Good case for the death penalty

Premkumar Walekar loved Elvis. He had every one of the King's albums.\nHe also loved his wife Margaret. They'd been married for 26 years with one daughter.\nNow Premkumar Walekar is dead.\nOn Oct. 3, while filling his cab a local gas station, a sniper shot him once in the chest. A man whose wife told People magazine they were looking forward to retiring in India died because someone was running around with a gun and a vendetta.\nWalekar wasn't the only victim. According to the Washington Post, the sniper has shot 11 times in the last 2 weeks, killing 9 people.\nJim Martin was buying food for a church potluck when he was shot in the chest. Sarah Ramos was killed while waiting on a bench for a ride to work. Sonny Buchanan was mowing the lawn of a friend's car dealership. Lori Lewis Rivera died after dropping off her three-year-old daughter at daycare.\nWhen this gunman is brought in, it'll be time to address his punishment. There will be arguments from both sides, and I'll support the death penalty for this lunatic.\nI could site many reasons here, such as the high cost of containing a prisoner for the rest of his natural life. I could tell you how unfair it is that many murderers live longer in jail than some of their victims got to live in their entire lives.\nBut I would rather appeal to the fact that a man who feels it's his right to take away the life of another for absolutely no reason, does not deserve to have a life himself.\nSister Helen Prejean visited the Bloomington campus last week to deliver a series of lectures on her anti-death penalty beliefs. On her Web site (www.prejean.com), she says by killing a murderer, "we emulate his actions. Like him, we make our point through violence."\nMaybe this is true, but it's also true that Prejean has never lost a loved one to a sniper's bullet. So we make our point through violence. So what? Maybe violence is the only way to feel that justice has been served.\nIndiana, like Maryland, is one of 36 pro-death penalty states. Since 1997, six people have been executed by lethal injection.\nI hear my opponents say the death penalty isn't a crime deterrent. Prejean herself says that when a man is in the moment of a crime, he's not thinking simply of the actions, not the consequences. And yes, there is not firm, statistical proof that the death penalty deters crime.\nBut to refute his opponents on this very point, poet Hyman Barshay calls the death penalty "just like a lighthouse. We hear about shipwrecks, but we do not hear about the ships the lighthouse guides safely on their way. We do not have proof of the number of ships it saves, but we do not tear the lighthouse down."\n John McAdams, a professor of political science at Marquette University also makes a valid point when he says, "If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murderers, we have allowed the killing of a bunch of innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former. This, to me, is not a tough call."\nNor is it to me. I hope they haul that sniper into court and "throw the book at him." I while he's being executed, he thinks of the lives and families of those he injured and killed. Maybe it will stop another incident. Maybe it won't. But it's what this guy deserves after the pain and anguish he has caused.