Leaving Prison at 72
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Geneva Cooley was sentenced to mandatory life without parole based on the drug conviction. However, even if that hadn’t been the case, she could’ve gotten a life sentence based on two prior felony convictions for forgery, and a felony conviction for failing to get tax stamps for the drugs she sold. The drug laws in Alabama have been amended, but the habitual offender laws have been much harder to change.
There is a ton of focus on the injustice of drug convictions, maybe because it’s something middle class people can identify with. But that’s just scratching the surface of what’s wrong.
It's also to some degree perceived as less severe because selling drugs is generally something addicts do to other addicts; it's not victimless, but it's not something that victimizes those that aren't drug addicts (beyond helping to continue the cycle of addiction, and stopping that by prosecuting drug dealers hasn't proved effective).
Forgery, on the other hand, is much harder to humanize for the middle class because it's generally a crime that victimizes the middle class. Many people are less likely to reduce the sentencing for things like that or burglary because it's a crime that might be inflicted on them, and they want their pound of flesh if it is.
Interesting take! I've always thought it's because of the change in viewpoints towards marijuana (and to a lesser extent, psychedelics).
Attitudes towards recreational marijuana use are far more liberal than they used to be. As it became more socially acceptable it caused much of America to re-examine attitudes towards penalizing drug usage in general, if only because it felt draconian to imprison someone from their milieu for smoking their illegal drug of choice (marijuana).
Perhaps off topic, and apologies for discussing political issues, but this is the angle I always bring up when folks wonder where "Black Lives Matter" comes from. Reason being in the 80s we also had a horrible drug epidemic that destroyed lives and families, but the response was 180 degree opposite of what you see today with the opioid epidemic: drug users were derided as "crack whores" and "junkies", oppressive minimum sentences were enacted (with cheaper crack punished much more harshly than more expensive powder cocaine), and essentially 0 empathy shown towards drug users. Compare that today with even hardcore Republicans advocating empathy and treatment. "Black Lives Matter" is needed as a slogan because, quite honestly, black lives didn't matter, at least in the eyes of America at large.
1) "30 years ago" is not some ancient time (as some people in the 20s might think). There are tons of people impacted from then, and tons of children and relatives of said people.
2) The "30 years ago" thing didn't stop "30 years ago". 30 years ago was just when it broke out...
I absolutely agree, and I wasn't arguing against that. I just think when you hear things like the "All Lives Matter" retort, the juxtaposition between the crack epidemic and the opioid epidemic is such a crystal clear difference where (a) the crack epidemic really wasn't that long ago at all and (b) the race of the main affected communities is the only real difference that brought about all the huge differences in the societal response.
TL;DR is that "my bone is sticking out of my leg" is different from "let's get fucked up".
When it comes to hard drugs, that's really not the case most of the time. Kind of hard to run a successful drug dealing operation when your consuming your own products. Especially gang dealers. A lot of gangs have no tolerance for their dealers doing drugs while selling. In a lot of cases these really are non addicts taking as much advantage of people as they can.
>but it's not something that victimizes those that aren't drug addicts
Ran into a junkie once, he asked to buy a smoke, then just started telling me his life story. He'd been engaged, ran his own company, owned a house. He ended up getting into a car accident, doctor prescribed him opiates, when his prescription was finished he started getting dopesick, he ended up finding someone who could sell him, oxy's(pretty sure that's what it was), anyway appparently his buddy or whatever.didn't have any one day offered him some heroin, helped him shoot up and pretty much started the dude's downward spiral into losing his entire life, not speaking to his family for years and had placed him in the position where he was asking me for a smoke on the street while trailing all his wordly possessions in a shopping cart. He was not happy with his life, he'd been too ashamed to talk to his parents for 6 years or something, there really isn't much help available for people like that. If they don't get into some kind of program, which, is not easy for people like that who have nobody, they're just stuck in that cycle.
Coincidently, this is why judges typically dislike mandatory minimum sentences and whatnot. Sometimes the punishment should be different than what the lawmakers said it must be. Every single case is as unique as the people that caused it happen, and thus, the sentences should be as unique too.
There are a LOT of arguments against this, but that there is an argument at all is not as widely comprehended.
Just saying, don't limit your empathy, limit your sentences -- sure, there is a few extreme cases.
I strongly suspect it isn't true at all. Politicians keep talking as if there are thousands of innocent people in prison, but then any reform tends to stall or backfire (i.e. releasing violent offenders to the public) or not result in much change.
In almost every case there are usually a plethora of prior convictions, or there was a violent crime (or a pattern of violent crime) underlying the conviction but the drug/non-violent conviction is what 'stuck'. In the same way, Al Capone's conviction wasn't really about non-violent/white-collar crime of tax evasion. The cases that are cited where there are no associated factors are, I suspect, few and far between and are largely outliers.
