The Execution

Despite the video's attempts to humanize Boggess, I still think he deserved capital punishment. His crimes were horrifying and he seemed to commit them casually, bragging about them afterwards. He wasn't forced or in a bad position, he simply decided to act, and that is the worst part. I think that to use Boggess's religious conversion as leverage for lightening his punishment is a bad idea. I feel like in many cases, people on death row will become religious or will say they have "changed" in order to distance themselves from their crime. I'm sure people change during their time on death row, but the fact is that they can never erase the damage they have done to other people. Of course, instances such as Leslie Gosch's botched executions should never occur; execution should be as humane and painless for those sentenced to die. Gosch definitely suffered psychological cruelty and should not have had to go through that.

What I learned about the case was that capital punishment is treated quite differently across the country. Even if you commit the same crime in two states, your chances of receiving capital punishment can be drastically different. I think it's so bizarre that in one state an action warrants death and in another it does not.