wait, wait, I'm confused.

If a straight boy was bullying a gay kid; and the gay kid killed the bullyer, it'd likely be controversial that charges were being brought at all. And the 'battered wife' defense is basically accepted where women kill husbands under premeditated circumstances where life/harm is not imminent (the general standard for self-defense). So I don't really see how this case is any different that kid gets bullied and kills the perpetrator. As you so excellently describe, the genders and orientations really aren't framing (for me) if this is murder/manslaughter/defensible.

I find it TOTALLY POSSIBLE for a jury to fail to convict if these were two straight kids of opposite sex.

I owe Ken a response from Morning News comments too, so here's what I saw unfold leading to this terrible result, just from reading the coverage in the LA Times over the last weeks.

I think the prosecution made conviction unlikely by choosing to try the killer as an adult. Even with a charge as "low" as manslaughter, that meant prosecutors absolutely had to convince the jury the killer had the reasoning, independent-mindedness and thus should be held to the same standard of behavior as any grownup. When the defense entered pretty convincing evidence that the killer was, before and at the time he acted, however premeditatedly, a deeply conflicted and insecure adolescent who hadn't grown up enough to break free from his truly nasty, racist, gender-fascist piece of shit abusive father, the prosecutors' job got even tougher. They needed to present a greater counterweight of compelling evidence that the killer was acting or capable of acting in an adult mental capacity, and I don't see that they did.

The other side, even sadder to me, is what the jury was told about the victim. Once the jury learned that Larry was not "just" gay but presented gender identity questioning behavior, and had used active taunting in order to forestall bullying, the prosecutors had to contextualize and humanize all that for the jury, let them see any "bad" behavior as originating in the same sort of suffering the jury members had all felt before. And I don't see that they did that.

Unable to assign the killer the adult role, and unable to overcome that by identifying closely enough with the victim, the jury was unable to agree on a conviction.

Again, bear in mind, this is based on my reading mostly of the LA Times the last weeks - their coverage seemed solid, but I can't be sure.

I hate that we prosecute children as adults these days. Children act far more out of emotion than logic, and 18 is a reasonable age for being considered an adult - not 14 or 12 or whatever the standard is these days.

The person that should be held under manslaughter charges is whoever owns that gun.

i see where you're going with this, dan... but the route you take to get to the conclusion is confusing.

No, Dan it is not impossible to imagine the scenario you lay out at the end of this post. It might be impossible for you to imagine it since you are so emotionally invested in the death of King but it could happen.

I agree with @ 3. 15 year olds should not be be tried as adults. The prosecution should have tried this in juvenile court.

My reaction to your hypothetical -- I agree that it is really unlikely that a straight boy would be let off for killing a straight girl who teased/tormented. But, if a straight girl was the one who killed a male tormentor? I don't know. I mean, I don't think it's a likely outcome (just as I wouldn't have thought the likely outcome was Brandon McInerney getting off), but I can see it happening...

Damn. Hard to believe Sheppard was that long ago.

Obviously, five jurors bought the defense's argument. One would have been enough.

I think what Dan is most disturbed by, and didn't show it clearly is that the jury was not deadlocked on any of the more severe charges. Brandon McInerney was charged with First Degree Murder with a Hate Crime aggrevation as well as with lesser charges. Only the Involuntary Manslaughter charge got the mistrial, which means that the other charges got unanimous votes.

Isn't this exactly what state and federal hate crime laws are for - when bigoted local officials fail to prosecute?

If this was a typical gay-panic defense and the victim was guilty only of flirting with the killer, then this is a total outrage.

However if this is a matter of a bully wearing someone down until they snap and kill them...it becomes less clear. Of course execution is not a deserved response to bullying, but it can certainly mess with your mental stability and I'm not surprised that a jury would have a hard time coming to a consensus on convicting a 14 year old of adult manslaughter in such a case, regardless of the genders involved.

@1 You're right- you are confused... or do you have some proof to back up your wild assertion that a girl/gay boy shot another student in school and wasn't charged for it?

yeah. That's what I thought.

I'm going through a lot of crap at home right now, so I'm pretty emotional, but when I read this on Gawker when I got to work this morning, I just sat here and cried. A 14 year old kid had it coming, 2 bullets in his brain. People really are awful. In 2011.

@ 9 What are you talking about? You can't be convicted of 1st degree murder and manslaughter for the killing of one person. The jury was deadlocked with 5 wanting to convict on 1st or 2nd degree murder and 7 wanting to convict on manslaughter. The prosecution over reached with charging the killer as an adult and with 1st degree murder.

