Life-or-death question

Re “Ohio’s botched execution,” Editorial, Oct. 14

The death penalty always demeans the people who implement it.

How degrading to ask nurses to painfully try to find a vein that will fill a creature of God with lethal poison. The governor of Ohio needs to think about what he is doing to his fellow human beings.

We all need to ponder what kind of society we want to be.

Frances Goldstein

Sherman Oaks

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I have a simple test for whether or not a state should have the death penalty: the guillotine test.

The guillotine offers something for everyone. It is quick, efficient, painless, dramatic and terrifying for the victim. If the state is unwilling to use the guillotine, then it should not have the death penalty.

My point is simply that execution can’t be sanitized.

George M. Lewis

Los Osos, Calif.

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We have poisoned an entire planet and brought countless species to extinction, all in a remarkably short time. Surely we can come up with a lethal injection system that works as efficiently on humans.

Ross Care

Ventura

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I read your editorial on the botched execution of one Romell Broom, who was scheduled to die last month for raping and killing a 14-year-old girl at knifepoint.

That girl had nobody to intervene for her when Broom committed this heinous crimes. On the other hand, Broom had a whole battery of appellate lawyers to try to spare his life.

That man killed someone in a state where capital punishment is the law. Gov. Ted Strickland was only upholding the letter of the law and should not be found at fault.

If this man is rescheduled for execution, I hope this time it will be successful.

Matthew L. Patton

Fullerton