happen to know what the laws are in Texas
uh capital punishment is uh you know accepted an accepted punishment it it's legal
uh-huh
uh there are uh there have been a number of executions
over the last few years
hum
uh
they drag you know the the appeals drag on interminably it seems sometimes
um personally i kept i keep thinking that if i could be guaranteed that
the people who perpetrate some of these vicious crimes were never allowed free then i would not be in favor of capital punishment
but when
oh i see what you're saying
but uh when i know that
uh they could be paroled and go right back to doing what they did before i i feel decidedly uneasy uneasy about it
huh
what about New York
well in New York i'm not quite sure but what sounds familiar to me is that it's it's not legal except in cases of murder of police officers
uh-huh okay
i might be mistaken but that's what sounds familiar to me
um-hum
so uh so we don't hear about it
well
yeah
i was visiting in California recently and apparently they over about two weeks ago they just executed one fellow
um-hum
it is legal there but they they always put it off and put it off and they finally for the first time in twenty five years executed someone
yes
um-hum
yes
so that was quite the news
i remember reading about that
um
is it only usually in cases of murder sort of an eye for an eye kind of thing
it's uh it's more than that i think it's a capital murder uh where
uh there there was an intent to do other harm as well you know where you you engaged in another felony like robbery at at the same time that you murdered someone
okay i know there's a a subtle subtle difference between manslaughter and murder
yes
i guess you can commit manslaughter by running somebody over by accident that kind of thing
by accident
yes
uh-huh
that's my understanding of it uh but that uh murder is something that you do intentionally
uh-huh
uh
i don't know it just seems to me that
everybody wants to know if they do something what's going to happen to them
um-hum
i substitute teach and i have kids who talk fresh don't do homework and they say so what's going to happen to me and
and people getting less and less respect and they understand they know that the bottom line is not very much is going to happen to them
um-hum
so if i could be sure that the people who are sentenced to execution absolutely did it because you know during the with the jury system you're not quite sure
um-hum
no you're not
you know i i i'd feel comfortable with it if i knew absolutely certainly that this person actually murdered someone
um-hum
um-hum
or
but i i think the reason we don't go for it is because we're afraid that we might be making a mistake and you can't fix it
that's right and and it's a terrible thing to do uh
and the world our world seems to become more and more violent all the time by the way i'm a public school administrator so
okay
well did you do you find that the kids are changing and they they don't they they don't respect authority anymore
oh
at all
they they do not respect authority uh they kill for fun
i
uh
they shoot guns for amusement after parties um
hum well the guns are legal where you are it's quite a to do to get a gun around here legally that is
yes
well it it's not it's not legal to carry a handgun in Texas but no it's not you can have it in your home
oh i didn't know that
okay
or in your car if you're traveling
from one city to another
oh okay that clears that
but uh rifles shotguns those sorts of guns are legal
um-hum well they can do just as much damage
oh yes it's just that they're harder to hide
that's true
but i do i feel decidedly uneasy about the judicial system in our country now not only because we can't be sure that the jury
you know has made the right decision that the person who did it's really guilty or really isn't guilty
and yet i feel very uncomfortable about the numbers of people who are paroled put back on the streets and within a few months are raping and killing other people
