What? Abolish the death penalty?

THE EDITOR: It was the most frightening story I’ve read by a writer in the newspapers for a very long time.

I am here referring to Leela Ramdeen’s piece (Newsday, 11/12/18) on the continuing attempt for the abolition of the death penalty by the Greater Caribbean for Life (GCL) of which she is reportedly a chairperson, and the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty (WCADP).

Ramdeen states that while the GCL and WCADP believe that society has a right to protect itself from people who commit heinous crimes and that offenders must be held accountable, they (GCL and WCADP) believe that non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect society from offenders.

I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at this dense, injudicious suggestion put forward by people who are supposed to be concerned with human rights.

After these heartless offenders have mercilessly chopped up or bludgeoned to death or strangled or shot multiple times my child, brother, sister, mother or father or caring, hard-working citizens, these self-professed human rights activists expect me and/or society at large to consider some kind of moderate reprisal for these cold, pitiless monsters we classify as human beings?

After being called or chosen to work with these human rights organisations, does it suddenly devoid activists of all the inherent human emotion they hold for bruised, battered and murdered human beings and outfits them instead with a defensive objective for the batterer? Have they ever had one of their adolescent loved ones brutally raped and murdered and then learn that those found guilty of the atrocious act boastfully reminisce about it among fellow inmates while behind bars?

Since his appointment, our Commissioner of Police has hit the ground running because he’s very conscious of not just our crime status but of today’s criminals’ unfeeling mentally.

The article says non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect society from offenders. But exactly what are these comical non-lethal means?

Are GCL and WCADP aware that in our small population of less than 1.5 million people our murder toll has crossed 500 (may that figure reverberate their eardrums) for the year – and not for the first time?

Aren’t they by their actions and proposals practically fuelling potential killers by giving them an assurance that they are insulated from punishment to fit the crime?

If the same efforts these organisations are using to try and establish a moratorium on the death penalty with a view to its total abolition were instead focused on the elimination of heinous murders, then we won’t have need for the death penalty. Would we?

I am not a marijuana smoker but I need to ask: is it fair to smokers that they and murderers would be given the same type of punishment if these human rights organisations have their way? Are our natural heartfelt feelings towards our fellow human beings daily growing cold by our absorption of secular scholarly legalistic views? Are Third World countries mindlessly obligated to UN resolutions?

Are certain aspects of our judicial system restricted in obvious straightforward criminal matters and those in authority unwilling or ill-prepared to change them? And since political parties, whether in or out of government, are saturated with attorneys, shouldn’t it be absolutely clear to the average citizen exactly where they (political parties) stand on this heartrending matter?

LLOYD RAGOO, Chaguanas

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"What? Abolish the death penalty?"

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