1) It is far from certain that the falsified test results "cause[d] a billion in damage." Press releases about settlements are not court judgments. At trial, the government would have to prove "but-for causation." For one of the failures, for example, the government would have to prove that the launch vehicle's faring would have opened fully had the aluminum met specifications. If the government cannot prove that, they recover zero. Even if the government proved that, if anything else went wrong in the launch too, it would have to rebut the defendant's case that some other component, not the out-of-spec aluminum, was the primary cause of the launch failure.
2) It's not typical for "kid[s]" to be put in prison for carrying "a few grams of weed." It might happen sometimes (in a country of 330 million people, everything that can happen will happen sometimes) but it's not typical.
The government settles cases for a reason. Often, it's because the case isn't a slam dunk for trial. Sometimes, it's because the company wouldn't be able to pay the judgment anyway. In government contracting, there is also the consideration that if you put a company out of business for something that was the fault of lower-level employees (as here), that reduces competition going forward. (There's probably not a ton of options for space-worthy aluminium fabrication.)
(Conversely, the government usually settles drug cases on very favorable terms because they're easy to prove at trial. You should see the police reports that accompany these plea agreements. "The accused tried to sell drugs to an undercover officer. After arrest, the officers searched his car and found more drugs. Then they searched his house and found still more drugs. A search of the accused's text messages revealed extensive records of drug sales." In such cases, the government has no need to put an expert on the witness stand to convince the jury what would have happened to a rocket launch in a counter-factual scenario.)
First, this shouldn't be a "sometimes" thing, it should be a "never" thing. You get convicted for drugs, regardless of how much, and your life is forever changed.
Second, for all the made, think about how many times police used the bullshit excuse of "I smell weed" to violate and harass citizens.
OP was right, this country's justice system is broken but it's not beyond repair. We are finally seeing changes in the political landscape that will address many long standing injustices.
Communities have the right to declare certain things unacceptable and police their citizens accordingly. The regulation of vice and harmful substances is one of the core functions of state and local governments. In a country of 330 million people, that means that "sometimes" people will exercise that right in a way that you or I think is undesirable or even unjust. But the self-determination of communities is a more fundamental right than the right to consume whatever substances you want.
Pretty sweeping statement there. What if a majority of a "community" decides its residents shouldn't eat meat?
No, they don't; communities don't have rights, individuals do. Communities have the legitimate power to do what you describe so long as no individual rights are violated.
> The regulation of vice and harmful substances is one of the core functions of state and local governments.
No, it's not. It may in some cases be an aspect of a legitimate core function (the protection of public health, for instance) so long as the manner of regulation is actually consistent with that function and with individual rights.
That kind of depends on whether you agree with ancaps on the scope and definition of individual rights; it is, certainly, ancap-consistent.
You missed a “not”, and yes it is a core principle of classical liberalism; indeed, classical liberals tended to see powers of government as legitimate exactly to the extent they served individual rights, as they perceived those rights. Locke, for instance saw the realization of the rights to life, liberty, and estate (which he collectively labeled as “property”, thought that term often is used equivalently to how Locke used the “estate”) as both the motivation for entering into government by the people and the function whose service defined the legitimate role of government.
> American conservatism draws from classical liberalism, for instance.
Both Americans conservatism and American liberalism draw from classical liberalism, without being entirely within it, but I'm not sure what your point is in raising that about American conservatives, since explicitly echoing Locke’s position on the legitimate role of government (with perhaps a narrower understanding of property and thus individual rights than Locke stated) is a central refrain of American conservatives, especially those most likely to explicitly cite continuity with classical liberalism.
A lot of things should "never" happen but do. Life isn't fair. Some people have really bad luck.
Regardless of drug laws’ justice, proving things about them are fairly easy. Proving things about what happened outside the atmosphere is hard.
I think it's far more likely that falsified test results could have caused a billion in damage. Over the course of 19 years? Substandard parts being used in the shuttle is just one data point. Who knows how many substandard parts went into other products' increased failure modes whose burdens were borne by third parties (including US and foreign citizens).
> It's not typical for "kid[s]" to be put in prison for carrying "a few grams of weed.
Maybe not where you're at.
Ah, yes, some ‘lower-level employees’ just got together to falsify metals tests because… they have a fetish for falsifying metals tests? They get to brag to their pals at the pub about falsifying metals tests? They have a betting pool to see who can falsify the most metals tests? It must be something like that.
Alabama Police Ruined a Couple's Lives Over $50 of Weed. Now the Charges Against Them Have Been Dropped
Greg and Teresa Almond filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the Randolph County Sheriff's Department after it raided their house and seized their savings for a misdemeanor pot offense.
https://reason.com/2019/04/16/alabama-police-ruined-a-couple...
Would you rather hire someone who was busted with a small amount of drugs or someone who faked test results for NASA?
edit: Real question, though. I'm often called to report for jury duty but have yet to actually sit on a jury. My understanding is the jury is explicitly charged to reach a "guilty of accusation" or "not guilty" decision. And sentencing is a whole separate phase of the trial in which the jury is not involved. I'm sure this varies with types of charges and with locale, but... am I missing something about how you were asked as a juror to consider that sentence?
It was probably asked during the "voir dire" phase; that's where if you actually perform jury duty and have to go down to the court, your group might be called in to sit for "voir dire", where the lawyers for each side (prosecution and defendant) ask each potential jury member certain questions regarding the case.
