Meh. What is essentially boilerplate on the right that everyone knows will never happen:

CLAYTON — Emphasizing that the most heinous crimes deserve the harshest penalty, Gov. Matt Blunt said today that child rapists should be eligible for the death penalty under Missouri law.

The governor, speaking at an afternoon news conference outside the St. Louis County courthouse, urged the Missouri General Assembly to pass legislation that would add the sentence of death to forcible rape and forcible sodomy cases when the victim is younger than 12 years old.

“We’re talking about the most horrendous crimes one can imagine and it deserves the harshest penalty possible,” Blunt said. “It is the punishment that fits the crime.”

Aside from first-degree murder, Blunt said, violent sex crimes committed against children “are the worst crimes that can be committed.” Victims are innocent and defenseless, the governor said, and are permanently physically and emotionally scarred.

Child rapists should be eligible for the death penalty “both as a matter of justice and deterrence,” Blunt said.

Agreed, but with the very bogus Repressed Memory Syndrome, which is gaining ground with child advocates having the death penalty on the table makes me, and most people, uneasy. Studies show therapists can implant false memories and the Satanic Panic of the 90s should show us how easily the country can get whipped up into a frenzy where justice is ultimately denied.

The McMartin pre-school case shows how easy it is for spurious claims to put innocent people in prison when we ignore the rules of evidence and common sense. Imagine if the death penalty had been on the table then.

Don’t get me wrong. Child rapists deserve to die but unlike murder, where there is a definite crime we can see, there are too many situations where a person can be convicted on what is basically spectral evidence. Until we stamp out the Myth of Repressed Memory we can ill afford to put the ultimate punishment on the table during some of the trials.

If Blunt could create a law that differentiates between perverts caught red handed and some poor bastard whose step daughter ended up at the wrong therapist and “realized” she was molested after weeks of hypnosis, “trance” work and journaling I think the law could be passed, but there’s no way to really do that in the political climate of today.

Blunt will never get this passed, but he can lay the ground work for a more sensible law where serial sex offenders (pedophiles and rapists both) are eligible for the death penalty. There are cases where a person has committed so many crimes that not only is his guilt beyond all doubt, but so is his recidivism. In that case the death penalty would be both justice and a deterrence.

h/t Crime Scene KC