New Jersey abolishes death penalty

I'm a NJ resident who is still wondering why the death penalty law was repealed.
There were eight inmates sitting on NJ's death row, most of whom I believe have run out of appeals. But yet for reasons unknown they haven't been executed. Is it because the bulk of the judiciary tends to be liberal and won't sign off on the execution order or is it something else? I don't know.
But if applied judiciously and only in extreme cases then why not keep the death penalty on the books? I'm not in favor of over-using it like under GWB in Texas or in some other states. I'm just saying use it in extreme cases.

 

Keep the death penalty -- throw out the judicial system!

 

It's also more expensive to keep prisoners on Death Row awaiting the outcome of their appeals.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/02/opinion/nyregionopinions/02NJharrison.html

The state’s bipartisan Office of Legislative Services estimates that repealing the death penalty will save taxpayers $32,481 per death row inmate annually because the costs of housing inmates on death row are much greater than housing them with the general prison population. Given that there are 8 people on New Jersey’s death row, and assuming that they live 20 more years each, taxpayers could save nearly $5.2 million — money that could go to victims’ families.

 

I'd just as soon we left the list of death penalty countries -- many of whom are those nasty terr'ist places -- and joined the rest of the civilized world. You cannot square the death-penalty with the "cruel and unusual" clause. Can't be done. This is what Harry Blackmun called "tinkering with the machinery of death," and said he would have no more part of it.

 

We have killings allowed in this country for many instances. Abortion; war deals with state-sponsored killing in a really big way. I'm for allowing abortions, I'm for allowing killing in wars, I am for swift execution of death row inmates, I am for mercy killing in the vein of Dr. Kevorkian.

I understand why people don't want executions. I just don't buy the "I don't want the government killing people" argument - unless you are against any and all forms of war.

 

So JR, do Canadian soldiers kill people in time of war?

If so, how do you reconcile that?

 

I don't believe this...Poin and I are in full agreement on this!

 

Timondequas isn't the only monster on NJ's death row. Ambrose Harris is another one that should be put down.

In 1992 he was released from prison after serving just 13 years of a 30-year without parole sentence for armed robbery.
He then, with the assistance of a female accomplice, kidnapped, raped and murdered 22-year-old Kristin Huggins. He put her in the trunk of his car, drove her off somewhere, raped her, shot her in the head and then buried her.
After being found guilty in 1996, the judge asked him if there was anything he'd like to say to Huggins' parents. He turned to them and suggested they apologize to him. That outburst caused the judge to remove him from the courtroom.
Three years later, he killed fellow death-row inmate Robert "Mudman" Simon in self-defense in a prison fight.

 

Full moon.

 

Not to mention, guilty in 99.9999 percent of the cases. A 7-year-old ought to know killing another human being is the most evil thing you can do, and you will suffer dearly if you do it. So why, if that's one of the first things a person learns in life, one of the most basic foundations of human society, shouldn't they pay with their own life if they murder someone?
There are acts that are so despicable and heinous that no other punishment fits. You take a life in cold blood, you should pay with your own. Period. You can say life in prison makes them suffer more. I disagree. When you let them live out their days in a cell, you allow them to die on their own terms. Whether it's by suicide or from old age 50 years from now. But when the threat of the death penalty is there, you're not giving them that option. You're putting their fate in someone else's hands, like they did to their victims. That's justice.
And it IS a deterrent, no matter what anyone says. It's a deterrent to the murderer. They won't kill again.
I'm all for appeals to make sure everything is on the up and up and the guy is guilt. But when you're on the 10th or 15th appeal, and you're arguing that he should be let off the hook because one of the jurors looked sleepy during the third day of character witness testimony, that's not the same as innocence.

One other thought...are the New Jersey state prisons on 23-hour lockdown as a general rule? I know death rows usually are, but without a death row will these guys go back into the general prison population? If so, I have a feeling Jesse Timmendequas might not be off of death row.

 

I was home for the summer from college when Harris kidnapped that woman. IIRC, that was the same year Timmendequas killed Megan Kanka. Kanka may have been 1997, I'm not sure. I remember seeing flyers posted around town asking for information on a missing girl -- Megan Kanka.
Both Harris and Timmendequas are pieces of shit who deserve to burn in the hottest, deepest pit of hell.

 

I take it you would favor cutting off the hands of thieves?