Kill and Kill Again was the title of a 1981 martial arts movie with a lot of bad actors.

The chorus of disapproval about executing convicted murderer and gang founder Tookie Williams also featured a lot of bad actors. It also featured a lot of stupid actors and a lot of sanctimonious actors. Among them were Mike Farrell, Susan Sarandon, Jamie Foxx -- and one actor who is not the celluloid variety, Jesse Jackson.

Their mantra is nothing more than the same hackneyed, debunked myths about capital punishment that have been said for years. They repeat the same lies and propaganda that go unquestioned by the uninformed media who interview them.

Not once will these disingenuous people say -- nor will they be corrected or even asked by the media -- why nearly one of every dozen convicted murderers had a prior murder conviction. Not once will they utter that several studies have shown that capital punishment saves lives.

According to a December 2001 report by the US Department of Justice, Bureau of Criminal Justice Statistics, of those sentenced to be executed 64 percent had a prior felony conviction, and 8 percent had been convicted of a prior homicide. About 4 in 10 had an existing criminal justice status at the time of their capital offense, including 18 percent who had been on parole, 10 percent on probation and about 11 percent who had charges pending, had been escapees or had committed the capital offense while incarcerated. Approximately 1 in 6 offenders admitted since 1988 had 2 or more death sentences.

A 2003 study by Emory University and Clemson University Professors Hashem Dezhbakhsh, Paul Rubin, and Joanna Shepherd stated, “Our results suggest that capital punishment has a strong deterrent effect” (emphasis mine).

These are facts you will not find repeated in the mainstream media. These are facts that will not be cited by capital punishment abolitionists. The capital punishment abolitionists will say things that are not true -- such as no reputable criminologist thinks capital punishment is effective. No mainstream journalist will fact check it.

Indeed, the journalists who witnessed Williams’ execution were so shaken by it that it is doubtful they will ever write a pro-capital punishment article. 

The good news is that despite the absolute disconnect by the bubble inhabiting mainstream media, despite the disinformation campaign by those who want to abolish capital punishment -- Americans approve of capital punishment.

A Gallup poll in October 2002 indicated that Americans favor the death penalty by a ratio of almost 3-to-1 (70 percent in favor compared with 25 percent in opposition). A 2000 Zogby poll revealed that 78 percent of Italian-Americans and 75 percent of Asian-Americans favored capital punishment. Among Hispanics, Zogby found 73 percent supported the death penalty, while 71 percent of Arab-Americans advocated capital punishment. Even 64 percent of this country's African-Americans, the group supposedly most "discriminated" against by capital punishment, favor it.

This racial-discrimination claim is the vilest deceit of the abolitionists and their mainstream media accomplices. They claim that blacks are sentenced to be executed in disproportion to their numbers in the general population. What capital-punishment abolitionists conveniently omit is that blacks make up a disproportionate number of the country's murder victims. According to DOJ data, "Racial differences exist, with blacks disproportionately represented among homicide victims and offenders. Blacks were six times more likely than whites to be murdered in 1999."

Another fact they conveniently distort -- incredibly distort -- is a study by the University of Maryland commissioned to determine if there was racism in the application of capital punishment. The study, by Professor Raymond Paternoster of the University of Maryland and Professor Robert Brame of the University of South Carolina, said, “Looking across the different decision points, there is no evidence that the race of the defendant matters at any stage once case characteristics are controlled for . . . As we found earlier in the unadjusted analysis, there is a slight tendency for black offenders to be less likely to be death notified. This disappears, however, when case characteristics are taken into account, and in fact switches direction with black offenders slightly more at risk. The difference is quite small, however, and the differences for each stage between black and non-black offenders are also substantively small. The largest difference occurs at the decision to impose a death sentence given a penalty trial. There, the probability that a black offender will be sentenced to death is .444 and the probability for non-black offenders is .376, a statistically non-significant difference of .068. In sum, we have found no evidence that the race of the defendant matters in the processing of capital cases in the state."

Of course, one would not have known this from the media reports. The newspapers in their headlines all said there was racism found. It wasn’t until one read the whole article that one learned the truth.

Sarandon named one of her kids after a murderer, Jack Henry Abbott, who was paroled from prison because of her efforts and primarily the efforts of writer Norman Mailer. Abbott subsequently murdered again. Sarandon and Mailer are the poster kids proving the adage of Edmund Burke who said, “The men who today snatch the worst criminals from justice will murder the most innocent persons tomorrow. "

Capital punishment abolitionists have no credibility except with those fatuous individuals who comprise the mainstream media. All those who want to eliminate capital punishment will accomplish is to provide an opportunity for those they champion to kill and kill again.

A former police officer, Michael Tremoglie's work has appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News, Human Events, FrontPage Magazine, and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. He is the author of a novel, Sense of Duty.

Email Michael Tremoglie

Send this Article to a Friend