I don't see what is so wrong with taking revenge (through the justice system). The justice system was established so that the state could take over from personal acts of revenge and so eliminate private wars such as the feud between the Hatfields and Mccoys.
I remember studying the Oresteia in college and admiring the idea that the law was ordained by Athena in order to solve intractable human problems like the cycle of retribution.
I understand the reluctance of many who mistrust that anyone, even society as a whole, should have the power to ordain 'death' as a punishment.
On the other hand, any organized set of laws or principles is bound to generate its counter-ethos. There are so-called human beings whose actions seem to pre-destine them to a dark end. Someone's gonna die, and if they are not stopped, they will take someone else's life. And if imprisoned, they will take someone's life in prison. A society reluctant to face this is likely to guarantee that the problem persists. This seems to be the current trend in Europe and the U.K. and most of the U.S. I only hope that when the pendulum swings back, it be moderate and not excessive. My understanding of the Biblical "eye-for-an-eye" and "life-for-a-life" was not that it maintain a culture of violence, but that it establish a limit to that violence."