Public opinion on the death penalty
The death penalty is normally cited as the classic example of disconnect between politicians and the people they represent, one where a majority of MPs consistently oppose the death penalty and a majority of the public consistently support it. This is pretty much true (whether it is a good or bad thing is an entirely different matter!)
Support for the death penalty has fallen over the decades – it used to be over 70%, these days roughly half of the population support the death penalty for “standard” murder – indeed there was a YouGov poll in 2006 that showed marginally less than half of people in support of it, the first time it had occured. More recently, a YouGov poll in September 2010 found 51% supported the death penalty for murder, 37% opposed. A MORI poll in July 2010 found 51% supported the death penalty for adult murder. An Angus Reid poll in 2008 found people supported the death penalty for murder by 50% to 40%.
Support for the death penalty is higher for specific crimes, such as murder of a police officer, murder of a child or multiple murders. The MORI poll in July 2010 asked people which of a list of crimes they thought should have the death penalty – 62% supported it for child murder (and 70% supported in at least some circumstances). A YouGov poll in November 2010 found 74% of people supported the death penalty for murder in some circumstances, though only 16% supported it for all murders.
If we go all the way back to 2003, a YouGov poll asked people if they supported the death penalty in various circumstances of murder. 57% supported it for murder , 62% for murder of a police officer, 67% for the murder of a child, 69% for a serial killer (note that the figures may be slightly higher than more recent polling because of the timing of the poll, conducted just after the Soham murder trial – 63% would have hanged Huntley).
So, generally speaking about half of people support the death penalty for murder, with slightly more than that typically supporting it for particularly circumstances of murder, such as that of children or police officers. Support for the death penalty tends to be strongest amongst Conservative voters, but Labour supporters also tend to be more likely than not to support it (Liberal Democrats tend to oppose). There is a strong class divide – middle class respondents are much less likely to support the death penalty than working class respondents.
Looking at the other end of the comparison, what about MPs? Historially the House of Commons voted on the death penalty rather a lot, up until the 1990s there was usually one vote per Parliament on whether the death penalty should be restored. Over time, these were defeated by solid majorities.
In 1994 the last attempt to reintroduce the death penalty was rejected by 403 to 159. The death penalty for the murder of a police officer was rejected by 383 to 186. Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs voted solidly against, while Conservative MPs were split (a typical pattern on death penalty votes) – 122 voted against, 148 in favour. If there is a similar pattern amongst current MPs (Labour and Lib Dem MPs solidly against, Conservative MPs split pretty evenly) then a large majority of MPs will oppose the death penalty.
UPDATE: Tonight’s YouGov/Sunday Times poll has voting intention of CON 35%, LAB 44%, LDEM 10%, so still very much in line with the Labour lead of 8 points or so YouGov have been showing.
KeithP
You cannot be a member of the EU without first being a member of the Council of Europe.
You cannot be a member of the Council of Europe if capital punishment is part of your penal code (Latvia still has it in force – but only in wartime).
Kyle Downing
Nothing wrong with a Bill of Rights (as long as it incorporates all of the provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights).
@ The Sheep
There seems to be European legal decisions that suggest that indeterminate sentences are against human rights legislation.
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Some hold the opinion that Indeterminate sentences without a review process may be against the HRA; I believe that the right to appeal when there is new evidence is held by some to be a review mechanism. I don’t think either school of thought has been tested yet but I may be out of date on this myself.
On clarification about locking them up on throwing away the key, I don’t mean literaly, I mean giving them an actual life scentance. (Forgive me that is my ultra Conservative speaking)
@ Kyle
The Human Rights Act is being interpeated by over zealous judges in a very ridculous manner that causes the Tabloids to breath fire on it. It is quite a bad piece of leglislation and needs to be removed asap.
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The Human Rights Act is being interpreted by over zealous tabloids in a very ridiculous manner that causes the tabloid reading public to breath fire on it. It is a very good piece of leglislation that is being developed via case law.
The days of the Torture rack, the Gallows, the thumbscrews and the Stake are long past. We need a system that properly punished murderes instead of it making look like they have got an easy life. Resorting back to outdated, medieval practises is not the answer.
Three cheers for Sydney Silverman.