And it makes sense. The justice system is already overburdened. Just as a matter of practicality, neither judges nor prosecutors wish to send non-violent offenders to prison. The last season of Serial, which followed a bunch cases in the Cleveland court system over a few months, showed this. People who deserved to go to prison, went prison. People who didn't (even if they were guilty), didn't.
From a big-picture perspective, the vast majority of people in prison deserve to be in prison.
I find that hard to believe. See Bernie Madoff. Sure he's an extreme example, but he's not a danger to anyone. Surely there's something else that can be done to deter people like him.
I've often thought just set up a camp for non-violent offenders. The security would be basically none, just that if they leave then they go to a real prison.
The forgeries presumably wronged someone, and so it's easy to see it deserves some kind of punishment. Even if the magnitude of the sentence is draconian, subjectivity means this isn't as clear-cut of an argument.
Say what one might but a middle aged junkie lady with a sock full of smack isn't going to bring the roof down over our heads.
Kidnapping: running away from parents that hit you. Helping someone else run away from their parents, or running away and taking your brother/sister (because you don't have the right to take yourself or anyone else away from parents). Can also be "removing from parental control", which is also a crime (if you manage to get help, those people can also get convicted)
(same for running away from an "open" child protection institution if you don't agree with their treatment of you (which is quite likely the case I might add), even running back to your parents.
Stealing: taking anything. Even your own stuff of course, as children don't technically own anything.
Drugs: much the same. But standing in the street while kids inside a house are doing drugs, even if you're clean, is drug use too (or at least conspiracy to ...). Child protection services have been known to ask to convict children for drugs because their parents or friends did drugs, EVEN if those parents were not convicted/were innocent (they can, because there is no burden of proof for them. After all, they’re “protecting” children, “not punishing them”) (usually because the parents didn't agree with doing whatever CPS wanted them to do, and this is a way to force parents into compliance, usually to "place" (lock up) the children (which results in a LOT of extra subsidies for CPS, which I’m sure is just a coincidence). And let's be real here, there's closed and "open" CPS institutions. And there's "juvie". All are prisons, it's really just the regimen that's different, and "open" should be understood to be something like minimum security prison)
Breaking and entering: same problem as with drugs. Being nearby, accidentally, will get you convicted.
Grand theft: being in a stolen car, knowingly ... or not, is grand theft.
And of course, there’s the fundamental criticism of the juvenile justice system and CPS: recidivism rates are higher for the system ... compared with just letting criminals go unpunished. It’s that bad. (Incidentally: the same is true for psychological problems: odds of improvement are better without treatment). Given the above “crimes” this makers more sense, I hope. “Criminal” (or “abused”) children often haven’t DONE anything they (or we) would consider a crime, then commit real crimes afterwards to take revenge against society for their treatment, because that treatment is so bad (violence, drugs, sex, forced and/or threatened is everywhere in CPS, schooling yourself is near impossible due to constant moving and instability). Understandable, to Some extent. Sadly both CPS and courts have financial incentives to get more children into the system, so this is getting worse.
What a waste of taxpayers money and a complete shambles.
- No victim, no crime
- Legal != moral
Either directly or indirectly (degrees of separation), many simple acts of commerce fund things most would find abhorrent.
Diamonds are most definitely on that list still - despite all the noise and promises made; I am fairly certain so-called "blood diamonds" are still a part of the trade.
Gasoline (more concretely, oil) is another.
It wouldn't surprise me to find out that various renewables have their own problems in a similar vein...
You can probably think of others.
There is also the coffee industry, which at least has the fair trade program, that helps the small farmers get the money they deserve instead of being pressured to lower prices by the distributors.
So if I drive at at 100mph past a school bus where kids are getting off and I happen to not hit anyone the parents should be, like, "no harm, no foul!"?
So? That's a valid debate technique, not a logical fallacy.
I'd love to have this conversation in a suburban mall food where the average bmi is >30
My parent comment said (referring to speeding past a school bus without harming anyone):
> Just because they are not the victim of murder or assault doesn't mean they're not a victim. You threatened them. You endangered them. They are victims of being put in danger by you.
Pro drug-prohibitionists would argue: just because you can use heroin without hurting anyone does not mean it isn't generally hurtful. But it does lead to other crimes: theft, murder, child neglect, spousal abuse, rape, etc. and burdens society (medical, unemployment, homelessness). You don't have to agree with this justification of course.
