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In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

nytimes.com

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Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#401

Post by atoav »

foxglacier wrote: post #344
atoav wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean if you think the US is the greatest country on earth, but for some reason needs to made great "again" and that has to involve scapegoating then having an ally where they solved most of the problems you are having with simple commons sense measures isn't all that attractive. It amazing how US billionaires managed to have a majority vote against their interest and endure this shitshow. Time for the US to realize…

If you think people are voting against their own interests, what's probably happening is you don't know what their interests are and don't even realize that you don't know. Other people's interests are obviously not the same as yours but often they're not even what they publicly claim so you won't find out without actual empathy and effort. But it's easier to just be a bigot than understand other cultures.

I grew up in a Austrian province governed by a neo-nazi connected right wing party, when I say voting against their interest who I mean are those who aren't ardent Nazis.

Sure, there might be actual Nazis who would like to lose everything if it just allowed them to force their beliefs on others as was historically the case. But most people who vote for right wingers do so because they believe they will have tangible benefits.

But if your premise is false, your conclusion is also false.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#402

Post by BrenBarn »

dragonwriter wrote: post #109
BrenBarn wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is less to with "overcriminalization" in the sense of legislation, and more to do with the enforcement process. In some sense I think we need more criminalization, in that the types of malfeasance described in the article (e.g., keeping people imprisoned beyond their sentence, failing to provide an attorney, etc.) should result in long jail sentences for the officials who perpetrated them. The problem is t…

You can’t add more criminal laws to deal with systematic refusal by law enforcement to obey and hold other law enforcement officials accountable for obeying existing law, because that relies on the same people whose behavior you are trying to correct to auddenly behave differently to have any effect. The US, in fact, has a comprehensive federal and civil and criminal prohibition applicable to such behavior (the prohi…

There's some truth to that, but I think that changes in such laws have resulted in slight improvements over time. Also, passing such laws at a higher jurisdictional level can allow comparatively "good" people at that level to disrupt local bad behavior like the stuff in the article. There are also other kinds of legal changes that can help, like transparency requirements and bans on certain kinds of police union contract provisions. More controversially I think there should be laws that shift the burden of proof (something along the lines of "every police officer is assumed to be unfit for their job unless they affirmatively demonstrate otherwise").

I think one thing that is needed is a "viral" kind of law that criminalizes essentially all attempts to perpetuate, conceal, aid or abet the underlying malfeasance. So that if you can get some people wedged in who do want to do the right thing, they can bring the whole house crashing down by convicting the whole network of corrupt officials.

Ultimately you're right though that there does need to be some cooperation from "inside the system". The question is just what can we do do lower that threshold.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#403

Post by dionidium »

SauciestGNU wrote: post #69
kubb wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this where the whole Europe bashing on social media comes from? US needing to believe that a better society, rule of law, social services isn’t real in Europe and impossible in general?

Not only that, but it explains the disdain for Europe in the current American government. European society proves that Americans could have true freedom and quality of life if it weren't for corporations and oligarchs effectively owning our government. Fascists hate a counterexample.

You'll save yourself a lot of time and confusion by accepting that neither side is jealous of the other. I don't want the lifestyle Europe is selling.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#404

Post by mmooss »

mmooss wrote: post #266
jwsteigerwalt wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, as a society we apparently don’t really care about these inmates. The social justice movement has chosen plenty of questionable causes, but neglected ones like this one.

The social justice movement has focused on prisoners, and especially on reducing incarceration and allowing former prisoners to transfer back to society successfully. The progressive DAs elected a few years ago prioritized decriminalization and deincarceration, and for formerly incarcerated, movements such as 'ban the box' (prohibiting employers to require info on past inceration) and restoring voting rights have als…

Also, ending the death penalty has been a long-time priority.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#405

Post by ty6853 »

dionidium wrote: post #403
SauciestGNU wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only that, but it explains the disdain for Europe in the current American government. European society proves that Americans could have true freedom and quality of life if it weren't for corporations and oligarchs effectively owning our government. Fascists hate a counterexample.

You'll save yourself a lot of time and confusion by accepting that neither side is jealous of the other. I don't want the lifestyle Europe is selling.

The hilarious thing is to get a visa in Europe one of the most reliable ways is to start a business under DAFT or be an investor. They want the evil hypercapitalist entrepreneur, they don't actually want the kind of people that their system often claims to champion the most.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#406

Post by FilosofumRex »

xkcd-sucks wrote: post #329
BrenBarn wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide a link to a non-big-corp-media source where we can read about it?