Kyle Downing
I’m afraid the main reason the tabloids “breath fire” on the Human Rights Act is that they are scared its privacy provisions will interfere with their ability to pry into people’s private lives. It’s also, like the EU and ‘Health and Safety’, a useful scapegoat to blame, often for things that have nothing to do with it.
Why is it that, when only 6% of the public say they trust tabloid journalists, people still quote what they read in such papers as reliable information? I’m not having a go at you personally, it’s a real mystery to me. People make an objective assessment, but them seem to forget it.
Roger rebel.
Interesting, thank you.
How closely was Kevin Barry involved?
@ Amber Star
“Most of us wouldn’t, I ‘d think. But Anthony has pointed out that polling puts most of us in the minority who are absolutely against it. Or do we think that the majority’s attitude would change, were they to be on a jury.
Also, it’s not the jury who sentences, is it?; it’s the judge, is it not? Therefore, if that sentence wasn’t mandatory, the jury wouldn’t necessarily consider themselves responsible for it.”
Have you ever seen the great 1950′s film 12 Angry Men? (It’s the favorite movie of both David Milliband and Jim Murphy, which I find incredible). One of the things that is notable about that film is that the murder charge carried an automatic death sentence. That is no longer possible in our legal system because such sentences are automatically unconstitutional as violations of the 8th Amendment. The sentencing and the trial must be bifurcated.
And I believe that the jury decides the sentence of death (not the judge) unless the defendant has waived their right to a jury trial.
The European Convention of Human Rights (and the Human Rights Act where this derived from) has actually done a pretty good job over the time it has been is existence. It contains a lot of statements of principle that few people would object to, and where the legislation goes into detail, there are extremely good reasons for doing so, in particular all of the provisions relating to the rights to a fair trial.]
The problem is that lately the ECHR/HRA seems to be getting abused by solicitors tapping into the market of people whose idea of “Human Rights” is whatever lets them get their way. The easy targets are the broad statements of principle that didn’t go into detail (such as the horribly ambiguous “respect for his private and family life”) that can be re-interpreted by expensive lawyers or (if they’re not doing their job properly) judges with political agendas.
I don’t think the European Convention of Human Rights should be repealed, it should be updated. Someone needs to have a proper look at which bits are working as intended and which bits need attention. But it would be a mistake to forget the bits of the Human Rights Act that do work, provide important safeguards, and allow rulings to be made by British judges rather than European judges. If we scrap the whole lot without thinking, we will probably regret it later.
Chris Neville-Smith
In general, I agree. However, revision of the Convention and its protocols requires a long period of negotiation and subsequent signing and ratifications by the member states.
I’m happy to be corrected by someone with greater knowledge of law than myself, but my understanding is that where individual legal systems ensure that their procedures are compliant with the philosophy of those “broad statements of principle”, then the Court is unlikely to declare them non-compliant.
The biggest problem is that in the UK legal systems/legislatures there has been complacency and a lack of rigour in examining law and practice to ensure compliance for its own sake.
After all, initially the UK saw the Convention as something to be imposed on those “damned foreigners” who needed to be given a set of guiding principles to bring “them” up to “our” standards,
That “they” would question “us” wasn’t seriously considered.
Here’s an experiment for you guys regarding the death penalty and criminal justice:
Pretend you are on a District of Columbia jury for a murder trial circa 1981.
The defendant, an unemployed African-American male, is on trial for the attempted robbery, rape, and murder of a young woman. The 21 year old Georgetown University student worked at a lawfirm in the Watergate complex and worked late one June night as she often did and departed at 9:30 pm. That was the last time she was seen alive. She never returned home to her Georgetown townhome she shared with roomates. The next morning when she failed to show up for work, her law firm searched for her and they found her dead just off the Virginia Avenue towpath that leads from Foggy Bottom (which is where the Watergate is located) to Georgetown. Police investigators established that she had been raped and had been shot to death. Her purse lay nearby, the contents of which were undisturbed.
You have the following evidence before you by the prosecution:
-A few weeks prior to the rape and murder of the victim, another young woman who worked at the Kennedy Center (which is across the street from the Watergate) was walking home to Georgetown after work on the same towpath at around 4 pm in the afternoon. She was allegedly jumped by the Defendant who had been hiding in the bushes who attempted to take her purse. When she began to scream for help and struggled, he threw her on the ground, lay on top of her and put his fingers to her lips, telling her “shhh!”.
