[moonhawk]

Name one.

[darkocean]

The ones who get executed are the ones you can't name as innocent. Nonetheless DNA testing has freed enough people from death rows by now that nobody should have any doubt that innocents are being executed and have been in the past in sizeable numbers.

One flagrant case you read about is that of Randy Seidle of Illinois, and of Herbert Whitlock who is still in prison in a case involving a very flagrant abuse of prosecutorial powers.

[USS Alaska]

"Name one."

They can't.

Remember that during the settling days in the west that horse thieves were hung. The fact that is was very easy to steal a horse but with severe and immeadiate punishment made the crime fairly rare. There is direct coorelation between crime and punishment {if the punishment happens in a timely fashion}.

Additionally, rape was also a capital offense. It too was much rarer than we see in todays world.

As a deterrent, it works 100% of the with the perp.