The Chinese Death Van

There's a fascinating article in USA Today about lethal injection gaining over shooting as the prefered method of capital punishment in China. A company called Jinguan, aflame with that spirit of entrepreneurship that currently rages through China, has therefore invented a "Death Van," to make it much easier to dispatch the wrongdoers.

It turns out that prior to this, if you wanted a hood killed by lethal injection, you had to send him all the way to Beijing, whereas if you would settle for just shooting him all you needed apparently was a gat, a back garden and a prisoner willing to keep his mouth open while being shot in the back of the head - they don't care for the bullet wrecking the face, you see. Spoils the effect. Now, because China supports human rights, you can just send for the Death Van, and they'll take your hood(s) on board and do the neccessary.

Nasty cynics in Amnesty International aren't convinced, though. It seems that organs taken from criminals who have died by lethal injection are in better shape, and therefore more saleable in a China currently aflame with entrepreneurship, that some guy that got riddled.

The Chinese Governement has sixty-eight crimes on the statue that are punishable by death. They are maintaining the numbers who are executed every year as a state secret, but Amnesty reckon it could be as high as eight thousand a year, which works out at a little under one an hour, all day, every day. That's a lot of second-hand liver to hit the streets in a free market.

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