Justice's fragility

There are many reasons that I'm opposed in principle to capital punishment - even in the case of Saddam Hussein; even in the case of Adolf Eichmann (though see here for quoted examples of some of the worst arguments for that position). This terrible story reported by BBC News contains enough information to indicate a powerful, and in my view incontrovertible, additional pragmatic objection to the death penalty:

A 54-year-old man has been found guilty of the murder of schoolgirl Lesley Molseed more than 30 years ago. Ronald Castree, of Brandon Crescent, Oldham, Greater Manchester, had denied the killing but was convicted by a jury at Bradford Crown Court.

Lesley, 11, vanished from her Rochdale home in October 1975. Her body was later found on moors in West Yorkshire. She was stabbed and sexually assaulted. Castree was arrested after his DNA was matched to semen found on her clothing.

Stefan Kiszko spent 16 years in prison after being wrongly convicted in 1976 for the murder and died soon after his release.

UPDATE: A correspondent points out additional relevant information that I'd forgotten about the case of Stefan Kizko. The defence QC was David Waddington, who proved incompetent to the task. A crucial piece of evidence establishing Stefan Kizko's innocence was that Mr Kizko was unable to produce sperm. That evidence was available at the time of his trial, yet Mr Kizko spent 16 years in prison as a reputed child killer - with all that that implies for his treatment by fellow inmates - for a crime he didn't commit. David Waddington later represented a footnote in British political history by being the last Home Secretary to support the reintroduction of capital punishment.

The Guardian recalls with understatement a scandalous state of affairs:

[The miscarriage of justice] damaged the reputation of those involved but did not prevent their promotion; the prosecutor Peter Taylor QC was made Lord Chief Justice the day after Kiszko's acquittal and the defence counsel, David Waddington, who made a series of tactical errors, became home secretary and continued to hold pro-capital punishment views.