I realize this is somewhat off topic but Massachusetts State Police is notoriously corrupt. Some recent items off the top of my head which have been covered extensively in mainstream media: * The overtime scandal; TLDR for years there has been a culture of falsifying overtime often in multiple excess of base salary * A recruit was beaten to death in an alleged hazing incident * Accepting bribes to pass CDL inspection…

It's considered one of the most corrupt police forces in the country. It's former head John DiFava gets $123,764 a year pension, MIT police chief job at $300k and looking for choice rocks on the MBTA public property. No Trespass charge or theft, while his goons issue hundred of those charges every year.

https://howiecarrshow.com/onetime-head-of-state-police-has-a...

Needless to say MIT police officers look up to and emulate Chief DiFava:

Joseph D’Amelio had arrested a student for protesting, twice - long before Trump: https://mailman.mit.edu/pipermail/mitai-announce/2004-August...

but turned up to be a gangster drug dealer himself: https://www.campussafetymagazine.com/news/former-mit-police-...

Duane Keegan had also arrested two MIT student hakers and tried to cover up for his drug dealer buddy D'Amelio. He was fired and quietly rehired and is now implicated in the witness intimidation case of the two whistleblowers mentioned below: https://thetech.com/2009/05/08/keegan-v129-n25

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#407

Post by wtcactus »

pnutjam wrote: post #387
wtcactus wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst offender in the present is India with 8 million slaves. Who do you argue is colonizing India at the moment?

Sure Jan, they can just shrug off close to a 100 years of colonization like it never happened. It's not even been 100 years since it officially ended.

So, let me see if I've got this straight:

- India had been practicing slavery since immemorial times [1]

- Then, the British started ruling the place and after only 2 years in power they abolished slavery in all parts of India they controlled [2]

- Then the British left, slavery returned to India, and it's somehow the fault of the British it still exists.

This sums up quite nicely your argument, right?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_India#Slavery_in_An...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_India#British_India...

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#408

Post by ponector »

lurk2 wrote: post #352
ponector wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Americans are overwhelmingly wealthier than Europeans by every other metric. $1.21 trillion in credit card debt, $1.66 trillion in car loans and $1.6 trillion in federal student loans - yes, Americans are overwhelmingly wealthier.

Yes, they are. The largest of those three figures involves the purchase of a hard asset that provides utility to the purchaser over time. If you buy a $30,000 van, you’re not out $30,000, because you’ve received the van in exchange. I note that you didn’t provide equivalent figures for the EU, however, so I imagine you’re less interested in making an actual argument than you are in looking clever.

Do you know why it's hard to get national student debt figures for Europe?

Credit cards and car loans are also not that popular.

PS: if you buy 30k van you are down more than that as you need to get an insurance, gas, parking lot, pay tax, etc.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#409

Post by data_maan »

mixologist wrote: post #134
yieldcrv wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

correct, but Americans as a whole aren't envious of what other countries are doing. There is very little consensus to suggest envy - as the supposition above had suggested was the root of European bashing. There is more consensus on accessing these things - healthcare and higher education - via wealth, or programs within the state of residence. Some individual states/cities do offer free higher education, and free he…

That perspective, as anything US based, is very US centric and wrong. EU supported US war on terror, or whatever you call last 25 years of US invasions, with our own troops and what did we get out of that? Immigration crisis. We basically had to spend huge amounts of money on handling immigrants because of all the wars US (our so called ally) started. Also, EU banks invested a lot of money in US scam financial instit…

Victoria Nuland 2014: "Fuck the EU" https://www.france24.com/en/20140207-ukraine-usa-eu-nuland-l...

Europe 2025: Fuck the US.

Re: In Jail Without a Lawyer: How a Texas Town Fails Poor Defendants

#410

Post by h3half »

piokoch wrote: post #274

This is interesting, from the article it seems that authorities broken the law multiple times "[...] people regularly spend months behind bars without charges filed against them, much longer than state law allows." In such a litigious society like the one in the USA, what stops convicts from hiring the lawyer and suing authorities, there are many lawyers who would gladly work for success fee, if indeed the law was br…

Do you expect coffee from fast food restaurants to be hot enough to send you into shock? That whole incident is a great example of a story confirming peoples' assumptions (frivolous lawsuits are everywhere) despite not being an example of that assumption
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