-In that prior crime (admitted for the purposes of motive and identity only), he was unable to rape the woman because being in the afternoon hours, others came to her assistance.
-An FBI expert testifies that the unknown pubic hairs found on the victim match the Defendant’s.
-A paid police informant claims that the Defendant confessed to him in a nearby park late one night about committing the crime. According to the informant, the Defendant had planned only to rob the victim and steal her purse. However, she struggled and was unable to take the purse. When that occurred, he became angry and raped her. After he raped her, he decided that he should kill her to cover up the crime.
-For his part, the Defendant claims to have never met the informant and has never even seen him prior to trial.
-One other thing of note. In the month of June in D.C., 4 pm to 4:30 pm is broad daylight. However, by 9:30, it is dark out. And there are no lights along that towpath.
There are no eyewitnesses to the crime. There is no other evidence presented besides that which I’ve given to you.
The prosecution has two theories of the case:
1. He attempted to rob her and killed her in a robbery gone awry (this would be first degree felony murder) as claimed by the testifying informant.
2. He planned to rape her and killed her in a struggle afterwards or killed her to cover up his crime.
Pretend you are on this jury. Do you vote to acquit the Defendant or do you vote to convict?
@ Old Nat
“The biggest problem is that in the UK legal systems/legislatures there has been complacency and a lack of rigour in examining law and practice to ensure compliance for its own sake.”
I wonder about this. Do you think that not having a death penalty makes people a little less stringent when it comes to holding the prosecution to its burden of proof in capital cases? And ensuring that constitutional law and evidentiary rules are followed? I wonder if there is an attitude of ‘well if we get it wrong, it’s okay, because at least we didn’t kill the person.”
And one other thing for my experiment. If you vote to convict the Defendant, at sentencing, which will be a separate process, do you give the Defendant the death penalty or do you give him another sentence (and feel free to fill in whichever sentence you feel is appropriate).
SoCalLiberal
I wasn’t referring to murder cases, but all aspects of law that should be, but aren’t, compliant with the Convention
There is often endless confusion here because the initials ECHR apply both to the European Convention on Human Rights, and the European Court of Human Rights which can declare that a state is non compliant with the Convention.
@ Old Nat
“I wasn’t referring to murder cases, but all aspects of law that should be, but aren’t, compliant with the Convention
There is often endless confusion here because the initials ECHR apply both to the European Convention on Human Rights, and the European Court of Human Rights which can declare that a state is non compliant with the Convention.”
Correct me if I’m wrong but if the European Court holds a law is not compliant with the European Convention of Human Rights, it’s not automatically struck down, right? Instead, the government is informed that the law violates the ECHR and should be repealed. Then the government has an opportunity to repeal it. But technically, a government could ignore what the European Court says?
I believe that is the case, and we may come to this situation with the votes for prisoners matter, because there’s no way the Commons is going to allow long-term convicts to vote, even if the Government says they have to.
Ultimately, there’s a catch-all exemption for all international laws which is if: you really really feel like doing what you’re doing and no-one stops you. And, unlike the death penalty, not many governments have strong views on votes for convicts and are unlikely to out out of their way to enforce that ideal.
SoCalLiberal
That’s my understanding.
Of course a government of one of the Assembly of States Parties can also ignore what the International Criminal Court says – as long as it accepts the consequences of that, and consequences aren’t always directly enforcable.
Chris Neville-Smith
“I believe that is the case, and we may come to this situation with the votes for prisoners matter, because there’s no way the Commons is going to allow long-term convicts to vote, even if the Government says they have to.”
However the ECHR didn’t require that all convicted crimminals should be allowed to vote. Where the UK is non-compliant in having a blanket ban on all convicted criminals being deprived of the franchise.
It would be perfectly possible to draw up a set of rules that specified that only certain categories of convicted prisoner should lose the right to vote.
Kyle Downing
“Resorting back to outdated, medieval practises is not the answer.”
I’m not so sure. The stocks and pillory might be more effective a deterrant for the likes of Bankers or Conrad Black.
You could take them t the market cross of a different n each Saturday and have the town crier or maybe a rapper deliver a citation. A day out for all the family.
Socal Liberal
Aquit. He’s fitted up.
Chris Lane
As close as Roy Bentley was to Craig.
ROGER REBEL.
