Put him in jail and keep him there
Reader comment on item: Hugging Iraq's Leaders
in response to reader comment: Mousaoui's fate is worse than death

Submitted by Octavio Johanson (Italy), May 9, 2006 at 05:23

With IRA terrorists, British judges used to specify that 'life means life'. They still got out of jail. Same thing is Spain with ETA. Italy has even released a Palestinian murderer, after the Italian boat Achille Lauro was hijacked by Palestinian assassins, and the only Jewish prisoner was killed. Now, don't even start with your defence of IRA, ETA or the PLO. I know, IRA were fighting for freedom, etc. etc. I don't want to talk about IRA: the point I am trying to make is different. Most western countries have abolished life-imprisonment. Mussaoui did not deserve to die, because that would have been the way out.

However, I would not want to hear that he has got out of prison, after 10 years. Keep him in jail, forever. He must waste his entire life behind bars. He must spend the rest of his days in solitary confinement. He must not talk to anyone. And, most importantly, he must never get out of jail. I don't agree with the death penalty. However, the whole point of the capital punishment is to prevent criminals from re-offending. If Mussaoui, one day, gets out of jail, then he will have won. There should be no compassion for Mussaoui. I am not happy to know that Mussauoi will spend the rest of his life in jail, but it makes me feel safer to know that he will be locked up. Crime must be matched by punishment. We cannot ask the families of the victims to be angels. Knowing that Mussaoui has been punished might make them feel better.

As for him, he will not get his martyrdom. He will get a boring cell, without television, no women, no friends. He will have to wake up at the same time for the rest of his life, go to bed at the same time, do the same things..........He will regret not getting the death-penalty!

---

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened for relevance, substance, and tone, and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome, but comments are rejected if scurrilous, off-topic, vulgar, ad hominem, or otherwise viewed as inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the Guidelines for Comments. For informational purposes, we identify countries from which comments are sent.