Death is not only an unusually severe punishment, unusual in its pain, in its finality and in its enormity, but is serves no penal purpose more effectively than a less severe punishment. William J. Brennan
I personally believe, as church law sets out, that sanctions are an absolute last resort, particularly penal sanctions of depriving people of the sacraments. Roger Mahony
If we believe in our current penal process, then the penalties imposed by judges and juries should be the only sanctions for one's crime, not the invisible sanctions of the legislature. Charles Rangel
In Brazil, there's a similar provision which transfers the power to prosecute to the crime victim if, and only if, the prosecutor in charge of the case fails to make a decision to file or drop the charges in the deadline established by the penal procedure code.
Remember, Watson that though we have so homely a thing as a goose at one end of this chain, we have at the other a man who will certainly get seven years' penal servitude unless we can establish his innocence.