Thanks for this reply, and the Bentley parallel.
Am I right that Bentley had a trial by jury? This is unlike
Kevin Barry: who had a court martial in Mountjoy
Hanged on All Souls Day 1920.
@ SoCaL
I don’t think there’s enough evidence to convict. Even if he did do it, I don’t think the prosecution has met the burden of proof based on the facts you’ve outlined.
SoCalLiberal
Based on that limited amount of evidence (would any of the evidence relating to the former case be admitted in aScottish or Rnglish court?) there doesn’t seem to be enough evidence to justify a Not Proven verdict – much less Guilty.
Been lurking on here for far too long but I have decided to jump in.
SoCalLiberal
Based on the evidence you have presented, I’d aquit. But then the chap’s ethnicity and composition of the jury will have a huge impact as well.
Chris Lane
Bentley was under arrest when Craig shot the Policeman, where as Barry was still shooting till his gun jammed.
As for the court martial it was impossible to find 12 good men and true in Dublin
.
ROGER REBEL.
12 good men and true in Dublin in November 1920?
Visit to Croke Park a week later by some soldiers.
Very counter productive though.
‘Just a lad of eighteen summers’
A medical student and a good rugby player.
The trouble with the execution was that most Dubliners were off to church that day anyway: All Souls day
Recruited many to the other ‘army’
Chris Lane
“Just a lad of eighteen summers’
A medical student and a good rugby player.”
The boys he murdered were teenagers too.
Chris Lane
One thing you forgot Washington did not even get a court martial.
Pete B et al
“The boys he murdered were teenagers too.”
I think we are extending the idea of murder rather significantly by discussing the Barry case.
Of course, if you want to argue that the Germans were correctly labelling members of the French Resistance as “murderers” when they killed members of the army of occupation ……
Such definitions are political in a very different sense to the way that “politics” is normally used on this site, and add little to this particular discussion.
OLD NAT
Thank you for that wise comment about the Barry Case.
When the State behaves badly it is normally a disaster, as Enoch Powell pointed out in his wonderful speech attacking the British behaviour in the HOLA Camp
Oldnat
“I think we are extending the idea of murder rather significantly by discussing the Barry case.
Of course, if you want to argue that the Germans were correctly labelling members of the French Resistance as “murderers” when they killed members of the army of occupation ……”
I agree that we risk inflaming old passions by dwelling on the Barry case, but I’d just like to point out that that it was hardly the same situation as the German occupation of France. Home Rule had already been granted, and there were over 100 Irish seats in the House of Commons. Also, Ireland had been part of UK for hundreds of years.
Pete B
I wasn’t making an exact comparison, but if you want to be pedantic ….
The Petain Government accepted the French defeat and accepted the German Occupation in the North, while keeping Vichy as a Protectorate. The time differences don’t alter the fact that both situations reflected the political reality after military conquest.
“hundreds of years” ???? Ireland didn’t become a part of the UK until the Treaty of Union in 1801.
Pete B
Because I am pedantic myself
“Home Rule had already been granted” Actually, it hadn’t. The Home Rule Act didn’t pass until 23 December 1920. The incident for which Barry was executed took place on 20 Sept 1920.
Oldnat.
Yes, sorry, loose usage of ‘uk’. Nevertheless representation in parliament is a key difference. Vichy France weren’t represented in the Nazi parliament to the best of my knowledge.
Anyway, I don’t wish to stir up another revolution, so am going to bed now.
Pete B
Night.
An Observer poll in 2003 found that 94% of respondents in the West Midlands favoured capital punishment. In London the figure was 34%.
Been away for a week and deliberately exiled myself from the internet but have missed this site! I can imagine that Tuesday with the GDP figures would have been a good day on the board!
Very pleased to see Labour 9 points ahead in the latest YouGov and even more pleased that they seem to be sorting things out in Washington.
I don’t believe the difference could be that great.
They obviously didn’t split the data properly.
But Lambeth voted for AV.
Andy JS
Are you sure that shouldn’t have read
“94% of respondents in the West Midlands favoured capital punishment in London”?
Old Nat
“94% of respondents in the West Midlands favoured capital punishment in London”?
