Subject:
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Re: Criminal Justice
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Mon, 19 Aug 2002 16:23:12 GMT
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Viewed:
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318 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Christopher L. Weeks writes:
> But I can imagine lots of circumstances that lead someone
> who is generally not dangerous enough to merit perpetual confinement to take
> another person's life. Or do you only mean that some subset of the occurances
> of the crimes that you listed should be handled that way? And tying back to
> what I was saying above, isn't it possible that the high rate of recidivism
> that you cite as a reason to confine indefinately, is a result of the way we
> handle/punish/stigmatize their situation/actions? If so, your response is kind
> of based on circular reasoning.
>
> I'm not saying that's so, just that it's possible. And I'm not sure how to
> untangle the threads so that we'd really know.
As a point of clarification, are you speculating that recidivism might
result from confinement-based punishment because such punishment is separate
from actual guilt-consequences of the committed crime?
> It seems like it would be relatively easy to monitor somone's spending and
> knock them around if it becomes obvious that they shielded some money from
> their vicitms. Or, you could grant the perpetrator's future to the victims or
> their survivors, and then they could opt to buy the debt/burden off. And they
> would have no incentive to keep their cash shielded since paying it back would
> be their only hope of ever escaping.
Escaping from what? I think that an unrepentant murderer (for example)
could come up with all kinds of ways to justify an extravagant lifestyle or
hide huge cash reserves while simultaneously claiming poverty. A few basic
ways that spring to mind:
A wealthy patron to whom the murderer's hidden money is surreptitiously
siphoned and who then financially supports the murderer, who in turn
retains a net worth of zero
A real estate owner could sell a tiny piece of land worth, say, $100
to the murderer for $100,000,000.00, and the murderer could live
according to the scheme above. If the sale was legal, then the seller
has the money. The murder victim's agents might seize the property,
but to what end?
The murderer could incorporate his holdings, thereby placing them beyond
the reach of litigation against any one member of the corporation.
I'm not solid on corporate law, but I know that incorporation protects
the holders and the holdings against certain kinds of cross-litigation.
In these ways he could continue to live in lavish fashion without ever
escaping his debt. It seems to me that someone morally able to commit
murder could find it within himself to subvert the restitutional process as
well. I mean, deadbeat dads do it all the time in regards to child support
payments...
> > If you can accept that no mentally "well" person would do any of those
> > things, then you are immediately in the realm of having to deal with the
> > woman's apparent level of insanity, temporary or otherwise.
>
> I think of it just like that. But I also wonder how "sane" someone is who
> rapes or molests children. Why is it that you're willing to accord this lady
> the status of insane and needing help, but not for those others? Is it just
> that you have enough detail in this case or something inherent in the type of
> crime?
A perennial question! In an ideal society, no "sane" person would commit
any crime, so it might be argued that candy bar theft is the result of
mental illness.
> > Future generations will probably see this as punishing the
> > mentally ill the same way previous generations used to put the mentally ill
> > through all kinds of bizarre and meaningless tortures.
>
> I hadn't thought of this like this, but I bet you're right. That casts an
> interesting light on the whole thing.
Yes indeed. I applaud the recent Supreme Court decision against execution
of the mentally ill. For that matter, I think I've decided that execution
is in any case wrong (except in immediate him-or-me situations, I guess),
but this decision is a good first step, even if it results in numerous
appeals based on false claims of retardation.
Gosh gosh gosh, I don't know. How great is society's responsibility to
care for the dangerously mentally ill, and to what extent and for how long?
Dave!
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: Criminal Justice
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| (...) Yes. But I think it's less of a stretch to imagine that recidivism is caused by some unspecified factor(s) of incarceration. In fact, I think it's almost certain that some such link exists. So I guess I'm speculating more broadly than the (...) (22 years ago, 19-Aug-02, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Criminal Justice
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| (...) When a child does something antisocial (aka "wrong") many parents/authorities have the first impulse to punish the kid. Current thinking in child development and parenting philosophy says (and I'm pretty sure I agree) that when a punishment is (...) (22 years ago, 19-Aug-02, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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