Does the potential for human reanimation render the death penalty impotent?
During the Falklands Conflict of 1982, the survival rate among exsanguinated casualties was higher than average, leading some to suggest that the mild hypothermia induced by the climate had been a significant factor.
Initial research into hypothermia-based suspended animation the late 80′s and 90′s gave partial successes when dogs were subjected to “profound hypothermic circulatory arrest” and then resuscitated. The success was only partial because although the dogs survived, they survived with brain damage.
At a meeting in the Safar Center for Resuscitation Research in late June 2005, it was reported that in the latest experiments, dogs had been successfully revived three hours after clinical death.
The process used involves flushing the blood vessels with a chilled saline solution that is enriched with glucose and oxygen, to help prevent tissue damage. It was conceived by the late Professor Safar who was also the co-inventor of CardioPulmonary Resuscitation (CPR).
In the USA, the death penalty is still used for certain crimes, but there is also the a concept called “the double jeopardy rule” which was introduced in The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. It states that a person cannot be tried twice for the same offence:
no person shall [. . .] be subject for the same offense [sic] to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.
So if resuscitation after clinical death is possible, then there is potential for the death penalty to become ineffective, because once a person has been pronounced clinically dead, they could be revived, and having completed their sentence they would, technically, be free.
This would only really be the case for instances where the method of death does not prevent revival (for instance the guillotine).
There is also the horrific possibilty that if it were possible in humans then judges could sentence people to *multiple* death sentences.
Personally I believe the death penalty to be indefensible on the grounds of false convictions, but if they find they are able to revive people then I wonder if it may even lead to it being used more often because “if we get the wrong person we’ll just bring them back from the dead”..