Death in Mexico

Re “Mexico’s death trap,” editorial, Feb. 5

The Times argues that Mexico should not reinstate the death penalty. I agree.

Executions have taken the place of an official death penalty policy in Mexico.

This quickly failing state can’t afford the creation of a death row in its prison system, with the endless appeals and high per-prisoner costs of detention that taxpayers are subjected to in the U.S.

Better to spend the funds on public education and polygraph machines for each and every member of the government, police and military.

Tara Murphy

Washington

::

The Times’ editors still refuse to comment on why they believe murderers deserve to go on living, or to propose reasonably simple solutions to the systems that they feel are “uneven and manifestly unfair” in applying the death penalty.

But bringing Mexico into the picture does present a just solution: Spending the rest of one’s life in a Mexican prison could be worse than death.

Mel Wolf

Burbank