the Texas Department of Criminal Justice for the original research.
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Tags: america
Posted in Incoming | Comments (2)
January 31st, 2009 at 2:44 pm
while this information and these statistics are troubling by all measure of human decency, didn’t the people now sitting on death row (and those who did and have been executed), didn’t they do some heinous crime that got themselves sentenced to death? While an eye for an eye is fairly barbaric, I think if we all take a moment and imagine what it was like in the last moments of life for, say, our daughter or sister or brother or 80-yr-old mother, before they were murdered by some fucking asshole who now watches tv while awaiting his death, we might think that 23 hrs a day lockup is not a bad deal. In fact, if I had had a loved one, or even a casual friend, murdered, I’d only hope they were murdered quickly so as to not feel pain. Because if the murdering asshole decided to rape my sister or mother or wife or girlfriend for, say, 28 days straight, and THEN decided to kill her, I’d feel even worse that they are no longer here.
As for the murderers who find themselves on death row? I believe that once a killer has been found guilty, he or she ought to suffer pretty much the same fate as what they gave so coldly to another human being. Lets say, immediately after the trial is over, in the public square (to make an example of them), as viciously and dramatically as humanely possible. Because, if you were to ever suffer such a loss as the life of your family through murder, all the retribution I have just laid down would go through your mind immediately after learning of their fate.
February 2nd, 2009 at 9:15 pm
Yes yes, I agree. They have done bad. They MUST be bad people (assuming they haven’t been wrongly convicted) so they should just take the punishment. The ultimate punishment.
So why not let them see their families?