Wouldn’t English capital punishment have to mean London?
aberdeencynic
@ Old Nat, John B. Dick, and Amber Star
So even though, the prosecution (despite not producing the revolver that killed her) presented evidence that he tried to attack a young white woman in the VERY same location as this other woman, AND produced testimony of the defendant’s OWN confession AND had an FBI expert on pubic hair testify that the Defendant’s hairs MATCHED those found on the victim that did not belong to her…..you would vote to acquit?
God forbid I’m ever put on trial for any crime, I’d want the three of you on my Jury (or maybe I should hope I get some Scottish immigrants in the jury pool).
Well this defendant was in fact convicted on the evidence presented. His conviction was affirmed by the D.C. Court of Appeals. However, he was not sentenced to death.
It is too bad that none of you were on his jury though because despite this overwhelming evidence against him, he was in fact an innocent man as he claimed all along. Thank god he wasn’t sentenced to death but the man wound up spending 28 years in prison for a crime he did not commit before he was finally released. Much of his life is ruined. This poor victim’s parents, who have likely never gotten over the loss of their daughter, have not seen justice.
I wish someone had wanted to convict (darn). Allright, tty guys later.
Good News-
Obama announces agreed deal between Republican and Democrat leaders.
Now it doesn’t really matter much if the tea-partiers vote against it, as there’s more than enough votes with moderate Republicans and Democrats.
Interesting article by Julian Glover re the impact on the coalition of the impending constituency boundary proposals
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jul/31/electoral-boundary-changes-crack-coalition
Mike N
I read that article. The Lib Dems plan to await economic recovery will be shot to pieces if the reduction of the number of seats (and equalisation of registered voters) leaves them with only a handful of seats even if their vote recovers a bit.
But would Cameron let the Government fall to get the constituencies sorted? Won’t they do a deal of some sort/
Or would Clegg gallop on regardless?
Nick Poole
So much has changed since the AV ref was lost. I expected NC to be seriosuly questioned/challenged at the LD upcoming conference but he’s kept a low profile and the hacking scandal has been a blessing.
Most if not all the boundaries proposals will be available just before the annual conferences are held. If the proposals indicate or suggest severe LD seat losses I imagine that the topic will dominate the LD conference and that LD members and MPs will wonder why the outcome of the AV ref was not linked to the acceptane of the reduction in the number of constituencies. IMO, this was (another) appalling strategic mistake by NC.
@roger Mexico – “It’s also, like the EU and ‘Health and Safety’, a useful scapegoat to blame, often for things that have nothing to do with it.”
The application of ‘laws’ is an interesting area and very often where things go wrong, through no fault of the law makers.
I’ve recently been told that I shouldn’t telephone past business contacts as part of a marketing exercise due to the data protection act and the fact that I didn’t get these people’s permission to contact them for marketing purposes. It’s conmplete nonsense, as my records are written, not electronic, so I don’t believe are covered by the data protection act, while the relevant names and contact details are published in association year books and on line anyway, which is where I got them from in the first place.
A second great example is Portable Appliance Testing (PAT) for electrical equipment. Most of the public (and private) sectors checks every single item on an annual basis, using qualified electrical contractors who charge a set fee for each item. For an office with hundred of PCs, monitors, lamps, etc this csts thousands.
But if you look at the HSE website they expressly state that most items need checking once every 4 years. Indeed, one of their ‘Myths of the Month’ is that everything needs to be PAT tested annually – the HSE actually don’t like this as they think it makes workplaces less safe as employees assume items are safe because they’ve been checked, rather than keep their eyes out for loose wires and bad connections etc.
However, insurance companies using untrained and rather dim assessors demand annual PAT tests and thereby enforce an unnecessary tightening of H&S requirements.
This is where I suspect the campaign to remove red tape from businesses will founder. While there is some nonsensical regulations out there, in the main it’s the interpretation of these that is the problem, usually by insurers.
Alec
“…as my records are written, not electronic, so I don’t believe are covered by the data protection act”
Paper records are within the scope of the DPA if certain conditions (eg there is a structure to the paper records that enables data to be located). I suggest you should visit the ICO website.
“I’ve recently been told that I shouldn’t telephone past business contacts as part of a marketing exercise due to the data protection act and the fact that I didn’t get these people’s permission to contact them for marketing purposes.”
You could always say you’re conducting a survey! This seems to be the most common type of (annoying) marketing call I receive.
Is the collection and use of census material a breach of the data protection act?