Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn announced Wednesday that he has signed legislation eliminating the death penalty in his state, more than 10 years after the state halted executions.
"Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history," Quinn (pictured), a Democrat, told reporters in making the announcement.
Illinois conducted its last execution in 1999. Then-Gov. George Ryan halted executions in 2000, after a series of death row inmates were exonerated. Quinn said his review had convinced him that it was impossible to administer capital punishment without mistakes, and abolishing it was "the right and just thing."
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Just the latest example of the wussification of America. Cripes, the dems are making great headway in their efforts to turn us into Europe West or South Canada.
I'm a conservative Christian and I believe the death penalty should be abolished-does that make me a liberal wussy?
Better than becoming South Carolina LOL. And by the way you pos, it was a Republican who put the stop on it.
The death penalty terrifies me, prison terrifies me. But I'm not a lawbreaker. These punishments do not terrify the law breakers.
We might try the original penitentiary concept, lock the prisoner away in silence, they stay in their cell in silence
with no contact with other prisoners. They work in their cell, originally I think it was weaving.
Great – another stupid move by the morons running the show in Chicago. I'm embarrased to say I live in this state.
Bye to all I have overstayed my welcome
For all those who are commenting that they disagree with this decision and think that the death penalty should be applied to all those who commit the murder of an innocent person, who should be held responsible and given the death penalty when an innocent person is executed by the state itself? The judge? The prosecutor? Maybe all the members of the jury?
This decision is not about saying murderers should not be executed, it is saying that our system is so unreliable that innocent people have been convicted and sentenced to death unjustly, and that there is only one way we can see to end this unjust practice.
Try to imagine yourself being convicted because the prosecutor wanted one in the win column, the jury believed the saying "where there's smoke, there's fire" and your public defender is a kid fresh out of law school that is getting paid a pittance to represent you and the other 100 cases on his list.
People need to shut up with the whole "imagine if you got falsely convicted" crap. The ONLY time people get the death penalty is when a capital crime has been comitted, e.g. murder. No way anybody is going to get either a) convicted or b) executed nowdays without DNA testing being done. In other words, the odds of someone being wrongfully convicted of a crime that warrants the death pentaly is nil. You get convicted of a capital offense with DNA evidence, you die.....period.
"No way anybody is going to get either a) convicted or b) executed nowdays without DNA testing being done."
You're horribly misinformed.
@Joe Blow Two quick things. 1)There is absolutely no law that says someone can't be convicted and sentenced to death without DNA evidence. Where do you get this from? Many murder scenes have negligible or no traces of DNA evidence. 2) DNA testing is far from the infallable science that SVU and CSI: Miami would have you to believe. It's still conducted by people, people make mistakes, tests go wrong, evidence gets tampered with! There is no rationalye argument for putting human lives in the hands of other people in this way.
'In other words, the odds of someone being wrongfully convicted of a crime that warrants the death pentaly is nil. '
absolute nonsense, you could never guarantee that.
I am ashamed to live in this state... much like many of the small business I will be leaving once I can acquire the means to do so...
Well you are an idiot, move to TX and the average IQ in both states will go up.
I've been in jail.The food is bad ,the anxiety high on what a next hour will be like.Mine was for selling my prescribed and needed morphine.I got a plea out of mercy shed on my painful medical condition.Nine days in jail facing 18+ years which would have been a life sentence for me I would gladly have chosen the death sentence to ESCAPE.I think all school children should see the inside of a prision and somehow without injuring them in some way be taught it is a place of horror.Stay clean people.You don`t want to feel what i felt for any amount of time.Especially the rest of your life.The Governor knew what I know.
And I love the statement that all the serial killers are going to flock to Illinois. As if killers have. A specific playground in mind! Illinois is not the only state that doesn't have the DP, just the latest one to abolish it.
SO, THE STATE WILL SPEND $45,000-$60,000 A YEAR TO KEEP A MAN IN PRISON, WHILE HONEST, HARD-WORKING, LAW-ABIDING CITIZENS STRUGGLE TO FEED & CLOTHE THEIR CHILDREN, MAINTAIN A DECENT STANDARD OF LIVING, NOT TO MENTION KEEPING UP WITH RISING FUEL COSTS, TAXES, & MEDICAL EXPENSES.......ALL OF WHICH CONVICTS GET FOR FREE.
Nothing is preventing you from taking advantage of those same great benefits. Don't cry about it, join them!
Not that there are long lines of folks on death row or the Green Mile, but it puzzles me that all the states are sucking wind financially and slashing budgets, and then they come up with this... Which garautees life in prison. How is that going to help a floundering state budget???
because its cheaper to keep someone in jail for life than to execute them.
The Death Penalty should have not been took off the table if punishment. For those of you who say a innocent person may have been executed because if it this is possible true, but if they hadn't been doing something in the first place they wouldnt have been a suspect. But I know if my wife or child was murdered by a criminal I would not want that person getting to spend the rest of his/her life on my tax dollars when my loved one was dead. Who wouldn't want equal punishment?
I sure hope that you are never called for jury duty!
"For those of you who say a innocent person may have been executed because if it this is possible true, but if they hadn't been doing something in the first place they wouldnt have been a suspect." It really scares me to live in a country where people think like this. Some of the leading causes of wrongul convictions are improper forensic testing, false testimony, & mistaken eye witness accounts. Now I know you're prob of the school of thought that some darn "thug" (we'll just use that term to be polite) with his thug homies who were smoking and robbing, deserves to get into trouble anyway. But the facts just don't support it. That "thug" could just have easily been buying bread when the robbery happened and be accused of committing it.
What is wrong with you brainless dolts that don't get it!!! Many innocent people have been killed in the name of the Laws of this land. That is just WRONG... PERIOD! You cannot accept that the killing of an innocent human being is an OK thing... Just think about this;
What if your Husband/Wife/Son/daughter was wrongly convicted of a crime that carried the death penalty? You would lose your mind, THAT'S what would happen.. Knowing they are innocent, yet watching as they are executed by the machine that is the Prison system in this country.
Executing an innocent person is an abomination and the most GROSS of injustices. It makes a mockery of our legal system.
The facts are that numerous people are wrongly accused and jailed in the present system.. Killing someone leave no margin for correcting any errors that happen in the system.. you cannot UNKILL someone!!! and Ooops, my bad, doesn't quite seem appropriate, now does it?
Jail the worst offenders for life and let them rot as they well should, but let's stop killing people, because frankly, there are too many errors made in the system and death can't be undone.
I'm gonna say it again.......People need to shut up with the whole "imagine if you got falsely convicted" crap. The ONLY time people get the death penalty nowdays is when a capital crime has been comitted, e.g. murder. No way anybody is going to get either a) convicted or b) executed nowdays without DNA testing being done. In other words, the odds of someone being wrongfully convicted of a crime that warrants the death pentaly is nil. You get convicted of a capital offense with DNA evidence, you die.....period.
So, how is it that this argument holds any water?
You don't get out much do you. Most death penalty convictions have no DNA evidence.
so every single conviction cannot be trusted? then how were they convicted?
The death penalty is not, and never will be, the act of a civilized nation.