There is a bunch of opinions on the net regarding the jury in the Zacarias Moussaoui case. These posts tend to follow 2 lines of thought:

• They should have killed him
• What were they thinking to let him live?

Initially, I am in the "They should have given him death" camp, but after the heat of the moment passed I can see a simple reason why the jury passed on the death sentence.

No matter how much you think a person is guilty, it is hard to personally pull the trigger.

I have (thankfully) never been in the position of being one of 12 votes on if someone were to live or die, but I can try to imagine the emotions surrounding casting that vote, let alone debating the vote with the other 11. In my mind, I would have been able to pull this particular trigger, but I can’t really be sure unless I was faced with it.

Try to place yourself in that jury room, arguing with even one of your fellow jury members that another human, no matter how vile, should be killed by your collective hand.

Still, I wish that the jury would have found the nerve to pull the switch.