Justin Carter Reportedly Beaten Behind Bars: A Reminder that Imprisonment is a Serious Thing

As noted at Reason 24/7, Justin Carter (who you might recall from earlier blogging by me is is behind bars for making obviously absurd "threats" in the context of Facebook gaming) is being reported by his dad to have "concussions, black eyes, moved four times…for his own protection."

This is worth contemplating and thinking more about: being behind bars in America is a goddamn serious thing with goddamn serious consequences, and it's horrible to be used as a quick general interest problem-solving tool. Especially so for victimless crimes for which one has not even yet been found guilty with a crazy-coocoo $500,000 bail.

Modern penology sucks, and is by no means modern or progressive. A decent case can be made that the stockades were a more sensible and humane crime-punishing method.

Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

Yeah, it's not all that serious for the law enforcement officials, prison officers and prosecutors. They encounter this kind of thing every day. To them it's all pretty inconsequential.

[Pro Libertate]

I've wondered whether we were better off with some public humiliation for relatively minor crimes. Aside from skipping this insane system of incarceration, it also serves to promote the idea that doing bad stuff is something to be ashamed of. Things are so fucked up now that being a con is no big deal to many people.

[DesigNate]

I would totally support public shaming.

As long as it doesn't include Steve Smith or Warty.

[Pro Libertate]

That's not shame. That's destruction.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

We'd go to zero crime overnight if the punishment was public "shaming" by Warty.

[Warty]

Almost literally anything would be better than throwing this poor nerd in prison to be beaten and raped. They could chain this kid up in Times Square and scourge him with a knotted leather whip and do less damage.

[Anonymous Coward]

Channeling the spirit of Derpy Hooves:

"Don't do the crime if you can't do the time! HERP-A-DERP-A-DERP!"

[sloopyinca]

But this kid did nothing wrong in the first place.

Fuck, I'm in support of strict sentences, but let's start by getting what should be a crime right from the outset.

And bring back the principle of mens rea. Intent to commit a crime should still fucking matter.

[Pro Libertate]

Intent to do something wrong to someone else should still fucking matter. I have little interest in what some goons in a legislature or soulless bureaucrats declare to be a crime.

[MP]

So no more crimes for being irresponsible?

[Pro Libertate]

No. Just a stern chastisement.

[sloopyinca]

What crimes are we talking about? Because I'm not talking about limiting civil remedies.

[Pro Libertate]

Torts are a whole 'nother issue. If you're stupid and reckless and I get hurt, fuck you, pay me.

[shamalam]

Being irresponsible has its own systemic punishment. Punishing irresponsibility is irresponsible.

[Acosmist]

I doubt changing the criminal justice system will breed criminality out of people.

[Dweebston]

Modern penology sucks, and is by no means modern or progressive.

What's not Progressive about using institutions to punish offenders of the delicate liberal ethos?

Oh, little-p progressive. Like, actually progressive. Got it.

[sloopyinca]

And in this case, to punish them before they are even convicted.

[gaijin]

for relatively minor crimes.

Unfortunately, I think the trend is that minor crimes are all becoming major.

[Pro Libertate]

Yes, and that's also absurd and awful.

[Anonymous Coward]

Modern penology sucks, and is by no means modern or progressive. A decent case can be made that the stockades were a more sensible and humane crime-punishing method.

What is more Progressive than a reflexive, visceral urge to punish thoughtcrime?

[sloopyinca]

The day this kid's trial starts, he should make a double-jeopardy claim and show how he's been forced to suffer pain and imprisonment already and that he should not even be forced to stand trial.

I'd like to see how a jury reacts to that without some judge threatening a defendant with contempt if he brings it up.

[shamalam]

Lawsuit against the prison bureaucracy. He was innocent while all of this occurred. They had a duty to see that no harm came to him, similar to the duty a mother has to not leave her child in a car to roast on a hot day.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

A sane penology would be to separate those who are detained before convicted from those who are already convicted.

An even saner penology would be to make it extremely rare to hold someone before they have been shown to be guilty.

And of course it would be nice if we could have a penology which made inmate on inmate violence for all parties rare.

Sadly, I don't expect any politicians to get sane on any of this anytime soon.

[Anonymous Coward]

You sound like one of those soft on crime types. Beatings, torture, and rape are all part of the rehabilitative process.

[Hyperion]

The USA is well on its way to becoming the most totalitarian state on the planet.

They should just go ahead and build big walls around the country and set up a border like McCain wants so that we're all in jail already. Why waste all the time and effort waiting for us to say the wrong thing so that they can lock us up? Only the political class should be free, the rest of us need to be locked up, for our own protection of course.

[Tonio]

Ow, my testicles!

[Heroic Mulatto]

They should just go ahead and build big walls around the country

No. Just New York.

[Ted S.]

When the Senate voted down the gun control legislation after Sandy Hook, Obama went on TV saying something like, "If this common-sense legislation [sic] can save one child from gun violence, don't we have an obligation to try it?"

My immediate response was, "If puting the children in concentration camps and keeping them away from all adults will save one child from gun violence, don't we have an obligation to try it?"

[John Thacker]

They should just go ahead and build big walls around the country and set up a border like McCain wants so that we're all in jail already.

McCain was not a supporter of the fence amendment. His quote was mocking it sarcastically, while at the same time not caring enough to make him actually oppose the bill, since he wants an immigration bill and he likes the Congressional process and bipartisan bills and all that.

[Raston Bot]

Getting your ass kicked repeatedly b/c some bootlicking judge found your words icky might alter your perspective of the state and not accomplish what the judge in this case was trying to accomplish.

[Hyperion]

What it should do is make a Libertarian out of him, and his parents and friends.

What is more likely is that it will have a permanent effect on his mental state and possibly even make him violent, since he's been locked up like a violent criminal and exposed to violence like that.

[Loki]

I said this before when the story first came out here on H&R, but it bears repeating: fuck the stupid cuntnuck busybody bitch who couldn't tell a joke from a real threat. Seriously.

[goneGalt]

WHO is this woman!?!?!?

Under the principle of "3 Felonies a Day" it might be useful to do a little Googling of our own. Merely to see that she is in full compliance with all legal codes. You know, "See Something Say Something".

Canada seems to be quite cooperative when it comes to enforcing US laws.

[Outlaw]

This story makes me more angry than I think anything ever has.

Letting him go can not make this right. Giving him money can not make this right.

Justice would be all the fucks involved with his prosecution and imprisonment dying of some painful terminal disease.

If I said what I really thought I'd end up in there with him.

[XM]

Stockades would encourage certain sexual acts.