For many people in the Pittsburgh Region April 4, 2009 is a day many will not forget. On this date City of Pittsburgh Police Officers Paul Sciullo, who was first to get shot, Steve Mayhle, who was backing him up, and Eric Kelly, who was on his way home but had stopped to help the others paid the ultimate sacrifice. Police were called to the home of Richard Poplawski after his mother called 911 asking him to be removed from the home. When Poplawski realized the police were on their way he went to his room armed himself with an AK-47 and protected himself with a bulletproof vest and waited for the officers to arrive. After a 4 hour stand off Poplawski was taken into custody by Pittsburgh SWAT only after 3 officers were murdered in cold blood and 2 other officers injured. While the pain of this day will never go away, today the families of the slain officers and their brothers and sisters of law enforcement came one step closer to closing this book. On June 20, 2011 trial began for the 28 counts Richard Poplawski was being charged with. The 28 counts were made up as follows; 3 counts of first degree murder, 9 counts of attempted homicide, 9 counts of assault of a law enforcement officer, 1 count of possessing instruments of a crime, 2 counts of discharging a firearm into an occupied structure and 4 counts of recklessly endangering another person. The trial lasted on 5 days and in a matter of 4 hours the jury delivered their verdict. Richard Poplawski was found guilty on all 28 counts. The next step will begin on Monday June 27, 2011 when the same jury that found him guilty will now decide his fate. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Mr. Poplawski which in my opinion he deserves; I can only hope the members of the jury can make the right decision here also.
Now while I want to see this murderer strapped to the table and the lethal injection given to him in a slow and inhuman manner, I also have to laugh knowing that there is little chance of that truly happening even if the jury hands him the death penalty. Why do I laugh at this thought? Well, Pennsylvania has only held 3 executions since 1976. All 3 of those executions occurred while Governor Tom Ridge was in office and the last execution occurring on July 6, 1999. Currently, lethal injection is the form of execution used in Pennsylvania. From 1913 to 1990 Pennsylvania used the electric chair as their way to carry out the sentence of death, In fact the chair even carried the nickname of “Old Smokey”. During the almost 80 years of service “Old Smokey” carried out the sentence of death to 350 individuals. Once “Old Smokey” moved on to the retirement home so did Pennsylvania’s Death Penalty, also note that Pennsylvania has one of the highest number of people waiting on death row in the nation. The last time “Old Smokey” was used was in 1962. So while Pennsylvania still recognized the electric chair as its form of execution, from 1962 to 1990 there was no chair. When lethal injection took Old Smokey’s place in 1990 the table has only seen 3 people lay their heads down on it for their last breaths. This in my opinion is uncalled for and the table with the heart stopping juice must and should be used more often. Currently there are approximately 220 people awaiting death on Pennsylvania’s Death Row this is the fourth highest in our Nation. Many of these people will face death by natural causes before they see the table. Why is this? Once again in my opinion it has to do with a two factors. One of the main reasons I believe is because we don’t have politicians with a strong enough stomach or big enough……. (insert your own word here). They are too worried about what the voters will think if I execute a human being. It’s your job to sign the death warrant on someone that has been found guilty in a court of law and sentenced to death. Now this brings me to another reason, the legal system. When found guilty and sentenced to death there is almost guaranteed to be appeals. Honestly you can’t blame them but that is the loop hole in the system, if you keep it in appeals you stay off the table. In the long run it cost more money to keep a person on death row than it does to keep a prisoner sentenced to a life sentence. In fact, the system is so screwed up that some appeals last 25 years! With so many people on death row and the state budget in the tank and crime almost out of control if not out of control depending the region you live in. Something must be done to fix all of theses issues. Pennsylvania’s slogan is, “You got a Friend in Pennsylvania”. Well, maybe we need to stop being so friendly to the criminals and make them fear the state. I know personally of one local small town in Pennsylvania that was once a nice quiet community. Going back 15-20 years ago the biggest crime to occur was an occasional fight amongst teenagers, a loud argument between a couple, and devils night or October 30 when kids ran through the neighborhood throwing corn at houses or putting toilet paper on cars and trees. In recent weeks that same community has had drug overdoses, stabbings, robberies and other acts of violent crimes. All of this in a community of fewer than 900 residents.
