It would authorize prosecutors to seek capital punishment for any sex offender convicted twice of raping children younger than eleven.
The plan is part of a larger bill that would set minimum sentences for sex offenders and require lifetime electronic monitoring for some of them.
Opponents say the measure would be unconstitutional. But the U-S Supreme Court declined to review a Louisiana law that allows the death penalty for people who rape children younger than 12.
State Senator Jake Knotts, chief backer of the South Carolina bill, says criminals who rape children don't belong on earth.
~I wonder what the penalties are for incest in South Carolina and Louisiana: a mandatory life sentence, chemical castration?
HH at Unknown News comments: "There's no politician on earth I'd trust with the decision of who belongs on earth and who doesn't.
And there's nothing worthwhile accomplished by killing child molesters that isn't accomplished by life in prison... except, of course, the inevitable execution of innocent people."