OUR VIEW: Nothing less than death for snipers

Terror. That’s exactly what some of the residents of Washington, D.C., Virginia and Maryland experienced during October. Remember, terror isn’t just fear. It is the instilling of fear through violence in order to cause lasting psychological changes in behavior.

Look at what happened as a result of the Sept. 11 attacks. There is more security at airports, marshals are now riding on planes, cockpit doors are reinforced, and more importantly, fewer people are using planes as a mode of transport, all out of fear of another attack.

Will there ever be less security at airports? Not likely.

The thought of another group of psychopaths storming another cockpit and flying a plane into a building or something else is going to last. Indeed, behavior has changed across the United States.

The Washington-area sniper caused similar changes in behavior.

People were going outside less for fear of being shot by a seemingly invisible stalker. Children were kept home from school.

The senseless killing that caused the terror for so many Americans deserves a like retribution. That means for killing so many people, the sniper should die.

Giving him a life sentence will only waste money and prolong a punishment that needs to occur as soon as possible. Be it by lethal injection, the electric chair, the gas chamber or by hanging, the sniper’s life should be extinguished, just like he smothered the lives of people in the Washington, D.C. area.

Death deserves death. It’s simple, quick and economically viable. The sniper, if found as such, must not live.