We should rethink Ga.’s death penalty
The impending execution by lethal injection of Kelly Gissendaner brings only added sorrow to a family already living with years of grief. Have not decades of incarceration with the knowledge of impending death been punishment enough for a woman who was not even the one who actually killed her husband? This case, as well as the controversial case of Mr. Hill — the supposedly mentally challenged inmate put to death earlier this year — are prime examples of our desperate need as the state to re-evaluate all aspects of the death penalty. Sadly, by the very existence and continued support of this law, all Georgians are either active or passive participants in those two executions and all others. Although I do not know firsthand the sorrow felt when a loved one is killed by the hand of another, I am a part of our collective sadness when we justify a death for a death.
PAGE MIDDLETON OLSON, DUNWOODY
Fiorina correct on abortion ‘violence’
Amid the recent avalanche of criticism rained down upon Planned Parenthood, some of the organization’s spokespersons have fought back, arguing, in part, that only 3 percent of its services include abortions; the rest are other, vital women’s health services. So if instead of abortions their services included a mere 3 percent of life-ending procedures for babies four months out of the womb rather than four months in, would anyone console him or herself with knowledge that at least it’s only 3 percent of their services? Instead, we’d all be aghast at such barbarity against innocent human lives and demand that the practice end — much less allow a penny of taxpayer funds to perpetuate such acts. Carly Fiorina is correct. The violence of legalized abortion “is about the character of our nation.”
ALAN FOSTER, ACWORTH
Prosecute execs for vehicle deaths
Peanut baron Stewart Parnell’s 28-year prison sentence for his role in the salmonella outbreak that killed nine people and sickened hundreds is a model for how to deal with corporate crime. Not so with the U.S. Justice Department’s $900 million dollar settlement with General Motors over its failure to disclose and fix an ignition-switch defect that caused at least 120 deaths. Fines against corporations in criminal cases punish only the companies’ stockholders. Real human beings at GM made the decisions that killed those unknowing motorists. Why are those individuals not being prosecuted for murder by reckless endangerment? When corporate executives cause illness, injury and death to maximize profits, making a few of them do the “perp walk” would quickly put an end to most of these outrages.
CHRIS MOSER, LITHONIA
