Sharigan and Zeuhl -
like the man in the proverbial orthopedic shoes - I stand corrected.
Sharrigan, i did misinterperet your original post, for which apologies. i did not intend to infer that you agree with capital punishment per se, my point was that you appeared to infer that in the situation Cregan found himself, you would do the same.
I think this is entirely academic - one situation precludes the other.
If you mix in circles where genuine threats are made to your children, then maybe you are the sort of sociopath who can exact advance and preventative retribution - as Cregan did.
None of us are, so who knows how we would react in that situation? I maintain that i would be not be able to kill someone unless the threat was immediate, and maybe not even then.
Could the police have protected Cregan's child? Unlikely, my point was that my position, as a thinking reasoning person as opposed to being a socioath as Cregan is - would be to approach the police as my first response.If it was my child, I would take that risk. As a member of society, I must first turn to law and orde for protection. If however, the situation arose where a threat was immediate, and I was facing it, then I would have to act on instinct at the time, but I by no means think that default instinct for a parent is to murder a person threatening harm - surely simple disablement would be a more appropriate default position?