I know I shouldn’t repeatedly watch the ID channel, which documents and reenacts the crimes of serial killers and torture murderers. I know full well it damages my psyche, my faith in justice, mankind and God. I’m sure it’s one reason I struggle to maintain any lasting sense of peace and happiness.

When I was last home in Pennsylvania, my restaurant-entrepreneur friend Lester told me about a great female psychologist he saw while living in Atlanta. As therapy, she urged him to watch the old Andy Griffith Show just before bedtime each night. I completely get the therapeutic logic behind that advice and the soothing effect of a kinder, lighter reality on the sleeping mind.

I suppose the theory would hold true with many old TV shows, although Ginger from Gilligan’s Island might disturb my sleep patterns in other ways. But if I was a better friend to myself, I’d go with Nick-at-Nite rather than Wicked Attraction, Deranged, Dark Minds, etc.

But while watching one of those disturbing crime documentaries recently, I stumbled upon a pearl. It started out like most, detailing the evil crime upon an innocent, numbing my mind with the usual shock and rage when the heartless killer received prison instead of death.

From my anger and disgust throughout the first 55 minutes, emerged the unexpected ray of sunshine at the end. Anthony Stockelman, the twisted, unrepentant monster who kidnapped, raped, brutalized and drowned little 10-year-old Katie Collman, appeared smug and satisfied when escaping a death sentence. The girl’s family wept loudly, but Tony seemed fine with his life sentence of free health care, color TV, endless naps and three meals a day, and he won’t have to cook or wash the dishes.

But in the closing credits came the liberating, feel-good ending: “Weeks after Stockelman’s incarceration, a group of inmates tattooed the words, ‘KATIE’S REVENGE’ into his forehead.” The photo of the large, crudely scrawled letters on his ugly forehead brought a smile to my face. Good on those inmates with a heart for children.

Yet, it might offer ammo for those still under the errant impression that life behind bars is more of a deterrent and a harsher sentence than the death penalty. But I contend that story is an aberration. I’ve seen hundreds of these shows — watched scores of demonic killers interviewed — and it all leads to one conclusion: most life-in-prison inmates are reasonably content and arrogantly unrepentant.

Since I normally can see both sides of political issues clearly, I’ll never be accepted by either side as a fellow ideologue. I’m all over the dang map with political opinions, but I know exactly where I live when it comes to the death penalty. I am not pro-life; I’m pro-choice — undeniably-guilty killers deserve a choice between the gallows or Old Sparky. The kind, gentle hypodermic needle should be retired.

If there’s a shred of truth that capital punishment isn’t really much of a deterrent, it’s because of the 15-year “grace” period between sentence and execution. Heck, I’ll be lucky to live another 15 years. If a killer knew he’d die in a similarly gruesome fashion within one year after an atrocious murder, he might have food for thought just before slicing a throat.

While unshakeable in my endorsement of capital punishment, I do realize even the most hideous murderer could repent and turn to God. But if you give him 15 years to relax and think about it, he’ll do it 14 years later. If he has only one year to get his soul in order, you speed up the conversion and compassionately grant the grieving family 14 fewer years of tortured non-closure.

Anyone still believing life behind bars is harsh punishment never watched the Richard Speck — who butchered eight student nurses in Chicago — jailhouse videotape secretly made years before he died peacefully of natural causes. While snorting cocaine with his he/she lover, he chuckled, “If they knowed how much fun I was having in here, they’d turn me loose.”

Sure, you or I would consider being locked up 24 hours a day with large, scary people a true nightmare. But we also consider freedom and family precious gifts and couldn’t fathom deriving delight from the terror, pain and suffering of others. Our thought patterns bear no resemblance to the evil ones who detested everything pure and innocent on the outside. The kinds of people they connect with are on the inside.

Life sentence inmates smuggle in cell phones to torment victims’ families. They sometimes solicit assassins to kill trial witnesses against them. Serial killers are in demand for interviews and love letters from sicko fans. Executed murderers go away and leave us alone.

It’s all disturbing, so Andy Griffith before lights-out is definitely the way to go. Mayberry’s only repeat offender was a legally-intoxicated Otis riding his cow down Main Street. Giving him free access to the cell keys really wasn’t much of a deterrent though.