An Eye for an Eye

Managing Editor

   According to the New York Times Web site, Guido R. Newbrough, a German detainee imprisoned in a Virginia jail, died in November due to neglected care for a bacterial infection. Newbrough’s family and fellow detainees admit Newbrough pleaded for medical care in the 10 days before his death. Instead of receiving medical attention for the infection, guards at the Piedmont Regional Jail in Farmville, Va., threw him to the floor, dragged him away as he cried out in pain and locked him in an isolation cell.

   I imagine humanitarians cringe with the description of his abuse and Germans scream “prejudice,” but I feel justice prevailed in this case since Newbrough molested his girlfriend’s young daughter. I notice how Islamic countries enforce much harsher punishments for those engaging in criminal acts and those countries remain low in crime rates.

   Why?

   I believe people of Islamic belief deter from criminal acts since such things as rape, treason and adultery find punishment by death. Sentenced to death in Islamic countries leads criminals to die by beheading, hanging, stoning, or a firing squad held publicly to serve as a warning to future criminals.

   The United States, on the other hand, put criminals in climate-controlled “cells” equipped with television and phone access. For example, John Wayne Gacy, notorious for killing young men and stuffing them beneath his home, died in 1994 by lethal injection approximately 14 years after jurors found him guilty of raping and murdering 33 victims. That’s giving the rest of the world an example of how the U.S. hands out punishment!

   According to the Texas Department of Justice, criminals on death row receive a regular diet and have access to reading, writing, a radio and legal materials. I feel the electric chair suffices for their “recreation.”

   I think, with the swearing in of our new president, Barack Obama, some change needs to come to the 14th Amendment, which states, “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

   With the 14th Amendment set in stone, death row inmates continue to consult their lawyers to file appeal after appeal, buying time to their life. Nearly a quarter of death row inmate deaths result from natural causes derived from age. I believe the families of the victim wished the victim’s time on earth could be bought back by filing an appeal!

  Even if an inmate receives 20 years for repeated offenses of manufacturing drugs with the intent to deliver, the inmate needs to stay in prison for exactly twenty years. In the U.S., 20 years means the inmate potentially serves, at the most, only five to ten years because of overcrowding in prisons. In my opinion, criminals need to be punished according to the crime committed, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. The good news … citizens maintain the ability to do a little bit to change laws.

   To learn more on how to lobby to change a law, visit heartsandminds. org.

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