Sometimes simple people grasp simple truths that more sophisticated minds find convoluted ways to rationalize away.  Sometimes people who have committed very evil acts have a better sense of what is just than some gentle souls who never hurt anyone.

Life prisoner Byron Scherf understands that justice requires that he die for the murder of Washington correctional officer Jayme Biendl, Jennifer Sullivan reports for the Seattle Times.

"I took her life and I think I should forfeit mine," Byron Scherf allegedly told Monroe police investigators earlier this month. "If I get a life sentence and she's [dead] then there's no punishment attached to it because I already have a life sentence."

Obviously.  Who can't see that?  Well, Justice Harry Blackmun and five of his colleagues couldn't when they decided in 1987 that a mandatory death sentence for murder by a life prisoner was unconstitutional.