It seems that almost any news story about felons these days contains stuff about how they "made a deal" to get a lesser sentence and or fine.

Out of 11 stories in the paper , 9 of them got "deals" for one reason or another.
yet
4 months later they are out of jail for two weeks and in cuffs for another felony.

I understand that we can not keep all of the felons locked up forever, its impossible.

How about we try this bargain for 2nd time felon offenders.

Don't commit another crime , petty or felony and we won't donate your cornea's to someone that is not! a felon.
or
quit causing problems and we won't donate your kidney or a lung to some good person who actually do good with them.
or
Don't make others miserable with your criminal activity and we won't
put you on the bone marrow list for donation.
or
next time you do not go to jail you lose both your feet.

Hows that for a bargain ?
what we are doing now is no where close to working.
and its costing the good people way to much..
if the felons don't like it, they can go to Mexico and commit their crimes

plea agreements have been around for ever..not a new issue. And the system would collapse without them.

what would really frost your Wheaties is how good they have it in prison. No deterent to stop being criminals or even act good in prison.

I suspect we will be seeing a increase in crime in the coming years!

How would the "system", "collapse". What system, and what would be the nature of this collapse ?

Best solution: Expand the list of capital offenses and enforce the penalties timely and efficiently. Eliminate the human garbage from the equation and recidivism will all but disappear, while the the volume of first time offenders will decline significantly. Also, as a result of this 'change', prison populations will shrink, driving down incarceration costs for taxpayers. That's a win, win, win for everyone.

quote:

Originally posted by wrightd:
How would the "system", "collapse". What system, and what would be the nature of this collapse ?

The court system today is already overwhelmed, and only a very small fraction of cases actually go to trial. (I haven't seen the national statistics, but I'd guess it'd be under 5%. Likely well under.)

As a result, plea bargains are the norm. The prosecutor and defense negotiate back and forth a few times, the bad guy pleads guilty to some charges while others are dropped, and they only spend a few minutes in front of the judge for entering the plea and sentencing. Good guys get their conviction. Bad guys get at least some punishment. And the court system quickly moves on to the next one from their mountain of pending cases.

If plea bargains went away, the court system as it exists today couldn't cope with the massive increase in trials. There simply aren't enough resources (time, money, manpower, docket space, etc.) to handle a trial for every case.

I can tell you in Kentucky if a three time felon steals guns from his family (who fail to secure them properly with him living in the same home) and he sets an ambush to murder a police officer it equals a ten year sentence.

But, wait there more! It is not a crime of violence for sentencing purposes so he only has to serve 20 percent and he is considered "served out".

The prosecutor made a deal with the family long before the plea to give the guns back to them. So, when he gets out, he'll have access to the guns again to be able to finish the job.

We can't even execute the people already on death row, and you want to expand crimes eligible for the death penalty. We have to trash pretty much all of capital crime precedent as it currently exists.

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:
Best solution: Expand the list of capital offenses and enforce the penalties timely and efficiently. Eliminate the human garbage from the equation and recidivism will all but disappear, while the the volume of first time offenders will decline significantly. Also, as a result of this 'change', prison populations will shrink, driving down incarceration costs for taxpayers. That's a win, win, win for everyone.

quote:

Originally posted by BBMW:
We can't even execute the people already on death row, and you want to expand crimes eligible for the death penalty. We have to trash pretty much all of capital crime precedent as it currently exists.

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:
Best solution: Expand the list of capital offenses and enforce the penalties timely and efficiently. Eliminate the human garbage from the equation and recidivism will all but disappear, while the the volume of first time offenders will decline significantly. Also, as a result of this 'change', prison populations will shrink, driving down incarceration costs for taxpayers. That's a win, win, win for everyone.

I think I also added the comment to actually "enforce penalties timely and efficiently". That's probably the biggest issue with the current system and why the offenders don't give a damn about it. The system was not only meant to punish those that offend, but also to function as a deterrent to future bad behavior. At current it accomplishes neither of those functions and has become little more than a joke to all of those who deal with it daily. Either the paradigm shifts and begins to address the problems, or society continues its plunge toward chaos.

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:
Best solution: Expand the list of capital offenses and enforce the penalties timely and efficiently. Eliminate the human garbage from the equation and recidivism will all but disappear, while the the volume of first time offenders will decline significantly. Also, as a result of this 'change', prison populations will shrink, driving down incarceration costs for taxpayers. That's a win, win, win for everyone.

