Cruel and Unusual Punishment: The Shame of Three Strikes Laws

Post by lutterkd » Thu, Mar 28, 2013, 5:48 PM UTC

GotAnyMegadeth wrote: post #8

benjohnson wrote: post #3

A rational person would stop stealing after the 2nd strike. It's wise to remove harmful and irrational people from society. Justice would demand that we expand the law to include white-collar crimes.

What about someone who has a bout of rebellious irrational behaviour when they were 18? Everyone does stupid stuff when they are 18 that they wouldn't dream of doing when they are older. Rather than assuming they are a right off from society and that everyone is better with out them, spend some of the 25+ years worth of prison money on educating them why what they did was stupid.

"Rather than assuming they are a right off from society and that everyone is better with out them, spend some of the 25+ years worth of prison money on educating them why what they did was stupid."

Isn't that what the first two strikes do? They went to prison once. They still indulged in criminal behaviour. They went to prison twice. They were told that if you do this again you will spend the rest of your life in prison, and they STILL committed a crime. Obviously trying to tell them that what did they is wrong is not working. We threatened them with a fucking lifetime in jail, and that still did nothing to stop them committing crimes? I think we can write them off at that point.

Post by DanBC » Thu, Mar 28, 2013, 5:58 PM UTC

lutterkd wrote: post #11

GotAnyMegadeth wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about someone who has a bout of rebellious irrational behaviour when they were 18? Everyone does stupid stuff when they are 18 that they wouldn't dream of doing when they are older. Rather than assuming they are a right off from society and that everyone is better with out them, spend some of the 25+ years worth of prison money on educating them why what they did was stupid.

"Rather than assuming they are a right off from society and that everyone is better with out them, spend some of the 25+ years worth of prison money on educating them why what they did was stupid." Isn't that what the first two strikes do? They went to prison once. They still indulged in criminal behaviour. They went to prison twice. They were told that if you do this again you will spend the rest of your life in pri…

> Isn't that what the first two strikes do?

Clearly not. Prison does not work, for most definitions of 'work'.

If you want to stop people re-offending there are cheaper and easier ways.

Prison is used because of weird financial incentives and because it's politically advantageous to say that you're locking criminals up.

> We threatened them with a fucking lifetime in jail, and that still did nothing to stop them committing crimes?

Most people pay no attention to the law when making choices about the way they live their lives. I do not steal. The reason I do not steal is because that's how I was raised, not because it's illegal and carries a potential jail sentence. Punishments might make someone pay attention to the methods used - murderers still kill, but they make an attempt to destroy evidence.

Have you heard about the guy who committed 2 crimes, and was then wrongly arrested and convicted for a 3rd, and sent away for life? All appeals failed. He escaped from jail, gathered evidence, and cleared his name. That 3rd conviction was quashed.

Unfortunately, escaping from prison is a crime, and so he was arrested and convicted of that, and returned to jail for the rest of his life.

Re: Cruel and Unusual Punishment: The Shame of Three Strikes Laws

Re: Cruel and Unusual Punishment: The Shame of Three Strikes Laws