That smile on his face

Not in France

How long is it there?

If you feel weely bad about it, you will only get a spankee

Depends. For kidnapping It can be 20 years for first degree, 5 years of the hostage is released within 7days.
Can also be 30 years or life sentence. But it also depends on the situation and all so it's not sure.
It's about the same for murder. It really depends on the degree and situation

Section 234 of German criminal code ascribes a minimum sentence of 1 year for kidnapping. Further sections add modifications based on factors and I'm sure there is some form of severity ascribed in practiced law. If the French tried him a general "kidnapping" of 7 days or less without additional circumstances carries up to 5 years. The French have a maximum sentence of 20-30 years for most types of murder and man slaughter. As in any legal system the charges pursued, legal defense and evidence, and other factors can effect sentencing, as cab bargains with the prosecution or court.

Makes sense. I suppose that someone who has proven that they could kill someone is a danger. We should probably execute drunk drivers too, people who text while driving while at it. I mean the only reason they haven't murdered is luck right? They are ticking time bombs too. 6.5 billion and growing, and so many people complain they don't have enough as is. Why waste space on losers? Plenty more and babies born everyday. Life is cheap no? How many people die every hour on earth, you don't miss most of them anyway so no skin off our backs. A single mistake in the heat of the moment should rightly cost a person their entire life, even if it was an otherwise good and productive life. No second chances! Zero tolerance for all! Nothing send a message like harsh punishment. That's why there's no crime in places that torture prisoners. Why aren't we doing more of that?

If you're gonna try to put words in my mouth and make me a straw man, I won't give you the time of day.

Naw. I think your mostly meat and water not straw, and the words came from my mouth, I never said you said those things. I think it was pretty clear I said those words from my mouth as I speculated that by the same logic we could execute anyone who performed an action that was likely to result in murder but was lucky it didn't. They are dangers too, it's still a crime if I shoot at a person and miss. It's only by my terrible aim they are alive, and next time I might aim better or get lucky no? As for time, it's night here and there's a clock on my screen so I'm good there too.

How the hell does my statement lead to that conclusion?

If you think the justice system is lax in Canada you should see the UK's version. It's appalling and getting worse. I'm not sure what it is now but I know a few years back the average sentence for tax evasion was 4 years whilst the average sentence for murder was also 4 years.

@famousone- granted it blurs the line between "manslaughter" and murder- but at its core your statement was that the past actions of a person showed a willingness to take a human life, that those actions regardless of frame of mind or circumstances constitute a potential future danger, and that in response to that and for the safety of any hypothetical victims that person should be locked away for life or killed. Now if the only question is the specific intent to kill a person, and not the act which ends in a person being killed, it's a stretch. But I present a person with 2 sequential charges for manslaughter due to DUI. How many accidental deaths do they need to cause to equal an intentional death? If we use the 1 strike law we aren't going to hope they don't do something foolish again, but end the danger. If another person has 4 DUI's, how long before they claim a victim? The hypothetical victims rights were put before the circumstances, why not extend to other hypothetical victims?

If they deliberately kill any innocent, lock them up or put them down.
Manslaughter is different, but if it happens again because of the same circumstances (DUI, Negligence, or what have you), then it may as well be intentional homicide.
If they regularly get DUIs, then if they kill anyone it should be considered deliberate.
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I will never advocate for punishing crimes that were never dedicated to, so when consistent refusal to exercise individual responsibility leads to loss of innocent life, it should be considered murder and punished as such.
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The balance between liberty and safety is not complicated in my eyes. Just be sensible, respect the individual's right to choose, and punish them when they choose to hurt another without provacation the average person would consider reasonable, and when their consistent irresponsibility gets someone killed.

I'm having trouble following. If you spend your life being aware cars can kill people, and sit through a life of PSA's about DUI's killing people, then you kill someone in a DUI, you get an easy one to learn your lesson on, and you're only a serious danger not if after you kill once you DUI again, but only if you kill again? And if you murder someone with the intent of murdering them, you aren't being killed to protect the possible victims you'd kill if you were alive, but you're being Killed because you killed someone? But if I try to kill someone and fail- I am an attempted murderer so do I get the death penalty or like the DUI do I get a do over to learn from my mistake? Is that just the "no retries" line- the killing someone? Up to and until you kill someone you get a second chance, but once you kill you're no longer Redeemable?