Yep.

I agree, but fixing this would likely require no less than a constitutional amendment to modify (or even actually specify) the definition of cruel and unusual punishment. It would also take a lot more resources to actually make it work.

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:

quote:

Originally posted by BBMW:
We can't even execute the people already on death row, and you want to expand crimes eligible for the death penalty. We have to trash pretty much all of capital crime precedent as it currently exists.

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:
Best solution: Expand the list of capital offenses and enforce the penalties timely and efficiently. Eliminate the human garbage from the equation and recidivism will all but disappear, while the the volume of first time offenders will decline significantly. Also, as a result of this 'change', prison populations will shrink, driving down incarceration costs for taxpayers. That's a win, win, win for everyone.

I think I also added the comment to actually "enforce penalties timely and efficiently". That's probably the biggest issue with the current system and why the offenders don't give a damn about it. The system was not only meant to punish those that offend, but also to function as a deterrent to future bad behavior. At current it accomplishes neither of those functions and has become little more than a joke to all of those who deal with it daily. Either the paradigm shifts and begins to address the problems, or society continues its plunge toward chaos.

Cell or cattle bolt. That should be the only deal.

quote:

Originally posted by MikeinNC:

Yes!!!

I am in favor of the 3 strikes law. Get out second time on parole, commit another crime and meet the hangman. And none of that stupid 25 years on death row shit!

How about bringing back the chain gang, and actually return the so-called prison system to real prisons. Like working on a big rock pile, with 16 lb sledge hammers, making little ones out of those big ones.

This privatizing of prisons was nothing more than another scheme to enrich certain parties at taxpayer expense.

quote:

If plea bargains went away, the court system as it exists today couldn't cope with the massive increase in trials. There simply aren't enough resources (time, money, manpower, docket space, etc.) to handle a trial for every case.

But if the "prisons"were actually prisons, and the perps actually were treated as such, perhaps recidivism would greatly decline, crime would actually decline, and the load on the courts would decline.

I always thought with all this stimulus money thrown around over the last decade they could build prisons.

You would need architects to design it, construction workers to build it, guards and nurses and secretaries to staff it. It would be guaranteed employment.

All these scumbags could be locked away but I guess it would somehow be racist.

^
You do realize we have the highest prison population in the world, right? It's not like we're not locking up enough people. We've certainly built a lot of prisons.

^
You realize that we have the most number of people in the world that need to be locked up, right?

If that wasn't the case, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

I know everyone has their pet peeve that you shouldn't be locked up for this or that, but overcrowding is real to the fact that they are letting people out as fast as we lock them up.

Cost in most places trumps public safety. In the Commonwealth of Kentucky, 70 some odd percent of crime links back to drugs.

Why? Our crime rate is similar, if marginally higher than other industrialized western democracies, yet our incarceration rate is multiple times higher.

quote:

Originally posted by jljones:
^
You realize that we have the most number of people in the world that need to be locked up, right?

If that wasn't the case, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

I know everyone has their pet peeve that you shouldn't be locked up for this or that, but overcrowding is real to the fact that they are letting people out as fast as we lock them up.

Cost in most places trumps public safety. In the Commonwealth of Kentucky, 70 some odd percent of crime links back to drugs.

I am no arm-chair criminologist but I would bet a bunch of money the following:

1. The vast majority of violent crime is concentrated in a very small number of zip codes (certain areas of Chicago, Detroit, Baltimore, Memphis, Houston, etc...) Remove them from the equation and the violent crime rate in the USA is practically zero.

2. The vast majority of violent crime is committed by an extremely low number of violent losers who are 'super criminals' in terms of volume. The proverbial guy with a 'rap sheet a mile long' and that's just the ones he was CHARGED with... Again - remove them from the equation and the crime rate is practically zero.

Note I said PRACTICALLY zero, not zero. We have like 350 Million people living in the US. There will always be a certain amount of one-off 'random' crime.

----------------------------

But would the thought of losing fingers, toes, and transplant-able organs be enough to deter 2nd, 3rd and 4th time felons?

example :
first time felon, serves his 2 1/2 years and has it explained to him/her what a second felony will cost him.

And the 2nd time he does not get 8 years in prison, but instead he loses a kidney to a father of four kids who needs one ,very badly and because his blood type matches , he gets bone marrow taken for another needy patient.

and 3 years in jail.

3rd offense , both corneas get donated to people who need them.