stanford rape case

[Ice_nine]

has anyone been following this? I'd like to use this as exhibit A to show how jacked up our legal system is. There's no parity. It makes me sick.

For those of you who don't know the story, I'll summarize. Last year, two men bicycling by a Stanford frat house noticed a young  man having sex with an unconscious woman behind a dumpster. The young man took off and the two men chased him and wrestled him to the ground.This year, the case went to trial. The victim was put through the standard battery of questions about her sexual history, what she was wearing etc. The jury unanimously found the young man guilty of three felony counts and the judge sentences him  to . . .

6 months (and he'll probably only serve three for good behavior)

For those who deny rape culture and systematic bias within the legal system . . . I have no words for you. This isn't the typical "he said, she said" thing. There were witnesses. The perp changed his inital story when he went to trial. The jury convicted him as guilty, and he only gets 6 months. He's also refused to take any responsibility and blames his actions on "drinking and promiscuity on campus"

Here's the letter from the victim https://www.buzzfeed.com/katiejmbaker/heres-the-powerful-letter-the-stanford-victim-read-to-her-ra?utm_term=.ungZExe2a8#.we7AwEZl76

It's long but it's worth the read.

 

[Luigi]

The jury recommended a sentence of eight years. It was the judge acting unilaterally who imposed the six-month sentence.

I figured out when I was about 20 that the "legal system" is unfair. That's why I call it the "legal system" instead of the "justice system" - there's no justice in it. If you expect justice to come out of it, you're just setting yourself up for frustration and disappointment. The cases that make this point are too numerous to count, but I'll mention the Affluenza case.

[Era Might]

I believe prison needs to be abolished like slavery. I don't think 8 years locked up does anything for anyone. There are more humane and productive ways to punish. But, yeah, when I saw he got 6 months, I was shocked. There are people in jail/prison everyday for something as minor as panhandling or drinking in public or violating probation or cutting off an ankle monitor or getting caught with a small amount of drugs. It's easy to sit a couple weeks or more on the smallest things while the almighty legal system gets its ducks in a row. So 6 months for rape is pretty shocking. There was a case in Florida where a young guy, I think he was 20 or something, was basically sentenced to life for weapons possession, it was a repeat offense, but it was only possession. Only after his family got the media and public involved did the judge release him.

I know someone doing 10 years right now for sex with a minor, but she was like 17, not a child, but she was his baby mother's sister so it was sordid fury on her part to get him locked up. Over a consensual relationship.

Edited June 8, 2016 by Era Might

[Ice_nine]

1 hour ago, Era Might said:

I believe prison needs to be abolished like slavery. I don't think 8 years locked up does anything for anyone. There are more humane and productive ways to punish.

Like what? I think most prisons are hell-holes, and the system needs major reform, but what do you have in mind?

[CatherineM]

Mandatory minimums are designed to avoid these situations. Unfortunately they also lead to wierd deals where non-violent offenders get life. 

[Era Might]

22 minutes ago, Ice_nine said:

Like what? I think most prisons are hell-holes, and the system needs major reform, but what do you have in mind?

There's a good book by David Cayley: "The Expanding Prison: The Crisis in Crime and Punishment and the Search for Alternatives." Here's the summary:

Quote

The Expanding Prison is a provocative, cogent argument for prison reform. David Cayley argues that our overpopulated prisons are more reflective of a society that is becoming increasingly polarized than of an actual surge in crime. This book considers proven alternatives to imprisonment that emphasize settlement-oriented techniques over punishment, and move us towards a vision of justice as peace making rather than one of vengeance.

Cayley looks at concrete alternatives in Europe (America has the largest prison population in the world).

If you really want to geek out, read "Discipline and Punish" by French philosopher Michel Foucalt, which looks at the historical origins of the modern penal system, exemplified in the "panopticon," the all-seeing circle of prison. Prison is the apotheosis of state power.

Also, a book I haven't read yet but has gotten good coverage, is Michelle Alexander's "The New Jim Crow" which looks at prison as the racist institution that it is:

Quote

 Contrary to the rosy picture of race embodied in Barack Obama's political success and Oprah Winfrey's financial success, legal scholar Alexander argues vigorously and persuasively that [w]e have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it. Jim Crow and legal racial segregation has been replaced by mass incarceration as a system of social control (More African Americans are under correctional control today... than were enslaved in 1850). Alexander reviews American racial history from the colonies to the Clinton administration, delineating its transformation into the war on drugs. She offers an acute analysis of the effect of this mass incarceration upon former inmates who will be discriminated against, legally, for the rest of their lives, denied employment, housing, education, and public benefits. Most provocatively, she reveals how both the move toward colorblindness and affirmative action may blur our vision of injustice: most Americans know and don't know the truth about mass incarceration—but her carefully researched, deeply engaging, and thoroughly readable book should change that.

I haven't been to prison (thankfully) but I've been to jail. It's a totalizing institution of power with one lesson: obey, submit, lose yourself in the collective process. It's hell, completely anti-human and populated by those whom society has failed. The victims are irrelevant...what the state punishes is violation of the state, not actual justice. It breeds violence. There are some people that society has no idea what to do with except lock them up, but the state can't just be honest about that, and those prisoners are relatively few. Even murder is not a crime that abolishes humanity...Cain was a murderer, but he was still free to walk the earth, albeit as a stranger.

