171–180 of 202 posts
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> The US murder rate is 5/100,000 people, Britain, Denmark and similar countries have about 1/100,000 people. Depends which crimes you look at. Britain, for example, has a higher overall rate of violent crime than the US.
UK murder rate is 1.4/100000 http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-murde...
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Manning is a soldier charged with violating the UCMJ, and should be court-martialed like any other soldier charged with violation of military law. (This is distinct from the "military tribunals" established for "enemy combatants" during the Bush administration.) The duties and obligations of a soldier don't change just because he's become a cause celebre on the internet in the course of allegedly violating his duties…
I remember in one of H Beam Piper's novels, I think it was Little Fuzzy , a character mentions that he had heard, "If you were innocent you are better off being tried by a military court, and if guilty by a civilian one." (not an accurate quote, but close).
There are several types of military courts, in a spectrum ranging from "lower burden of proof of guilt but tighter restrictions on punishments" to "higher burden of proof of guilt but fewer restrictions on punishments." For the rest of this post I will arbitrarily refer to the latter as the "lower" end of the spectrum and the former as the "higher." Non-judicial punishment (NJP), which isn't actually a court-martial, anchors the lower end of the spectrum: the commanding officer (CO) can consider more or less any evidence he chooses, and gets to decide guilt or innocence based upon a preponderance of evidence (as opposed to "reasonable doubt"), but the maximum punishments he can hand out are severely limited (still shitty if you get them, but not even in the same ballpark as hard time). At the high end of the spectrum are general courts-martial, which are comparable to civilian courts in terms of burden of proof, rules on evidence, and maximum sentences.
Generally, the type of court-martial chosen is a function of how certain the authorities are that the defendant is guilty, and how bad they want to hammer the defendant. For example, if they're very confident that the defendant is guilty, but don't feel a need for very harsh punishment, they might use a summary court-martial (the "lowest" type of court-martial, with only NJP being lower on the spectrum). If they are not that confident of guilt, or if they really want to go for the maximum punishment, they will use a general court-martial. If you're guilty, you want to be towards the lower end of the spectrum because your punishment will be minimized. If you're not guilty, you want the general court-martial because anything less gives you a higher chance of being wrongfully convicted. Fortunately, in most circumstances, defendants have the right to demand proceedings which are higher on the spectrum. Typically, however, defendants who know that they are guilty have the good sense to accept the lower-end proceeding.
There are other things which separate courts-martial from civilian courts, such as article 31 rights, and the composition of the jury.
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And a massive cash cow if you're selling the products of the cheap labour that goes on in US prisons. http://www.cio.com/article/595304/Prison_Labor_Outsourcing_s... http://newworkerfeatures.blogspot.com/2010/02/us-prison-labo... Paying someone who you have in complete physical bondage under $1 an hour is slave labour as far as I'm concerned, even if it is nominally voluntary. At best its unconscionably exploitative.…
It is slave labor. The US constitution bans slavery except for prisoners. Here is the text of the Thirteenth Amendment, Section 1: “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” – edit: To add a bit more substance, here is an article about the recent Georgi…
(Source wikipedia.)
I also recommend reading Norwegian criminologist Nils Christie, on why the US should empty their prisons: http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/magazine/17-10/ff_smartl...
It's probably worthwhile to have some familiarity with how the arrest/jail/lawyer process works beforehand. While for most people it is a low-frequency event, it's not good to learn about the process for the first time while in jail! The key is: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6014022229458915912#... http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6014022229458915912#
It's also good to familiarize yourself with the distinctions between detention and arrest.
In the United States, "detention" is whenever police temporarily restrict someone's rights based on an "articulable" suspicion that a crime has occurred. Police can detain anyone at any time if they have an articulable suspicion, but only for a short period of time, and they cannot search the belongings or vehicles of people in detention without consent (many cops will try to obtain consent by saying things like "let me see what's in your bag," but you are well within your rights to verbally deny consent). A good way to establish if you're being detained is to ask the officer if you're free to go. If not, you should then ask why you're being detained, and memorize the response. This is the "articulable suspicion" that the officer is supposed to have before detaining you.
"Arrest" occurs when "any reasonable person" would feel that they are not free to leave. The distinction between detainment and arrest is subtle, but if you're being handcuffed or put into a police vehicle, your belongings or vehicle are being searched after you have denied consent, or you are detained for an extended period of time, then you're under arrest. Crucially, police are not required to make any formal declaration of your arrest, nor are they required to read you your Miranda rights (though they are required to read them if they wish to question you). If you feel that you're under arrest, your best course of action is to state that you refuse to speak and wish to see an attorney. You can repeat this as often as is necessary. They're not allowed to question you after you say this, but only if don't say anything else. If you do, then you've waived your right to silence. The only exception is that you are allowed to give your name and address in order to be released with a promise to appear in court. If you do give that information, immediately follow it by repeating that you will remain silent until an attorney is present.
Again, I Am Not A Lawyer, although all of this information does come from lawyers who give talks about civil liberties. None of these talks are online, but most of the above is explained in more detail on an actual lawyer's website[1].
[1]: http://www.williamweinberg.com/lawyer-attorney-1127658.html
In case you're (like me) wondering what "attempted lynching" means in the context of the article, consider yourself enlightened by the California Penal Code: 405a. The taking by means of a riot of any person from the lawful custody of any peace officer is a lynching. 405b. Every person who participates in any lynching is punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for two, three or four years. I can't imagine this…
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Criminals are created by (a) laws, (b) their transgression, and (c) their enforcement. You seem to think that the whole issue is in (b) - that there's something about the US that causes more people to act unlawfully, to transgress. Have you considered other possibilities, such as unjust laws, or unequal application of laws? Besides that, there's social issues, whereby subgroups are disadvantaged and have fewer opport…
It's certainly the case that (b) is a major role. Forget about convictions - lets just look at crimes. The US murder rate is 5/100,000 people, Britain, Denmark and similar countries have about 1/100,000 people. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentiona... The reason why we are different from much of Europe isn't a secret, it's just taboo to discuss. Most of our crime is confined to a small subset o…
According to those figures, the most effective way to lower the homicide rate is to get rid of men.
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That's merely a symptom, not a cause. The cause is that US prisons are for profit organisations, and that laws are written by lobbyists and passed by bribes. This shows how effective market forces are.
they should get paid for every prisoner they rehabilitate instead of incarcerate
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Many of those crimes are drug crimes, which are only a crime because we've chosen to make them so. It's not all that hard to change a law to make a certain group of people whose habits you dislike criminals.
All crimes are crimes because we decided to make them so.
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they should get paid for every prisoner they rehabilitate instead of incarcerate
Isn't that a bit like using "bugs fixed" as a metric of programmer quality? It gives them an incentive to get lots of people in for nothing, do nothing, and then call them "rehabilitated."