Along the lines of @2, I think that the jury deadlocked because the prosecution made the mistake of trying the defendant as an adult. But I'll go one further. I believe that it's patently unconstitutional up to the point of criminal prosecutorial misconduct to try ANY juvenile as an adult. This is because no juvenile can successfully argue that he or she is entitled to the same rights as an adult and be allowed to vote. While that's still the law of the land, it's therefore improper to hold a kid to adult responsibilities in criminal matters as well.

I wonder how much this

"The defense reached for jury sympathy by calling relatives to testify to the abuse McInerney routinely suffered at the hands of his father, a drug abuser. McInerney was a boy who couldn't cry, because if he did his father would smack him in the face, his aunts testified."

had to do with it.

Also seems like it was more than provocative dress and lewd remarks. More like out and out sexual harassment which the school seemed to do nothing about. King certainly had the right to dress as he wanted, but no one has the right to sexually harass others in school.

Not saying what the McInerney did was right, but I can certainly see how a jury might have a hard time convicting a 14 year old who had a fucked up home life as an adult in a case like this.

Not at all similar to Matthew Shepard where at best you had some unwanted flirting in a bar among adults.

Bullies are terrible and ruin people's lives. Except when the bullies are gay.

Of course I don't think that kid deserved to be killed. Unfortunately I suspect that if the sexuality of the two kids were switched we would not be reading the same kind of post from Dan.

This just sucks from start to finish. I don't even have a knee-jerk response to it one way or another, because I don't know how I feel about it. Was Larry King trying to protect himself or being a bully? Is Brandon McIereny a homophobe, or did he legitimately think he was defending himself from sexual harassment and possible violence? It's not as though sexual harassment doesn't often turn into violence. It's not clear to me from the stories I've seen on the case.

What is clear is it's a tragedy. And just as clearly, the kid left alive has too thin a skin and needs to be severely punished, and probably spend some time in prison. But at 14, trying him as an adult...? I don't know. It all makes me uncomfortable.

I can totally imagine a girl getting off on charges if she shot someone and then claimed that she was being sexually harassed. That's the standard defense used by murdering (or disfiguring) housewives...and sometimes it works.

We live in a society that collectively thinks violence is a viable solution for many of our problems. Just ask the President or the guy at the gas station.

America = Violent.

The news this morning said that if the prosecutors had taken the possibility of life in prison out of the equation the defendant would have taken a plea for manslaughter. It seems the problem is not establishing guilt but what is an appropriate punishment for such a young defendant. Everyone in the jury was in favor of his going to jail.

@5: Yeah, the same sort of homophobic culture that allows this to occur is linked to strong misogyny, but usually it's a full-grown woman in control over her (FEARSOME AND UNGODLY) sexuality and not a young girl being blamed.

We will never be free of hatred and violence in this country. Soon there will be armed conflict between the christianists and the GLBTQ's. Someone won't be able to take this anymore and will come undone.
Complete and total mis-carriage of justice happened on September 1, 2011.

I was so horrified when I heard this yesterday. There's just nothing good about this case. But can anybody explain how a kid threatens to bring a gun to school the next day, puts it in his backpack, sits in class behind his intended victim for 20 minutes & then pulls it out and shoots him ... and that DOESN'T add up to pre-meditation?

Earlier things I heard before (when they were in deliberations and got orders from a judge to come to a conclusion or it would be a mistrial -- which it now is) and after the mistral said that the jury was in disagreement about which charge they should convict on -- so that it wasn't that 7 agreed on voluntary manslaughter and 5 were voting to let him go, but that those in disagreement on the voluntary manslaughter charges were voting to convict on the adult murder charges. Based on Dan's reading (and my reading of the linked article he linked), I guess I either imagined that reading or was making assumptions (or hearing other people's assumptions) that weren't there. Did anyone else hear that?

To be honest, as heinous a crime it is, I would have a really hard time convicting a 14 year old of any adult crime, especially murder one with additional hate crime charges and life in prison, and I wish the prosecutors had made some sort of deal, even if I wouldn't have completely liked the message it sent. Maybe that makes me a softy liberal but it's the same way, God forbid, I'd want my hypothetical kid to be treated in the same situation.