'Your right to swing your fist stops where my nose begins' sounds simple. But what if people keep swinging their fists around and unintentionally hitting me? What if people are living on the street and stealing from me so they can spend all day swinging their arms around? What if my neighbour swings her arms around so much she gets dizzy then decides to drive-while-dizzy?
Stealing from you? Charge them with theft. Hitting you accidentally? Let's call that a misdemeanor. Driving while dizzy? Call it DWAI.
Your case does imply possible victims this therefore it is an incorrect analogy.
What if addiction makes me completely vulnerable to people willing to exploit that addiction for their own gain?
As I understand it, those are secondary effects of what is still a victimless crime. I believe this also reduces the need for any further what-iffing.
I posited some indirect victims.
Maybe my point is that reality is way more complex than just "no victim, no crime."
If it’s the former, reply and I’ll clarify my point. I definitely do not agree with what you wrote.
Because we live in a world where it is impossible to fully _not_ affect anyone directly or indirectly, by victims we should understand any party that has an injury caused by our actions and can claim it (but please note again that we expect all the parties involved to be consent)
Before folks would diving into the depths of sophism I would suggest to refer to the Wiki article that explains this in better details.
Secondarily, appealing to the moral aspect of this problem is meaningless, because again, we are talking about it strictly in a legal sense.
In the case of speeding past the school bus, the crime is putting lives in danger by the imminent threat of a high-speed collision with your car.
But now we've opened the can of worms of your actions posing a threat to someone else. Does this automatically lead back to total prohibition of any mind-altering substance, since you might be a threat to someone under the influence?
There certainly is a lot to argue about, but starting from the premise of "no victim, no crime" instead of "for your own good" should get us quite a ways toward a more just society.
This example isn't victimless. That someone has been terrified and will probably have psychological issues for the rest of their life.
It's easy to argue 'no' there, because the key word is "might." In those other examples, your action is putting them in direct danger. If you take drugs, you still need to take further unrelated action to endanger others. You still need to get behind the wheel or pick up a gun. The drugs in your system aren't going to hurt someone, and it's purely a matter of mind-reading to assume that you "might" decide to hurt someone because you're on drugs.
If we want to go down that route, we can just plug all our data into Google Judge and let it statistically decide who should be sent off to prison based on the likelihood that we might harm someone in the future.
The classic prohibitionist argument against "no victim, no crime" is that society is the victim when an individual uses drugs, because a productive, healthy, social individual who becomes a drug addict stops contributing to society, or even becomes a drag on it, making the world a slightly worse place for everyone. And for some drugs that may be the case... but it's beyond me how the solution to that problem should be to persecute the addicts rather than try to help them live up to their full potential.
Driving under the influence, domestic violence, aggression.
Speeding on the other hand is reckless endangerment, if you are to fast, your stopping distance will become to short for the given environment. As a result, you will run over a kid if one crosses the street at a dangerous position. You driving to fast at this position will have the effect of a run over kid, with the only variables being whether or not a kid is just crossing the street at this point. You already made the decision to drive to fast to have a sufficient stopping distance. Your similar decision of taking drugs doesnt have inherent consequences, it only has an influence of the decisions you make after that, for example a drunk barfight. The same could however also be said for other things which influence your mood.
Driving under the influence is a much better comparison to speeding than druguse itself. Not sleeping enough is not dangerous, however driving while dozing off is
Drugs don't pose an intrinsic danger anymore than cars pose an intrinsic danger.
Want to reduce driving under the influence? Have stiff penalties while making sure there is public transportation for all so that it can realistically be avoided.
Folks partake in domestic violence without substances. It should be punished and I don't think it matters if a substance was involved or not. Abuse is abuse and substances do not mean abuse. Sometimes, they are a bonding thing (MDMA especially).
Agression really depends. Teenagers can be quite aggressive. I can be quite aggressive depending on my hormones. A testosterone glitch can make folks aggressive. And so on. It really more depends on what the outcome of "aggression" is. Did you commit assault while aggressive? Charge for assault. Or whatever. If it just makes you an asshole, well. Don't be surprised if folks spend less time with you. Or maybe you instead feed that aggression into basketball or other sports so it doesn't matter at all.
The entire point is that drugs aren't necessarily dangerous beyond whatever physical dangers they do to the user. We can use the existing laws to punish things like assault.
Yet in both cases I would have started the day with the same disregard for peoples safety, it was only a matter of luck that changed the outcome.
You could be driving 30 on a bog standard road, a child could trip and fall under your car, and bam.
I’m sure you can work out the answer yourself.
This isn't a simple rule at all. How do you quantify this?
"If you imprison me my very large company will shut down and everyone there will lose their jobs. Guess you can't imprison me now, since that will cause more harm than letting me go" - any rich person