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Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

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Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#181

Post by ImJamal »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #168
okeuro49 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the UK 30 people are arrested a day for social media posts online. Only about 10 percent resulting in convictions. Police don't face criminal charges for this. https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-make-30-arr...

Those 30 aren’t arrested for just for writing “social media posts” but for possibly “harmful communication including incitement to terrorism and violence, online threats and abuse, and unwanted communication via email and other means” Of the 90% many will accept their fault and receive a caution or warning Edit: and none of those cases would involve pretrial remand/jail

And harmful communication can be "Fuck Hamas" which may be hateful, but not harmful.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#182

Post by caconym_ »

ikeboy wrote: post #160
caconym_ wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are not suggesting that "maybe we're overcriminalized". You are suggesting that we should not hold law enforcement accountable for egregious abuses of power that do real harm to real people. You think it should not be considered criminal for a police officer to put somebody in prison (under threat of bodily harm or death, by default) just because they feel like it, or whatever. You think police officers should be…

I haven't said those things. Rape and murder are existing crimes, and they should be applied equally to police officers. I think that the core problem with the system is not individual bad actors, but overcriminalization and the acceptance of that by judges and juries. To solve that you need actual reform, and adding a new crime that would inevitably be weaponized is not the way. The whole concept of holding people "…

> I haven't said those things.

No, but they clearly follow from what you have said.

> Rape and murder are existing crimes, and they should be applied equally to police officers.

Okay, but they aren't, because police enjoy broad immunity and benefit of the doubt from (and during) prosecution. How do you suggest we fix this?

Additionally, I am not sure you appreciate the magnitude of harm that can be caused by locking somebody up for months. They can lose their house, their job, their pets, their kids. They miss important life events. The payout in this case was fully justified, though, of course---since the officer himself was not held accountable---it is the taxpayer who will foot the bill.

> The whole concept of holding people "accountable" is the wrong frame. It's precisely that mindset that created this highly flawed system. I want to reduce bad things, not to feel good because people who did bad things are punished.

Holding people accountable is not the same as pursuing retributive justice for its own sake. I agree that the latter is bad and that it is pervasive in our justice system. But I don't agree that we shouldn't hold people responsible in any way for what they have done, especially if there are no mitigating factors.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#183

Post by kube-system »

lokar wrote: post #67
Arubis wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a sane, fair, and (crucially) long-term stable system, persons given privilege and authority over others are subject to a higher standard for their own behavior. The long-running US trend of the inverse (additional legal protections for positions of authority) is incredibly destructive. This is a moral and values judgment, yes, but it's not just that -- it communicates to the population at large that they should f…

The death penalty should be reserved for people who violate a position of public trust and authority.

Because it is irreversible, the death penalty should be reserved for cases in which there is no possibility of mistake. Which, given the fallibility of humans, is never.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#184

Post by [deleted] »

sidewndr46 wrote: post #171
TimTheTinker wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the worst examples in the US is the consequence asymmetry for speech. Law enforcement and federal agents can lie as much as they like with impunity when dealing with citizens, but (a) it's a federal crime to lie to a federal officer (18 US Code § 1001, up to 8 years imprisonment), and (b) truly, anything you say to law enforcement when under any suspicion can and will be used against you in a court of law, eve…

This distinction doesn't make sense. A police officer's job is to lie to you. Are we expecting jailtime for doing their job?

[deleted]

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#185

Post by ikeboy »

malfist wrote: post #169
ikeboy wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not at all what I said. I'm saying that for decades, people who were maliciously prosecuted by the federal government had effectively no recourse. It's good to change that, and I'm hopeful that the new fund does some of that. I would prefer to change the system to vastly reduce the threshold for finding the federal government liable in such cases.

Are you asserting that the folks who participated in a literal coup attempt were maliciously prosecuted by the federal government? Because that sounds like the position you're arguing from.

If you include the guy who was arrested for posting memes as participating in a coup, sure. "But the memes were misleading" (as someone else in this thread was arguing) I don't care.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#186

Post by kube-system »

sidewndr46 wrote: post #177
maerF0x0 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Sheriff absolutely should face some consequences, at least to his career. The money paid to Bushart ultimately is no skin off the government's back. It's taxpayer money, they will just underfund a good thing, raise taxes, or print debt to pay it if there's a shortfall. It'd be an interesting thing to see garnishing of wages, deductions from pension funds, or loss of some kind of bonus system to help balance the s…

I highly doubt Tennessee is going to start printing USD.

States and municipalities can issue bonds, which is what I presume they meant given a charitable interpretation.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#187

Post by OkayPhysicist »

Sohcahtoa82 wrote: post #148
embedding-shape wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hot take, but I feel like no humans should be killed as a punishment... But I'm also probably too European to understand the true value of death penalty.

I'm only against the death penalty for the simple fact that courts have convicted innocent people. Sometimes, that conviction happens when the court actively blocks exonerating evidence. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/410/284/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/547/319/

Anybody who is wrongfully executed was basically guaranteed to spend their entire life in prison. Death row inmates get dramatically more access to legal aid than anybody else rotting in a cell, so if they couldn't win their appeal, the guy doing life isn't, either.

Generally, I'm against incarceration for that reason. I think the relatively muted violence of it is too easy to stomach for the public, which leads to people letting the system get sloppy. For public and infamous crimes, however, where the question is not "what act took place", but rather "did this act constitute a crime, and if so, what is the punishment?"-type cases, I'm perfectly fine with capital punishment being on the table. We trust public officials with significant authority, and abuse of that authority is utterly irredeemable. Frankly, for elected officials I'd support a "two-thirds vote and you hang" policy. If you want power, and seek out power, you have an immense responsibility to live up to your constituent's expectations.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#188

Post by owenmarshall »

Manuel_D wrote: post #106
okeuro49 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Linehan was arrested for making this post: > If a trans-identified male is in a female-only space, he is committing a violent, abusive act. Make a scene, call the cops and if all else fails, punch him in the balls This seems like a straightforward call to violence to me. And he was released after police ascertained that he had no intent to act on these statements. If someone made posts along the lines of "Christians…

CBP, maybe not - there’s a lot more leeway for things that happen at the border, for better or worse.

But in general US law sets a high bar for claims of incitement. Your hypothetical statement would certainly be considered protected speech. That is, of course, not to say that you would not be a victim of vindictive prosecution ;)

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#189

Post by ikeboy »

caconym_ wrote: post #182
ikeboy wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't said those things. Rape and murder are existing crimes, and they should be applied equally to police officers. I think that the core problem with the system is not individual bad actors, but overcriminalization and the acceptance of that by judges and juries. To solve that you need actual reform, and adding a new crime that would inevitably be weaponized is not the way. The whole concept of holding people "…

> I haven't said those things. No, but they clearly follow from what you have said. > Rape and murder are existing crimes, and they should be applied equally to police officers. Okay, but they aren't, because police enjoy broad immunity and benefit of the doubt from (and during) prosecution. How do you suggest we fix this? Additionally, I am not sure you appreciate the magnitude of harm that can be caused by locking…

I would get rid of all forms of immunity and mandate body cameras. Probably also raise requirements for police officers. And part of it is reducing the scope of what the cops are meant to enforce.

I appreciate the massive harms done by incarceration, which I why I support vastly reducing it.

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