I think GLSEN's statement says it all and reminds me that there are gay organizations that are worthy to support at a national level:

"The mistrial declared today is hardly a surprise," GLSEN Executive Director Eliza Byard said. "This was always destined to be a case with little resolution and no winners, whatever the verdict. The central facts remain the same: homophobia killed Larry King and destroyed Brandon McInerney's life, and adults failed both young men because of their own inability to deal forthrightly and compassionately with the multiple challenges they each faced. The jury's indecision is a sad reflection of our collective inability to find common ground and invest in a better future for all youth and a culture of respect for all."

I just don't believe in trying juveniles as adults. These are middle schools students!

Dan, this was a very poor vehicle for a critique of how badly gays are still treated by the system. And your wholehearted embrace of the draconian punishment model rather than the root of the problem model shows your asshole side in this case.

@1 Find such a case where that happened. Hint: You won't in the US because bullying happens every day to a lot of kids and they don't kill each other over it, they kill each other over drugs a lot, but not bullying so much, and I have yet to hear of one bully case that ended in murder by a kid .... but that still doesn't apply here anyway, does it, no. This is an obvious premeditated murder, no excuses, though I feel sorry that the kid who pulled the trigger is so confused about his own sexuality that he'd go that far. Even adults don't take this step very often, yes it does happen, but not very often. So you really just don't get it, that's all that can be said.

As for the "don't prosecute children as adults" crowd, here's the ugly truth, there is no other way because parents do nothing, and something like murder changes you, it hardens you when you are the murderer, ask a soldier who's been to war and they'll warn against it, or a cop that has to shoot a criminal. The only reason they are not lost causes is because of the reason, to them it's self defense or defense of the law or country. To someone who kills just because, without a real threat, there is no turning back because something snaps. Justify it all you want, a cold blooded killer is a cold blooded killer for life, never forget Gary.

@25 LogopolisMike: nice post.

Not pursuing Murder One wouldn't make you a softy liberal. It would make you rational.

It's so much more complicated than you laid out. Both of these kids were very troubled for many reasons and they both needed assistance of loving, caring, adults, and both of them didn't get it. I don't think the jury deadlocked because the victim was gay. I think the jury deadlocked because they rightfully didn't want to convict a child for an adult offense. Only one child died, which is unequivocally a tragedy, but the life of another child is ruined, which is also pretty sad.

Dan: by your reasoning here 14 year old girls and boys should be assumed to have the maturity to decide whether or not to have sex with a 40 year old, and they should be allowed to contract for house loans, and sign contracts to join the military, and vote, etc. etc. But we don't allow these things because we recognize they don't have that level of maturity.

Wait, the bullying is excused because it was just to forestall bullying by other students? This is crazy if it's being presented as a valid defense to bullying. This is essentially why ALL bullying occurs (to victimize others before being victimized yourself); whether it is because the kid is gay or because their parent is an alcoholic or whatever - Unless we choose to believe the bullies are born, not made.

Secondly, at @12; the kids who bullied Phoebe Prince are slowly being worked through the justice system; and this involves presumptively straight kids. Everyone basically cheered "Zangief Kid" when tossed that little twerp bully to the ground - what would we be saying if he'd broken his neck?

At the end of the day, I still don't see a fundamental gender and orientation component to this. Kids who get bullied are basically allowed retribution up to the point that they cross the line of proportionality, and that's what we see here.

Does anyone else think it would have been a less tragic outcome if the kid had just shot his drugged-out, physically abusive father, intead of his classmate?

Guess I'm in the minority here, but if my kid got murdered at school I'd want that 14 year old psychopath to face consequences more severe than being locked up until he was 21.

This is Dan in all his Pro-Iraq-War glory. I'm angry and threatened so someone must be punished with shock and awe.

TV dinner: I don't think are in the minority. I would want the same thing probably, but we have a system designed for benefit of society, not for the benefit of vengeance seekers. I believe in preparing the system in a way that would force me find another resolution for myself than pure vengeance. There have been a lot of follow-ups with families who thought the death penalty conviction of a killer would give them closure, but found that the "closure" of conviction served more as an ideological victory for someone else than a benefit to them.

And while your at it. If we have a victim based system, why not allow a dead child's parents to take money in lieu of punishment? if that makes them feel more "whole"?

14/15 years old is not fucking adult. The kid should be remanded to juvenile hall until he's 18, receive intense counseling, then have the record expunged when he's 18.

I hope the prosecutors re-think the charges, and re-try him. He's too young to be tried as an adult, but he does need to go to jail (juvenile) for this. He murdered someone, and that is not the answer to harassment, sexual or otherwise.