The questions are meant to allow the lawyers to pick from the group a pool of jurors - those that make it through voir dire perform the actual jury duty of being the jury. Those who don't, go home.
And if you ever want to never serve on a jury, or never be called again for jury duty, mention that you support FIJA or the concept of a "fully informed jury".
It's like a poison pill for ever serving on a jury again, but usually, if you are anything like a software engineer or similar (which they do ask your profession in voir dire), they will generally skip you (they really, really don't want anyone with that kind of mindset of extreme logic, reasoning, rationality, process flow, etc).
But if you mention FIJA - there's a chance they'll not only let you go, plus strike you from the "call list" - but that any other potential juror in the room will get the same treatment.
FIJA is not against the law. It's your right as a citizen to understand and be "fully informed", but the courts (or our justice system) have made it so that most people aren't (for instance, most people don't know or understand anything about "jury nullification", and the system plays to this ignorance). They will say such things prior to the jury leaving to decide the case that the jury can only consider the "guilty or not guilty" according to the law, etc - which is a complete lie. A juror or jury can decide "not guilty" even if it is clear that the law was broken, if they feel the law is unjust. But they don't want you to know that you can do that as a juror or jury. So they don't "fully inform" you of that option.
If you really want to get them into a tizzy, print out 500 business cards with the FIJA info on them, and put them on cars in the parking lots around the courthouse...note that you might need a permit for this, or they might have made it "illegal" to do this to cars around a courthouse (it might be considered jury tampering or something - amazing that by informing people of their rights as a juror and citizen, that would be considered "tampering"...), so understand that, too.
At one point, they asked if we would be able to consider the full range of punishment during sentencing. Naturally, we asked what that range was, and both lawyers and the judge all had to confer to decide whether or not we were allowed to know. (Apparently that question was new to them. Weird.) They finally decided we were allowed to know, and the answer was up to 20 years in prison. At that point I stated that I could not possibly consider 20 years in prison for the crime of receiving stolen property. I was subsequently cut from the jury, probably because of that, although of course they didn't say why.
Incidentally, one of the guys who had important classified stuff going on at work that would pose a big problem if the trial ran long ended up serving on the jury. I hope for his sake that it didn't actually run long.
You also have to consider what your motivation behind punishment is; is it re-education? Is it compensation of damages? Or is it to just completely bankrupt the company because Never Again? I mean in that last case, NASA and the US as a whole may find itself at a disadvantage in the aluminum industry.
Edit: on second thought, these often are considered for individuals, as long as they’re sufficiently sympathetic/rich. See for example Brock Turner. I should say, funny how these are often not considered for individuals, depending on who they are.
The company caused 700M damage to the US tax payers (assuming the proof part), they should be on the hook to repay that, if they can't they should go bankrupt like anyone else who owes more money than they have.
that being said, for the incurred loss, 46 million is tiny.
Disclosure: My ulterior motive is that I think corporations are way too big and also I found the Sun Tzu story of killing a general very interesting.
> Sun Tzu said: "If words of command are not clear and distinct, if orders are not thoroughly understood, then the general is to blame." So he started drilling them again, and this time gave the order "Left turn," whereupon the girls once more burst into fits of laughter. Sun Tzu: "If words of command are not clear and distinct, if orders are not thoroughly understood, the general is to blame. But if his orders ARE clear, and the soldiers nevertheless disobey, then it is the fault of their officers."
> So saying, he ordered the leaders of the two companies to be beheaded. Now the king of Wu was watching the scene from the top of a raised pavilion; and when he saw that his favorite concubines were about to be executed, he was greatly alarmed and hurriedly sent down the following message: "We are now quite satisfied as to our general's ability to handle troops. If We are bereft of these two concubines, our meat and drink will lose their savor. It is our wish that they shall not be beheaded." Sun Tzu replied: "Having once received His Majesty's commission to be the general of his forces, there are certain commands of His Majesty which, acting in that capacity, I am unable to accept." Accordingly, he had the two leaders beheaded, and straightway installed the pair next in order as leaders in their place. When this had been done, the drum was sounded for the drill once more; and the girls went through all the evolutions, turning to the right or to the left, marching ahead or wheeling back, kneeling or standing, with perfect accuracy and precision, not venturing to utter a sound.
This is 100% impossible to carry out at the scale of a corporation. You don't have enough data about a person staging in front of you to bet a prison sentence on their never ever doing anything wrong, maybe unless you've been friends with them for years. The board+CEO have even less visibility and control over hiring decisions made by middle managers. You would make every leadership position a game of Russian roulette.
They didn't catch it themselves, they didn't take care of it themselves; that means the company as a whole is responsible.
"Second, from in or about 2002 through September 2015, Dennis Balius, the SPI testing lab supervisor, led a scheme to alter tests within SPI’s computerized systems and provide false certifications with the altered results to customers. Balius also instructed employees to violate other testing standards, such as increasing the speed of the testing machines or cutting samples in a manner that did not meet the required specifications. Balius pleaded guilty in July 2017 and was sentenced to three years in prison and ordered to pay over $170,000 in restitution."
The penalty is only $46 million because they've yet to be able to determine (like in court) that the claimed loses (like the failed launches) were actually a consequence of SPI's fraud. The damages are likely on the scale of the orders actually made.
https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2018/08/company_supervis...