Even if he could remotely foilow you - and trust me, he couldn't - he would sacrifice any sort of logic easily for his gut feelings, cause when he feels he's right anyway, despite all your fancy words, that was it. He then simulates an argument by randomly saying "straw man" and he stops working right there. Though, in this case he meant the Non sequitur fallacy, but, as I said; whatever...

I think you just described yourself, not Famous

I really see how you "think" that.

It's not that I consider it a freebie when someone is killed by mistake, that's still reckless driving and manslaughter. It just isn't murder unless the perp refuses to change even after seeing the worst case scenario first hand.
The biggest part of charging for first degree murder is intent, after all.

@hammerhead- the more I see your posts the more I like you.

Thank you, same here.

@famousone- if two strangers are standing in a kitchen, one picks up a knife, sticks it into the others heart, and the victim dies do you consider that manslaughter or murder? Considering there is no statement of intent to kill, no motive.

That's the definition of second degree murder.

Second degree murder requires malice aforethought even if not premeditated. If there is no motive, no proof of intent to kill, and no malice provable malice- do you still call it murder?

If there was no malice and it wasn't an accident, then why? The only conclusion I can come to is that the attacker was mentally unwell, which is arguably worse than premeditation.
What state has malice in the definition, anyways?

Malice or intent is a general criteria. As you're aware specifics vary by jurisdiction, but I wasn't interested in the law but in your definition, as we are discussing not the legal punishment for murder but your proposed punishment. Why? Well- Would you still consider it murder or manslaughter if their intention was not to kill them but they just decided to stab randomly and the first place they stabbed was that person neck?

They decided to stab someone without any provacation. That's a lot closer to murder than it is manslaughter.

Then we can agree, they have every reason to believe their actions were a direct danger to that persons life. They cannot claim ignorance. Regardless of their simply stabbing wildly. They knew a knife was a deadly tool, they have no excuse at not having been educated and aware of not only the very real possible danger of their action, but also the fact that other people have been killed or injured by similar actions. The lack of purposeful intent on their part is irrelevant as it was not unavoidable or unforseeable. They knew. So then why if you kill someone drunk driving- meeting all these criteria, is it then manslaughter and worthy of a second chance in your definition?

Drunk driving by itself cannot be charged as murder, but if their DUI gets a person killed it may as well be premeditated murder and treated as such.
My apologies, I misspoke on my earlier comment. I thought you were saying that DUIs should be treated as murder even if nobody got hurt.

Ah. No worries. That clears up what I was seeing as inconsistencies in the stance. While I'm not against the death penalty per se: I will say this: What separates a killer from an idiot is a moment. Anyone who has ever struck another person in anger could have killed them, it only takes the right hit at the right time to kill a person. As suicide statistics show pulling a trigger is instant and in a swell of emotion people will do so when without the weapon they would have cooled off. Picking that knife up off the kitchen counter- sometimes we don't realize the gravity of things until we are out of the moment and then it's too late. Is it really in that light a service to kill a 19yo kid or lock him up his whole life for one bad choice before he could even legally rent a car in many states? If justice is fairly uniform by nature of our system, should we treat the worst of a group with the lesser, or punish the lesser as though they were the worst?

The victim won't get a second chance, why should the killer? Unless it's self- defence, or otherwise justified, the thought of therm ever walking free just doesn't sit right in my mind.

The idea doesn't thrill me either. We've discussed all the ways that harsh sentences can't and don't undo any of the wrong, and how things can be circumstantial, but here's one we didn't touch. People are bad at math. Most premeditated murderers either don't care about the consequences anyway at the time, or don't think they'll get caught, so the sentence doesn't deter them either way. But almost all people are bad at understanding statistics intuitively and abstract concepts like death or infinity. Without experiencing something we literally can't understand it. We know "death" and "prison" are bad, we know 25 years is a long time, but until you experience it you don't KNOW. I'm all for death when there's a clear continuing and likely danger, where crimes are so intentional and horrible to deem their lives worthless. But if you set that bar set it high and the standards of proof higher lest you make a system worse than those it punishes and a slippery slope.