If I recall, when someone is convicted as a juvenile, they can only be held until they are 25 (this may have changed).

This whole situation is tragic. Just terrible.

@33 the instinct for revenge is barbaric. It's natural to feel vindictive after a family member has been wronged, but intelligent people realize that they aren't capable of being rational after an event like this. This is why we don't allow grieving parents to make decisions regarding the punishment of the accused. We rely on the cold third-party logic of a judge or jury.

The fact is, our legal system's desire to try children as adults for serious crimes is a fucking human rights scandal, as viewed from other first-world countries. Due to a lack of frontal cortex development, a 15-year-old kid is necessarily not as capable of understanding the long-term consequences of killing someone as a 30-year-old is. We cannot treat them the same in the eyes of the law. However, we do, and places like the UK and Sweden and Canada lose that much more respect for us.

And the 'battered wife' defense is basically accepted where women kill husbands under premeditated circumstances where life/harm is not imminent (the general standard for self-defense).

No, it isn't. A few high-profile cases aside, it's very unusual for a jury to accept the battered wife defense as a get-out-of-jail free card, and there are many formerly battered women in prison today. Even a woman who killed her abuser as she was being beaten has a high probability of going to prison for it.

Yeah, I just can't get outraged by this. Kid was 14, and I just don't expect 14-year-olds to have the same self-control that adults do (or should). At that age you're basically an automaton that spouts off whatever your parents or friends told you. You've barely had any time to do any real thinking of your own (if any), so how can I blame you for who you are?

Does the kid scare me? Yes. Do I think he needs to be locked up so that he doesn't kill other people? Yes. But trying him as an adult was a step too far. Kid needs extensive treatment, not to be thrown into the prison system.

At 14 we all knew what killing was and that society says no to killing without reason. Hell, I can remember knowing this at 8 years old, and if you don't know what death means by 6 you're pretty stupid.

35 and 38: You're right, of course. It's the adults who surrounded these kids who failed so badly to prevent this. I hope this kid grows up to recognize the enormity of his actions and is able to express real contrition to his victim's family. I just keep thinking of that little piece of shit who killed Tuba Man and not only has gone on to commit more crimes but has bragged about the murder. He was tried as a juvenile, and look how that's turned out.

@45,

I'm sure the prosecutor would have been more than happy to prosecute the Tuba Man's killers as adults, but the available evidence didn't allow for an aggressive prosecution, or really any prosecution. They all took a plea.

"or a jury failing to convict a girl who murdered a male classmate for sexually harassing her"

I can definitely imagine that. But I think the real issue is trying him as an adult. If I was on that jury I would find it next to impossible to find a 14 year old guilty as an adult because 14 year olds aren't adults.

As the multi-year recipient of exactly that kind of abuse (and didn't shoot any of the perpetrators, nor even gave them the beating they so sorely deserved), I can sympathize with the killer. HOWEVER, I have to ask this:

Was the mean gay guy ACTUALLY hitting on and harassing the boy or was the boy taking the gay guy's out existence as harassment? As in, "You're out and you're gay, so you must be hitting on me." Some people think, incorrectly, that anything other than acing straight is a gay come-on.

I would have to agree with bassplayerguy. The kid is fourteen and should be tried as a minor, which he is, for killing the gay bully, which he did. Maybe this is less about the jury wanting to excuse a murder so long as it's of a gay person than about not wanting to try a child as an adult.

Yeah, I don't find it difficult to imagine an acquittal on the basis for a boy killing a girl or a girl killing a boy. I mean, if sexual bullying/harassment can drive someone to kill oneself, certainly it can drive one to kill others. There's a conversation to be had about whether or in what circumstances such a situation should constitute a legal defense, but I don't find your impossible-to-imagine scenarios even difficult to imagine. And I do think that harassment/bullying should be considered as a mitigating factor, especially when a student (required to be in the hostile environment by law) tries all of the appropriate/legal channels first and gets no support from them. Do you really not think there would be all sorts of people proclaiming that someone who was sexually bullying a gay kid and then was killed by that gay kid had it coming?

@3 -- I disagree with your assertion that a teenager shouldn't be tried as an adult because they're more emotional. Adults do stupid shit all the time for being emotional. 14's young, yes, but I'm not sure a planned revenge killing is one of those things that should be responded to with a few years in juvie hall and a wiped record.

@48: Yeah, ditto.

@38 said everything I wanted to say. Knee-jerk reactions are as bad coming from the left as they are from the right, and I'm pretty disappointed in Dan right now. Hopefully he will read this thread and temper his views.