While many opponents of the death penalty are correct in saying that it cost more to keep a person on death row than it does for them to serve out a life sentence, it has nothing to do with the death part of the sentencing. The expense comes from the life long appeals. In fact, the cost of the drugs used to fulfill the execution cost approximately $86.00 according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. How do we solve this problem? I personally like the way the grocery stores do things. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania needs to add an express lane to death row. Maybe take lessons from the Lone Star State of Texas. But yet we come back to the appeals process. I have a solution for this. First, we elect a governor that is not afraid of using the death penalty, a governor that will pressure state congress into changing the laws of the appeal process. Second, we elect people to state congress that are not afraid to take the bull by the horns and realize this is an issue in our state and those people be willing to change the laws on the appeal process. Third, revise the appeals process as follows. Once a person is sentenced to death the convicted and their legal council have 30 days to file an appeal. If the appeal is not filed within 30 days then the guilty will be scheduled for execution within six months. If an appeal is filed, then the appeals hearing will be conducted within 6 months of the date the appeal is filed. Upon conclusion of the appeals hearing a decision will be made to either serve out the original sentence of death or to be sentenced to life in prison. If the sentence of death is upheld, the case will then go to an execution review board. This brings us to the fourth change. The creation of a review board made up of citizens; let’s name it PA State Execution Review Board. This board would be made up of citizens not politicians. The board will have no more than one lawyer, one medical doctor, one psychologist, one retired police officer, one criminologist, and four average citizens of the state. The members review board will remain anonymous during their time of service on the board. The nine member review board would review all execution sentences. The review board would have 6 months to review each case. At the end of the review a vote by the board would be held with a majority approval to fulfill the sentence of execution. The governor must also sign off on the execution warrant within 1 weeks of the boards’ decision. Once the governor and the board have signed off of the execution a date will be set within 3 months to fulfill the sentence of death. In the event the review board reverses the decision and feels the guilty should not receive the death penalty then the guilty person sentence will be changed to a life sentence in a maximum security prison with limited luxuries. At anytime if the guilty person wishes to uphold the original sentence of death the guilty party can request so in writing to the review board and the governor. At this time execution will be scheduled for immediate fulfillment within 30 days of the review board and the governor receiving the request. Fifth change, any person found guilty of murdering more than 2 people or guilty of killing public service personnel such as police officers, firefighters, paramedics, and social workers in the first degree will automatically be sentenced to death. Sixth, the date of execution will not be released to the public or media until 24 hours in advance. This will be done so that those families involved will be able to have peace in the final hours and the execution will be done at undisclosed locations throughout the state. Families of those involved will be notified in advance of the date and location and will be permitted to attend and view the execution if they so wish. Family members of the guilty will be given time to say their final words to each other through a secure meeting.
While there are other options I would like to set into place these are just the beginnings to get the system rolling. Now I understand that there are going to be many people upset with what I have written and honestly I do not care. The facts are simple, people commit heinous crimes and these criminals are a burden on the judicial system and the community. With modern day forensics there is less of a chance of executing the wrong person. With an option of an appeal this gives the guilty person and his legal council a second chance to reverse the original decision. The review board is the third so called safety net in execution of sentencing. What more do we need? If a person is found guilty and there is nothing that can change the mind of those making the decision then why should we continue to let the guilty use the system in their favor at the expense of tax payers? With a system in place like I described above a person sentenced to be executed in the state of Pennsylvania would be executed in a period of 7 to 16 month after the initial hearing. No longer would we have guilty persons milking the system with appeals for 25 years and costing the state and its tax payer’s money. Plus the added benefit to this, it would make people think before committing a crime in the state of Pennsylvania. I know that I referred only to people that commit murder in the first degree for the death penalty however I would be willing to open the death penalty up to other violent crimes. With a harder sentence it would make these crimes less desirable. While doing this we would also need to reform our prison system to make them less like country clubs and more like the prisons they are suppose to be. A prison is a place that people are sent to for committing a crime, it’s a place that once there a person should not want to go back to. While I could go on ranting and complaining about the changes needed in the prison system I won’t. We can save that for another day. For now, we can only hope that a politician with some intelligence will read what I have written and make the moves for my dream to become a possibility and to hope and pray that Richard Poplawski is sentenced to death for the cold blooded murder of 3 of Pittsburgh’s finest.
On my final note while I will agree to the use of lethal injection as the form of execution to be used in the State of Pennsylvania it would not be my first choice. I prefer and believe in a good old fashion public hanging. Yes I know, if I haven’t upset people before I will now but as usual I don’t care. If you have people watching the execution what will make them think twice before committing a crime. What would leave more of a lasting impression in your mind? Watching someone basically fall asleep and fade of to death or watching a person drop through the door of the gallows and swing from the neck until they are dead, hearing the sounds of the door opening, the body dropping and the neck snapping. I think the answer here is obvious. I’m sure that if someone was debating a crime the flashback in their mind of seeing a person hanged would make them think is this really worth it?
Some information in this writing was gathered from the following:
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_621386.html
http://www.prodeathpenalty.com/methods.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_the_United_States
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