A moral dilemma for death penalty opponents

[Joe Republic]

Let's say that you live in a state that has the death penalty, and you have been called for jury duty in a murder case.  The evidence overwhelmingly points towards the defendant being guilty.

If the jury finds the defendant guilty, he/she is certain to get the death penalty.  Your vote for his/her guilt would therefore contribute to this sentence.

As an opponent of the death penalty, how would you vote?

(If you support the death penalty, please only vote for Option 3.)

[Joe Republic]

Well, that's a pretty useful way of separating the rational people from the sadists, I suppose.  Fairly disturbing at the same time, of course, given the opportunity the sadists will then find themselves in.

In any case, let's continue this scenario as a hypothetical.  Let's say that the option to recuse oneself for this reason is denied.

[Joe Republic]

It's a hypothetical moral dilemma, CARL.  Deal with it.

[Joe Republic]

The Supreme Court as well as others have ruled repeatedly that mandatory death sentences are unconstitutional. I could easily just vote against the death penalty in the sentencing phase, as it must be unanimous to impose it. There's also what CARL said. So the scenario could never happen.

In addition to what Carl says, the SC has also seen fit to declare it unconstitutional, in death penalty cases only, to take sentencing out of the jury's hands. It is therefore entirely unproblematic to agree to a guilty verdict but hold out for life without parole. (Yeah, so it's a hypothetical. I'm dealing with it.)

Let's not assume that the scenario takes place in the United States.

I wouldn't vote guilty. I couldn't deal with myself doing that if it wasn't a big one. but then I would be complain on how a state could have the death penalty in the first place. If he did something really really really really bad then yes. But it has to be really bad. And I have to confident in the evidence not being tampered with. It is really on what he is accused of doing. And why he did what he did. That is very important for my voting reason.

The charge in this hypothetical case is murder.

[Joe Republic]

It's a hypothetical moral dilemma, CARL.  Deal with it.

So, hypothetically, is it moral to state that one will abide by the Jury Instructions from the judge, and then subsequently ignore them because of a result one might dislike?

I understand complex situations are a little difficult for you but, real life is like that.

Oh, and I didn't even mention that common practice is for a bifurcated trial, with a guilt phase and a separate penalty phase.

Given your continued failure to grasp the terms outlined in this hypothetical scenario, I have no choice but to ignore any further attempts by you to shit on my thread.  Good day, sir.

The rest of you don't need to keep reiterating that this scenario could never happen, as I am well aware of that.

[Joe Republic]

You never answered my question about the morality of ignoring a judge's jury instructions!

Why?

Simple.  Those are not the instructions the judge gave the jury in this scenario.  Happy?

[Joe Republic]

I guess I'll need to revert to my stated intention of ignoring your continued attempts to feign a lack of understanding of the purpose of the exercise.

Unless I'm mistaken, and you genuinely have missed the entire point.  That seems likelier.

Additionally, given that you support the death penalty, I'm not sure why you're still posting in this thread.  The target audience is described clearly in the thread title.

[Joe Republic]

I was going to get to that one after resolving other matters, but, Joe being Joe refused to answer my question about the "morality" of ignoring Jury Instructions, by denying such jury instructions (which I linked him to and which are standard)) would be given.

You actually have completely missed the point of this poll, haven't you?  I just thought you were playing dumb to rile me.  Wow.

Given that this poll deals with one question of morality, and yours is a completely separate one that is not relevant to the terms of this hypothetical scenario, why don't you create a new thread for it?  I'd be more than happy to answer any questions of morality in any hypothetical scenario you like.  And unlike you, it seems, I would actually be capable of understanding and abiding by your defined terms of the scenario.

[Joe Republic]

CARL, I've already accepted that you are wholly incapable of participating in thought experiments; you don't need to continue demonstrating this.  Evidently, if you had been posed with Avicenna's "Floating Man" scenario, for example, you would have outright rejected the premise on the basis that humans cannot actually levitate unaided.  Thus you would have again missed the entire point of the exercise.

Everybody else here - including myself - has been able to accept that the conditions of the supposition I have posed are impossible in real life, and have therefore been able to address the moral conflict it posed.  You have not.  You are either genuinely unable to conceptualize a fictional set of conditions, or you are feigning it for the purpose of trolling.