"As long as there is one soul in prison, I am not free." --Eugene V. Debs

Edited June 9, 2016 by Era Might

[PhuturePriest]

Super messed up, but considering the undeniable issues with the legal system and its horrid biases, I'm honestly not surprised. It's simply par for the course to give WASPs a slap on the wrist for one of the worst possible crimes while incarcerating minorities for years at a time for minimal amount of substance possession.

That being said, even if the legal system were fairer in its verdicts, the prison system is horribly flawed and helps no one. It is completely based on vengeance and punishment and cares nothing for actual rehabilitation.

[KnightofChrist]

11 hours ago, Era Might said:

There's a good book by David Cayley: "The Expanding Prison: The Crisis in Crime and Punishment and the Search for Alternatives." Here's the summary:

Cayley looks at concrete alternatives in Europe (America has the largest prison population in the world).

If you really want to geek out, read "Discipline and Punish" by French philosopher Michel Foucalt, which looks at the historical origins of the modern penal system, exemplified in the "panopticon," the all-seeing circle of prison. Prison is the apotheosis of state power.

Also, a book I haven't read yet but has gotten good coverage, is Michelle Alexander's "The New Jim Crow" which looks at prison as the racist institution that it is:

I haven't been to prison (thankfully) but I've been to jail. It's a totalizing institution of power with one lesson: obey, submit, lose yourself in the collective process. It's hell, completely anti-human and populated by those whom society has failed. The victims are irrelevant...what the state punishes is violation of the state, not actual justice. It breeds violence. There are some people that society has no idea what to do with except lock them up, but the state can't just be honest about that, and those prisoners are relatively few. Even murder is not a crime that abolishes humanity...Cain was a murderer, but he was still free to walk the earth, albeit as a stranger.

"As long as there is one soul in prison, I am not free." --Eugene V. Debs

So what are some examples of proven alternatives to imprisonment?

[Anomaly]

But what's confusing you, is just the nature of my game.  Just as every cop is a criminal and all the sinners saints.  

[Era Might]

16 minutes ago, KnightofChrist said:

So what are some examples of proven alternatives to imprisonment?

I don't understand the question because when you say "proven" I would need to clarify what is being proved. In other words, it all depends on what is trying to be achieved. If the goal is vengeance, certainly, concentration camps are a proven alternative. If the goal is treatment, drug courts have helped redirect from criminalization of addiction. If the goal is exclusion from society, I don't think you could find a better model than Nazi crematoriums. It all depends on what is the social function of control (the main purpose of imprisonment, physical and behavioral control).

[KnightofChrist]

1 minute ago, Era Might said:

I don't understand the question because when you say "proven" I would need to clarify what is being proved. In other words, it all depends on what is trying to be achieved. If the goal is vengeance, certainly, concentration camps are a proven alternative. If the goal is treatment, drug courts have helped redirect from criminalization of addiction. If the goal is exclusion from society, I don't think you could find a better model than Nazi crematoriums. It all depends on what is the social function of control (the main purpose of imprisonment, physical and behavioral control).

I was using the verbiage in the summary of one of the books you cited. Having read the book I thought you may be able to give some of the so-called proven alternatives.

[Era Might]

Just now, KnightofChrist said:

I was using the verbiage in the summary of one of the books you cited. Having read the book I thought you may be able to give some of the so-called proven alternatives.

Well the book is looking at it from the perspective of what "justice" means rather than vengeance. So, for example, drug courts would be a closer realization of justice, rather than criminalizing addiction. It recognizes the social phenomena of addiction, and doesn't reduce drug use to just law. Drug courts would be a proven alternative that helps deal with offenders as people and not as POWs in the War on Drugs.

[KnightofChrist]

1 minute ago, Era Might said:

Well the book is looking at it from the perspective of what "justice" means rather than vengeance. So, for example, drug courts would be a closer realization of justice, rather than criminalizing addiction. It recognizes the social phenomena of addiction, and doesn't reduce drug use to just law. Drug courts would be a proven alternative that helps deal with offenders as people and not as POWs in the War on Drugs.

I agree that addiction should be treated more as medical issue than criminal. But in the context of the original topic what of rape and other like crimes? What are the alternatives to prison for those crimes, if any?

[Era Might]

8 minutes ago, KnightofChrist said:

I agree that addiction should be treated more as medical issue than criminal. But in the context of the original topic what of rape and other like crimes? What are the alternatives to prison for those crimes, if any?

It depends on what you think the purpose of a prison sentence is in the first place. For example, in this case, suppose he were sentenced to 8 years in prison. Is that to exclude him from society, or to inflict pain and misery, or just as a warning to future rapists? The form depends on the function. But our present system is based on state discipline and punishment. The Wife of Bath in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales tells of a Knight who commits rape and receives an alternative punishment:

There was a Knight in King Arthur's time who raped a fair young maiden. King Arthur issues a decree that the Knight must be brought to justice. When the Knight is captured, he is condemned to death, but Queen Guinevere intercedes on his behalf and asks the King to allow her to pass judgment upon him. The Queen tells the Knight he will be spared his life if he can discover for her what it is that women most desire, and allots him a year and a day in which to roam wherever he pleases and return with an answer.

[Maggyie]

To be honest I love Arthurian tales but that's a prescription for a whole lot of rapes. I know what you're getting at about alternatives. But with sex offenders it's hard because of the tendency to re-offend.