Volume I No. 30
 10-27-02
 John Allen Muhammad - John Lee Malvo
 { The Case Against The Death Penalty For The DC Snipers }
 author: Vance Cureton
 © Copyright 2002

 The pair that are responsible for three weeks of terror in the 
 Washington D.C. area are safely behind bars in federal custody.
 Now the inevitable turf wars as to what happens next are slowly
 beginnning to show that the regional coperation of police agencies
 - including - the FBI is already fractured.

 In fact, there is some grumbling - in FBI ranks -about the quickness 
 with which the Montgomery County prosecutors office filed 
 charges. As the federal government has not publicly announced 
 if they wanted to file additional charges { involving the murders } 
 before any of the involved jurisdictions did so. After all, Muhammad 
 and Malvo are in federal custody under arrest - in the case of 
 Muhammad - on a weapons charge, and in the case of Malvo, 
 as a material witness. 

 But what is the ugliest in all of this confusion is the seeming 
 blind rush to ensure that these two murderers are under threat 
 of the death penalty. Tune into almost any television station 
 and you will notice local prosecutors boldly announcing how 
 the "proper" charges can be finessed, so that both Muhammad 
 and Malvo are subject to the death penalty. { not all murders 
 are automatically death penalty cases - contributing factors 
 must be considered first } 

 All the facts of the sniper incidents are not known, nor is the 
 relationship between the 41 year old Muhammad, and his teenage 
 accomplice. But the prosecutors - acting like politicians eager to 
 please a mob crowd - seem to have a cold blood lust in their eyes. 
 As if the death penalty for these two men is the only possible 
 outcome.

 John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo are presumed to be
 responsible for some of the most heinous acts of civil terrorism,
 - and that's what it is terrorism - that this nation has ever witnessed.
 Neither should ever see the light of day again. But the presumption
 of so many that the death penalty is the only possible relief is 
 troubling. In the eyes of prosecutors and public officials, alike, 
 Muhammad and Malvo are all but convicted, and strapped onto 
 the gurney.

 This is disturbing to say the least. The ugly blood lust on display
 by some of our most distinguished public citizens. Never is there
 a mention that in many parts of the world, the dealth penalty is no
 more. Nor is in this time of revenge-seeking when emotions are high,
 is a contrary voice allowed as to the numbers in the U.S.A that are 
 uncomfortable with the death penalty for anyone. -- Juvenile or adult. 
 Mass murderer or lone gunman.

 Is this America's only ultimate answer to violence? More violence 
 performed in the name of the state. There is nothing that man - as 
 a being - can do to bring back lives that are taken. This is the cruelty 
 of life. And this is also what makes life so very precious. If they are
 eventually executed, the deaths of Muhammad and Malvo will return 
 nothing to its former state. Those ten dead people will still be just 
 as dead. And the state will then be just as responsible for the deaths 
 of two additional human beings.

 In many religious texts, taking a life, for a life, is justice. But there
 are many things that are not practiced in modern societies, that
 were readily accepted in the ancient world. Is it not the goal of 
 most societies, both secular and religious, that human beings 
 should always strive to improve themselves? Not only in the realm 
 of technology, or medicine, but in the nature of the communities
 they create and maintain.

 Perhaps the Europeans are onto something. The abandoning of 
 the death penalty in so many nations over there, is not about 
 giving evil people a free pass. The banning of the dealth penalty 
 is about eliminating the dark stain that state sanctioned murder 
 leaves upon a society. No human being has the right to take the
 life of another human being for any reason. 

 Not in the name of the state. Nor in the name of a God.

 One day the dealth penalty will be no more in the United States,
 as it will be eliminated in most of the world. But clearly that day
 is not here yet. America is a society obbessed with violence. The
 violence it allows. And the violence it perpetrates upon its own
 citizens in the name of justice. When the John Allen Muhammad's
 and John Lee Malvo's are consigned to a life of misery behind 
 bars - instead of being executed - no matter how many murders 
 they commited, it will be a sign that American culture has matured 
 just a little bit more. And has achieved a higher standard. For 
 what does it say about us when we allow criminals and evil-doers 
 to drag our entire society down into the barbarism they wallow in. 

 A barbarism we claim to abhor.

 For if the purposeful taking of a human life is not barbarism. 

 What exactly is it?
 

 ReadingPost.Com
 © Copyright 2002

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