“Massachusetts as a commonwealth has a basic commitment to civic virtues, to decency. These are deep, deep, deep in our soil,” says the Rev. Nancy Taylor, senior minister at Boston’s historic Old South Church, which stands next to the marathon’s finish line. “The death penalty kind of defiles the best of what it is to be virtuous in a civic sense. It kind of starts to wreck the equation.”

My opinion follows like this:
The Old Law (from the Sovereign of the Seven Isles books)
"You have a right to your life because you are alive.
You have a right to your liberty because you have free will.

You have a right to your property because it is the product of your labor.

You forfeit these rights when you take them from another."

He forfeited his life and the right to live off the taxpayers.