Crime Punishment Quotes

It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, "whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection," and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever.

The degree of civilization in a society can by judged by entering its prisons.

Under current law, there is no additional penalty for someone who enters the United States illegally and then commits either a crime of violence or a drug trafficking offense. They simply come under the same penalty as we have in current law.

Banks don't commit crimes. Bankers do. And they won't ever stop if they don't have to pay for their crimes.

Show me one American drug kingpin who has been put in jail in America. There are a number of Hispanic kingpins from South and Central America but I don’t see any Mr. Smith’s.

There is no American right to loot stores, or to burn buildings, or to fire rifles from the rooftops. That is crime—and crime must be dealt with forcefully and swiftly, and certainly—under law.

Hanging may seem barbarous, but the greater barbarity lies in the slow abandonment of our common law traditions.

If I rob a gas station, I'm going to get 15 years. If I steal $400 million on Wall Street, I start plea-bargaining.

Law enforcement does not ask an advantage in its struggle with the lawless. It asks only that the scales of justice be balanced. The cause of justice is not served when hardened criminals are allowed to go free through legal technicalities.

I should not regret a fair and full trial of the entire abolition of capital punishment.

And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death

Proposals to abolish the death penalty demnstrate an effeminacy in the general mind of the country.

White collar crime must be taken as seriously as any other crime.

It is always possible that occasional individuals may have overstepped the law and humanity in treatment of criminals and those charged with crime, and if so, they should be severely punished.

We are not supposed to go out and kill all those we suspect to have committed a crime.

Decisions on a matter as serious as charging an individual with a crime cannot be decided on anything less than complete examination of all available evidence. Anything less is not justice.

The severity of punishments ought to be relative to the state of the nation itself. Stronger and more easily felt impressions have to be made on a people only just out of the savage state. A lightning strike is needed to stop a fierce lion who is provoked by a gunshot.

The laws only can determine the punishment of crimes, and the authority of making penal laws can only reside with the legislator, who represents the whole society united by the social compact.

I have prosecuted very serious criminals who are now serving very long jail sentences.

The nature of the criminal justice system has changed. It is no longer primarily concerned with the prevention and punishment of crime, but rather with the management and control of the dispossessed.

The criminal law is no use to decent people.

Part of my platform is, of course, the guilty must be punished and that we no longer let our children see their guilty leaders getting away with murder. Because it teaches children, you know, that they don’t have to have any morals as long as they have guns and are bullies and I don’t think that's a good message. . . . I do say that I am in favor of the return of the guillotine and that is for the worst of the worst of the guilty.

Robbery is a crime; rape is a crime; murder is a crime; treason is a crime and crime must be punished. The law provides for it, and the courts are open. Treason must be made infamous and traitors must be impoverished.

… too big to jail