As a woman, that's not at all hard for me to imagine, Dan. It would be just as outrageous as this case, and I'd be just as enraged, but I don't live in a world where the justice system has a great record when it comes to determining what women are or aren't "asking for" when it comes to expressions of their sexuality. Do you?

According to the LA Times, the prosecutors are saying they will definitely retry McInerney, but may decide not to charge him as an adult. If convicted of murder as a juvenile (which is what he was), he would likely be out by the time he's 25. I wouldn't really read the jury's failure to convict as saying that King was to blame for his own death -- 7 jurors were at least willing to go with voluntary manslaughter, and 5 wanted a murder conviction. I think Gloomy Gus @2 is spot on in his analysis, and others have echoed. This was a failure by the prosecution to get a very get-able conviction.

I think what we really have here is a jury's reluctance to go for adult murder charges against a child who was, after all, only 14 when this happened. There's this conservative idiocy that wants to charge children as adults yet believes teens are incapable of having sex, voting, drinking alcohol, etc. There's no doubt McIerney did it, the problem is how the prosecution went about it.

Dan,

You got a couple of facts wrong. They did not deadlock over manslaughter. They deadlocked over convicting the kid of first degree murder, second degree murder or manslaughter. It seems a minor point, but it should me made. No one on the journey was arguing for an acquittal.

Complicating matters further was the decision by the DA to try the 15 year old as an adult, which meant harsher sentencing, something some of the jurors expressed discomfort with. Did homophobia play into the deadlock? I'm sure it did. But the case is more complicated than just a gay panic defense.

@44: There's a difference between knowing something and knowing it. At 14, you know you've been told killing is bad, and maybe your superego is sufficiently developed that you recoil from the concept of killing. But you don't picture how the kid will look the moment after you pull the trigger, you don't see how you're robbing him of his entire future, you don't imagine the suffering on the faces of his family, and you have no fucking idea how losing a child completely devastates the parents.

Yes, you know killing is bad, like you know lying is bad and stealing is bad, but at 14 you can't really picture how much worse killing is, because your brain hasn't developed enough to plan for the future. It's only when you can envision the scope of suffering playing out over years that you have an adult's understanding of the wrongness of murder.

Now lets be honest with ourselves: we all do wrong things all the time. We lie to other people, we break rules, we try to get away with things. That's just human nature. The vast majority of us don't kill, because we have an adult's understanding that killing is really wrong, not just like keeping the extra change the cashier handed back.

Most 14-year-olds don't have that understanding, however, so they don't have the categorical refusal to kill that most adults have. It's easier for them to convince themselves-- or be convinced by others-- that this particular killing is justified.

tl;dr: 14-year-olds are not adults, and do not have the mental capacity to understand the wrongness of murder. Not all "wrong" things are created equal.

Hopefully the little piece of filth McInerney will end up like Dan White or Jeffrey Dahmer.

And hopefully karma will punish the complicit modern day kapo dyke attorney who went along with the "gay panic" defense. Bitch.

From the state that brought you Proposition 8.Politicians and religious groups bad-mouthing the LGBT community to force their point of view helps create an atmosphere in which this sort of thing becomes possible. Legal technicalities aside, it is wrong. And how come a 14 year old had access to a firearm?

@58: Why does it matter what understanding a 14-year-old has? A 14-year-old who commits premeditated murder is not going to grow up to be a responsible productive adult and should be locked up for the rest of his life. I don't care what his understanding is, I don't ever want him out of jail.

@38: Justice means people getting what they deserve. And if a 14-year-old kills someone and is convicted of murder, they deserve execution or a lifetime in jail. That's not revenge; it's justice.

Quoth @65:

A 14-year-old who commits premeditated murder is not going to grow up to be a responsible productive adult and should be locked up for the rest of his life.

Are you arguing from emotion or from statistics? Because you should know that people who commit violent crimes have significantly lower recidivism rates than other criminals:

http://www.sgc.wa.gov/pubs/recidivism/re…, page 2: "Despite generally held views, the more violent offenses, manslaughter, murder and robbery,
accounted for the smallest number of offenses and, along with sex offenses, the lowest recidivism rates."

http://www.sgc.wa.gov/Publications/Recid…, page 3: "As expected, the lowest recidivism rates were found among the more serious offenses such as
manslaughter and sex crimes."

