CO- Death penalty for rape doesn't protect children

3-18-2008 Colorado:

A bill pending in the Colorado Senate that would authorize a death sentence on a second conviction of raping a child could backfire by giving some of society's most vicious criminals a perverse incentive to kill their victims.

Senate Bill 195 by Sen. Steve Ward, R-Littleton, would authorize the death penalty for people who sexually assault a child 12 years or younger if DNA evidence links them to the crime.

Ward's bill also could discourage victims from reporting abuse by relatives, fearing they'd get the death penalty.

The Senate Judiciary Committee amended the bill to allow the death penalty only for rapists previously convicted of a similar attack on a child. It then sent the bill to the Appropriations Committee, where it should receive a quiet burial.

The Post has historically opposed the death penalty. But even supporters of capital punishment have strong reasons to oppose this bill. First, it endangers the very children it is designed to protect. If the penalty for rape alone is death, then a criminal vicious enough to make such a heinous attack in the first place may reason that he faces no further penalty for killing the victim.

Granted, most rapists would not even think that far down the road, but why provide the incentive for those who might?

Whether or not the death penalty deters crime at all is a subject of endless debate. But what influence the law does have should always be aimed at shielding victims from even worse harm. Colorado law already allows a death penalty for a rapist who kills his victim. By executing for rape alone, Ward's bill strips victims of whatever protection they now receive under that law.

Ward's bill also violates one of the tenets of Judeo-Christian morality, the rule that punishment may be proportional to a crime but must not exceed it — an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.

The notion that life can only be taken from those who have themselves taken life is so deeply embedded that the U.S. Supreme Court in 1977 ruled that states can only impose the death penalty for murder.

Despite that ruling, five states still have laws on the books like the one Ward wants to bring to Colorado, allowing execution for the rape of a child under age 12. But only one, Louisiana, is currently trying to execute a rapist, Patrick Kennedy, for such an offense. That case is now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.

We share Ward's outrage at the kind of sick people who would rape children — but why wait for a second such heinous offense to crack down on these criminals? Current law allows sentencing child rapists to 20 or 30 years, depending on the circumstances of the crime. If the legislature wants to get tough, why not allow a life sentence on the first offense in the worst cases and thus preclude the possibility of a second offense?

That's the best way to protect children. ..more.. Opinion: The Denver Post