Richard Ramirez Dead at 53...

[RivkahChaya]

Good one. I'm guessing it wasn't even considered. Just as when Susan Atkins of the Manson family was dying of brain cancer and had had a leg amputated and requested "compassionate release" from prison so that she could die in peace. The answer was "NO- you should have thought about that before you went and slaughtered all those people for Charles Manson."

It irks me that Ramirez outlived his sentence. I try to find solace in hoping that he suffered as he was dying. And I know that that diminishes me, which makes me hate him even more for making me sink that low.

The governor who denied compassionate release was Arnold Schwarzenegger, so no surprise there. Atkins was in late-stage cancer dementia for several months, and it was actually family who made the final request, but it was still denied. I know Schwarzenegger was just being tough on crime, but the fact is that she, and any hospice, private home with visiting nurses, whatever, doing her end-stage care, would have been a target, so no matter how you choose to view it, it was the right decision.

I doubt prisoners serving life or very long sentences, let alone on death row, are ever considered for anything other than directed donation (when a match within the family agrees to donate to that specific person). One requirement for a donor is "stewardship," or something-- I'm really not sure how it's phrased, but it's related to the person's ability to keep themselves in optimal health for their situation and degree of illness, take their anti-rejection drugs regularly, and so forth. Someone whose liver disease is the result of alcoholism is still a candidate to transplant if they are currently sober, but if they show up drunk to the transplant surgery, they don't get the organ. People with a co-morbidity that will shorten their lifespan significantly don't get on the transplant list-- you won't get a heart transplant if you also have brain cancer. HIV used to keep you off the transplant list, but now people with HIV can get organs from HIV+ but otherwise healthy donors.

I think there's a pretty good "stewardship" argument against putting death row inmates on the list.

[Barnaby]

CNN is now reporting he died of cancer.

[belinda]

At last