Put more simply, your assertion that "a 14-year-old who commits premeditated murder is not going to grow up to be a responsible productive adult" is factually incorrect. Some do go on to commit additional crimes, yes. But the majority of violent offenders-- both juveniles and adults-- stay clean afterwards.

@65/66: I actually just learned about the recidivism rate discrepancy this week, when debating SB 391. It's causing me to rethink some of my conclusions about criminals and the prison system.

@66: I'm looking carefully at that report and I don't think it says what you think it says. You quote an excerpt that looks at all the past crimes committed, which points out that murder is a very rare crime. This is correct: in any group of people, previous criminal history or not, there will be far more who commit property and drug crimes than murder.

Now look at table 2, before that. Among that small group of murder convictions, over half, 56%, had committed previous crimes. The low recidivism rates you quote really just say that murder is a rare crime.

The reports you link to really don't give enough information, because they don't look at the base rate. What we need to know is to look at the number of murderers released, and how many of them committed crimes, or some sort of longitudinal study that followed them. The links you provide take the opposite approach, looking at the number of crimes committed now, and seeing how many of the criminals had past records.

(The reports are poorly written and it's difficult to tell what they mean by the terms they use, but that seems to be what they're doing.)

@65 So what's it like writing the code of morality for the Islamic judiciary of Iran? Does that pay pretty well?

@65

Your definition of justice is revenge. It's hard to argue with you until you understand the definition of "justice." Justice is making sure that a criminal will not be a danger to society in the future. It is NOT to punish them for crimes they committed in the past.

If someone commits a one-off heinous crime of passion (as in this case), it's not indicative that they're going to run around murdering people in the future.

The biggest problem with your post is this: "A 14-year-old who commits premeditated murder is not going to grow up to be a responsible productive adult and should be locked up for the rest of his life."

What it should say, more accurately, is, "A 14-year-old who commits premeditated murder is not going to grow up to be a responsible productive adult without serious psychological counseling and should receive said counseling to rehabilitate him, however long that takes." Imprisoning a child with rapists and real adult murderers is not rehabilitation, either.

Regardless of your personal thoughts or vendetta on this issue, it's been proven (and already argued in this very thread) that a 14 year old does NOT have the same understanding of the finality of death that adults do. They also don't have impulse control, which isn't fully-developed until the mid-20s. Trying this kid as an adult is a tragedy that, little-by-little, society as a whole is slowly learning.

I mean, I think the kicker of it all is to look at more highly-evolved nations like Norway and how they deal with crime. The maximum sentence they have is like 23ish years, although they do have a very-little-used ability to imprison someone indefinitely if they prove to be non-rehabilitatable (which may be used for the Norway kid-slaughtering motherfucker). And the rate of violent crime in Norway is extremely low compared to ours in the US. I mean, according to your line of thinking, the "mild" punishments they hand out in Norway would encourage people to commit violent crime all the time, because the reprisal is so mild. But in reality, that doesn't happen.

@68: Wrong statistic. The question isn't whether people who are in for murder committed previous crimes; it's whether people who are in for any crime previously committed murder. That's the relevant recidivism rate: if you killed someone and got out, what are the odds that you commit another crime?

Even accounting for the relatively low number of murders, the percentage is still much lower than people in for lesser crimes like theft. For whatever reason, people who kill someone are less likely to commit another crime than people who committed a lesser crime.

Now it's certainly possible that there is a self-selection bias here: the parole boards are more stringent on murderers and thus they make damn sure the convict has really reformed. But the statistic even holds for manslaughter, where you have to let the guy go after some period of time.

Another angle: longer sentences mean older ex-cons mean less likely to do something young and stupid. I'm still analyzing the numbers from this and other studies, but at this point I have to accept the possibility that killers are much more likely to feel guilt and reform than criminals who are not killers.

@69: No, they rejected my proposal because it included barbaric things like trial by jury, evidence rules, and innocence until proven guilty. Executing murderers convicted by jury trial was too much even for Iran.

@70: Actually, our dispute isn't about definitions, it's about what we believe is just. I agree that deterring future crimes and protecting society are part of the rationale for punishment, but I also think another part is retribution. The heinous crime of passion might never be repeated, but it was still a horrible act that deserves punishment.

I agree that a 14-year-old probably doesn't have the same understanding of death as an adult. Even so, he still deserves at least life imprisonment, because he did something horrible and harmed society.

As far as I know, there is no evidence that rehabilitation for horrible murderers is actually possible, which is why we don't do it anymore. Though please correct me if I'm wrong as I'd like to learn more on this.

