Editorial: Who has the right to kill?

Myuran Sukumaran was executed by the Indonesian government over drug smuggling charges.

Think about the stupidest thing you've ever done.

Maybe the consequences were a broken bone, a broken relationship, a lost job or even a loss of liberty.

No matter what it was, you had the opportunity to make up for that mistake in some way. You had a chance to learn from your stupidity.

What if the stupidest thing you've ever done resulted in execution by firing squad?

The news yesterday morning that Bali Nine ringleaders Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran had been shot dead on an Indonesian island shouldn't have been shocking. They'd been on death row for 10 years and the world knew their execution was scheduled.

But somehow it always felt like there'd be a last minute reprieve - a legal challenge or appeal that would at least prolong the process.

Instead they were lined up and executed with six others. So yes, the finality of it shocked.

No matter the arguments, it's too late for two men who by all accounts had been rehabilitated and learnt from their stupidity.

The high-profile case has reignited the debate around the death penalty.

Do cold-blooded, evil killers deserve to live after taking others' lives? Maybe not. Does a court or government have a right to make that call then act upon it? In my view, no. But not all agree.

A poll on our website yesterday asked readers if they agreed with the death penalty.

At 3pm, 50 per cent of the 1700 or so who had voted said they did not support the death penalty.

But 43 per cent said yes, they did. Seven per cent were unsure.

Trying to smuggle more than 8kg of heroin from Indonesia to Australia would rank up among the stupidest things one could do in life. It deserved serious consequences.

It didn't deserve a bullet.