I don't know if the comparison to Norwegian society makes sense here, because their culture is much different from ours. It's not clear they have lower crime rates because of their lack of long prison sentences; it seems more likely to be the other way around.

@71: Your first paragraph is completely correct. We need to know the base here: that is, of all released murderers, how many committed further crimes? The studies you linked to didn't address that. They looked at the number of murderers who committed further crimes compared to the number of other criminals who committed further crimes, and got a very low number because murder is a very rare crime.

@BlackRose

Could you give us a few words on your definitions of "adulthood" and "deserve"? You seem not to recognize that there is a developing brain, that there are significant differences between adults and children. Society has different rules for kids for good reasons.

As for justice, are there no limits to our conduct in handing out punishment? I don't think anyone "deserves" to be executed.

@73: They also got low percentages as well. The numbers are lower because the number of murderers is lower, yes. But after you account for the lower number of murderers, you still get a lower percentage.

You don't have to take my word for it. Google some combination of recidivism, murder, rates, statistics, etc. and you can see for yourself. For example, check out this Florida study:

http://www.dc.state.fl.us/secretary/pres…

If you're like me, intellectual honesty will force you to do the research yourself (as I've been doing this past week). I shouldn't have to walk you through every step.

@72 But they be lovin' your stance on executing minors. Iran, Pakistan, Somalia, and the US; that's some fabulous company we're keeping.

Actually, I can see a girl being convicted of killing another girl under these circumstances. I think it's the toxic heteronormative brand of masculinity raising its head here, that makes it especially bad when a male (of any age) fails to display heteronormative standards of "masculine" behavior and another male (of any age) enforces said "masculine" behavior on others (including the elimination of anyone repeatedly failing to adhere to said "standards")..

@75: Thanks for that link... it does look like you're right about murder recidivism rates. I will need to keep looking and thinking about this.

@74: Shouldn't everyone get what they deserve? Kids as well as adults? Developed or undeveloped brains?

Yes, I think there should be limits. For instance, I think solitary confinement is psychologically abusive and should not be used. And of course there are procedural protections: criminal juries need to be unanimous, hearsay should never be admitted, and so forth. But really, you can't imagine anyone who deserves to be executed?

@78 You'd be amazed that there are some people who honestly believe there should be no death penalty. I know why the penalty exists, and it's a good reason, fitting even today because of over crowding of prisons (though that may itself be a problem with the legal system but until that's fixed what can you do). It's to keep those of us who are not a danger to others safer, or at least those of us who do not give into the impulse to kill the mother fucker who's being a prick for no reason ... I mean ... us "good" people?

@78 BlackRose

"Shouldn't everyone get what they deserve?"
No, they shouldn't. Your definition of what someone deserves is certainly different from mine. What's the right balance of vengeful torture that we inflict? Is that really the negotiation we want to have?

No, no one deserves to be executed. Right there we have a major disagreement. I object to capital punishment on moral grounds alone (and I'm an atheist). Procedural safeguard discussions are not only beside the point but also a bit of a fool's errand. Strapping defenseless people down and ending their lives is barbaric. Doing so is all about what we are, what we become, not what that person has done.

I realize most people will disagree (violently!) with this but I am absolutely against all forms of punishment. Punishment is exactly the same thing as torture. Some people need to be segregated from the rest of society for our, and possibly their, protection.

Consequence need not be punishment. But punishment is easier to understand. It appeals to everyone's baser instincts. We punish/torture despite the objective evidence that it doesn't accomplish the goal of the exercise.

Incidentally, I have a very well-behaved 13 year old who has never been punished. There are viable alternatives. It's not punishment vs. anarchy.

@79: Do you seriously think that the death penalty will alleviate prison overcrowding?
Look, there are about 3,250 people on Death Row in the country. There are about 2.4 MILLION total prisoners in the US of A. The fact is that even if all murderers were quickly and efficiently put to death, there would be a negligible impact on the overcrowded state of our prisons.
You're really trying hard to be the next Will in Seattle, aren't you? Every time you post, something stupid comes out of your keyboard.

@80/81: If you're referring to Rudolf Dreikurs' theory of natural and logical consequences to teach kids, in place of punishment, I completely agree with you. I also agree that we should not engage in vengeful torture.

However, I don't think humane painless execution is any more barbaric than putting someone in prison for their entire life. Either way, you take away their life: anything meaningful or real that they might have is gone.

I also disagree that punishment is inappropriate for society (as opposed to when a parent does so) and that it "doesn't accomplish the goal of the exercise." The goal is to serve justice. If someone harms society, it's only fair to harm them as well, as well as the other goals of protecting society from bad people and deterring others from committing crimes.

Schools really are like prisons; I am unsurprised, more and more, seeing students behave like the residents of cell-block C. You leave children, for the most part unsupervised, in abusive situations without the capacity for escape or distance, something to which they must return every day; a scared dog may go run and hide, a terrified or humiliated child is forced to stay within close proximity to his tormentors.

I am unsurprised this leads to violent outcomes.

I have very few positive memories from grade school; I was very happy to make it through, as I did, without murdering anyone. And now, I just have to spend some of my money on psychiatrists and pills.

The kids shouldn't be bullying each other, period. It sounds like the murdered kid was egging the other one on. On what planet is that ever a good idea?

@82 That was not what I implied at all. ;) I said because of prison overcrowding I agree with the original reason for the death penalty in the US.

@85 Do you even remember being a kid? Bullying happens period, even if the murdered kid "egged him on" that offers no excuse. Does every child carry a gun now or something?

@83 BlackRose
I'm not familiar with Rudolf Dreikurs. Why wouldn't you continue with a rehabilitative approach once children grow up? Why switch to punishment? Are adults less able to be reasoned with or less teachable?

"humane painless execution"
It's still murder which is my concern. I'd like to prevent all murder, not institutionalize it. There are many people who oppose humane painless execution because they believe that the convicted deserve painful death as their fair punishment. Humane execution is unfair in their view. Do you see where I have a problem with using words like "fair," "justice," and "deserve?" There is no particular volume of justice floating around that we need to maintain. We should stop fretting over it. This obsession leads to all sorts of new evils, e.g. wrongful prosecutions driven by the need to punish someone.

"...you take away their life: anything meaningful or real that they might have is gone."
How so? I don't agree that life in prison or a mental hospital must be a non-existence. We can make it whatever we want. It can be the hellish thing it is now in many places or it can be a highly structured life of rehabilitation for people who can't manage to be civilized on their own. It all comes down to why you are incarcerating them. Is it to make them suffer (be tortured) their fair share or is it to protect the rest of us and to correct their behavior? What have they learned by the time they are released? Humanity? Responsibility? Brutality? What was the goal of the exercise and what was the (foreseeable) result?

"The goal is to serve justice. If someone harms society, it's only fair to harm them as well, ...and deterring others from committing crimes."
This is the current philosophy. I get that. We should choose different goals. We should be more humane. The problem is that a humane approach fails to satisfy the desire for revenge and fails to indulge the illusion that we can go back in time and balance out injustices.

@86: The original reason for the death penalty in the US was that the death penalty was part of the British criminal justice system. The death penalty still has nothing to do with overcrowding.

@87: It's not about whether the person is a child or adult. Individuals dealing with someone of any age should use consequences. Punishment is reserved for society as a whole, through the legal system. Again, we should also use a rehabilitative approach if it works, but the idea is that society as a whole has been harmed and it's not fair to allow the criminal to get off without experiencing some of that harm in return. Nor is it respectful to someone found guilty to let them off the hook and avoid giving them justice.

To understand the difference between an individual conflict and one with society, think about resolving a conflict with a friend or family member, versus a conflict involving a crime or with a policeman. With a friend, you'd want to apologize, try to listen and understand them, and use a collaborative approach to come up with the best solution. Obviously, criminal activity is very different: we have an adversarial court system to protect people's rights, the government is required to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and criminal suspects are warned not to say anything. The collaborative model where we get together and find the best future outcome doesn't apply.

As far as execution, it's not murder, by definition. It is ending a life, but there are all sorts of circumstances where this is fine, such as war, abortion, euthanasia, or self-defense. While some people might support painful death or torture, you and I agree that these people are wrong and their proposals unjust. Just because some people are wrong or propose unjust punishments does not mean we should give up justice as an ideal.

You make some good points about prison reform, and I agree that it should not be hellish or torturous. That said, I think a completely pragmatic approach where we concentrate only on rehabilitation is missing something: sure, it's great for society and for a criminal if we can rehabilitate, but at the same time, it just seems unjust and ignores that the criminal did something bad. I'm not supporting bloodthirsty vengeance but some amount of punishment seems deserved.

How do you feel about other forms of punishment, such as mandating harsh but useful labor, or fines? As well as making the criminal do something unpleasant, these forms of punishment directly give back to society as well.