I thought I’d never say this, but America is looking really like a third-world country lately. Of course that’s too much of a generalization, but shit like this, and school shootings, and etc etc…makes you really wondering if you get what I mean.
I get we have problems, but holy shit. Stop saying this.
We are not a third world country, and someone even comparing us to one just shows they’ve never been to a 3rd world country, outside of maybe an enclosed resort.
I know what you mean, but I’d lay a dollar that these people aren’t from the city. More likely suburbs, exurbs, small town, etc.
People who live in cities tend to understand danger and avoid it. If somebody is like, “that street gets dangerous past X block, and you’re likely to get mugged or worse” you don’t go there. Same principle as a wild animal.
No need for Matt Parker, just anyone who can program and has a textbook covering graph algorithms. Actually the graph is probably small enough it would be easier to do it by hand than to code a solution.
I had to do a double take a few times on my news feed as weird things like wild fires and air plane crashes were being reported in Ontario ...... California!
Man, don’t you just love thoughtcrimes? They don’t even need to wait for you to actually do anything - they can just guess you intend to do something and jail you.
“No reasonable person would dress scantily” they say in a place that gets over 110f in the shade. “No reasonable person would carry condoms” they say when we have XDR Gonorrhea, HIV, and Hep C. “It was a known prostitution area” they say, assuming Google Maps publishes known prostitution areas so we can all know where to avoid. “It’s manifesting an intent…” but an intent is not a crime - there’s no injured party with a thought - what damages/punishment could possibly be awarded/inflicted to make a party whole?
It’s fucking farcical how lawyers will defend laws like this, yet also claim to follow logic and reasoning.
I mean, prostitution CAN be a victimless crime, it is not always the case though. Sex trafficking is a thing after all.
Aside from that, jailing the “prostitute” is somewhat brainless though because you have no idea what the circumstances are to begin with. The logic totally falls flat on itself.
Prostitution is not human trafficking. Human traffickers force their victims into numerous occupations, but somehow prostitution is the only one where the job itself is illegal, and the only one where the trafficking victim is treated like a criminal.
I didn’t say human trafficking! Human trafficking like you said is a very wide range of work which can go so far as to include illegal organ trade. I’m referring specifically to “pimping” so to speak.
When I was a kid, I remember seeing an ad in my belovedly ridiculous, now defunct Weekly World News for anti-meteorite bracelets. Maybe I should have gotten one.
And if you had also ordered the 'X-Ray Glasses' ... you'd be able to lie in bed at night and see right through your roof to keep on eye out for any falling meteorites
Does anyone remember when the “yesmen” (no relation) went on BBC posing as Dow Chemical reps announcing a $12 billion dollar settlement for the disaster in Bhopal? That cut their stock price by 5% before they could reassure stock holders that they were in fact not going to compensate the 10thousand people they killed.
General Assembly had the authority to eliminate cash bail and replace it with a system in which people are detained pending trial only if they pose a threat to the public or are a flight risk.
Cash bonds unfairly affect people with lower incomes. Eliminating cash bonds makes it so people will be released unless they are a risk to the public or are a flight risk from trial. This should reduce the inequality in treatment by the justice system based on income.
That’s correct. It’s just going to increase petty crime as opposed to solving any problems. The crime in this state is already bad, I can’t fathom what it’s going to be like this time next year.
Police will enforce the law because that’s what police do. Locking up poor people without a trial is a bad idea. Book them into the system, then see them at their court date. If the don’t show up, they become a fugitive. It just means these seedy bail bond companies charging huge rates will have fewer poor people to prey on. I think only the richest should have to pay bail.
when they know they will see that same person back on the street within a day?
The blame for that lies squarely with the judge's decision to release them. The only factor should be whether they're likely to be a social harm, not whether or not they happen to have money for bail, which is a completely unrelated matter.
Why would police enforce laws when they know they will see that same person back on the street within a day?
Because they’ll eventually be convicted? Or are you asking why police will bother arresting people they don’t think will be convicted? Because the answer to that is really simple: they absolutely should not, because we’re not living in a police state (in theory, anyway).
Where I live they ended cash bail for any non-felony offense and it's led to repeat offenders being picked up, released and they'd offend again, where they get picked up and then released again.
It's a complex issue, many of these people need mental health help, and putting them in jail isn't the solution, but allowing them to continue to walk free when they're known re-offenders isn't helping either.
Is the problem that they are just releasing all non-felony offenses instead of evaluating them in place of the cash bail process?
Because using cash bail was just evaluating and adding a layer that costs the accused money based on their risk, and without it they should still be taking the same steps to determine the risk.
I’m in… Uh… Not Chicago…ill say that. Crime downstate is running pretty rampant right now. There’s a lot of gang violence, and we are at a record clip for gun violence.
What kept a lot of that in check in the early 00s was the people committing the harder crimes were getting picked off by lower level stuff.
However, after being pretty intimately involved in our justice system as of late, that’s stopped. The cops just aren’t interested in dealing with the fallout of picking up people for petty / low level felonies. It both political and resources keeping them from getting involved.
The result is, unless there’s a gun involved, the cops aren’t coming.
Combine that with the few times they do get someone, and said person is immediately released, we are in trouble.
The really interesting case that’s going to happen… Trespassing. Let’s say I’m pissed and go sit on my ex’s porch. The cops pick me up for Tresspassing, I get released and go sit right back on her porch. If I’m not threatening or being violent, that’s a completely plausible situation.
In short, the people who want cashless bail have never been around criminals. For those of us that actually need protected, we are fucked.
The cops just aren’t interested in dealing with the fallout of picking up people for petty / low level felonies. It both political and resources keeping them from getting involved.
That sounds like a police oversight problem, not a bail problem.
Let’s say I’m pissed and go sit on my ex’s porch. The cops pick me up for Tresspassing, I get released and go sit right back on her porch. If I’m not threatening or being violent, that’s a completely plausible situation.
If you’re not threatening anyone but you do it again, that’s a violation of your bail conditions (presumably they would have told you to stay away from her and her house/work/whatever), and you’d sit in jail until your hearing.
When you can pay for your freedom pending trial, it means that arrests will result in extended pre-trial incarceration disproportionately for poor people. Which further means that police can use the power of arrest - not conviction - to imprison people they find undesirable, based on specific officer biases. Pre-trial incarceration impacts the lives of poor people disproportionately, too, as they are more likely to lose employment, or lose enough work that they can't pay rent or a car payment, lose custody of children, etc. Not to mention that Illinois has never had bail bonds, so if a judge sets bail at $1000, you have to fork over $1000. I have that money available to me; plenty of people simply do not. Depending on the charges, it's also an incentive for poor people to plead guilty even if they know they are not, in order to get a shorter sentence or probation. Edit: And doing so means they now probably have a felony on their record, which will impact their employment opportunities and child custody for the rest of their lives.
Cash bail disproportionately punishes poorer people who have not been convicted of a crime.
Is this a catch and release program except for those that pose a risk to the public?
As an ELI answer: If you’re rich, you can afford infinite bail already so for the rich its already “catch and release”. So the only ones it was preventing from being the same is the poor that don’t have infinite money.
This change makes it equal to both groups now. Whether we should allow release at all and under what circumstance are different and valid questions to ask, but we shouldn’t be treating groups to different sets of rules.
news
Oldest
This magazine is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.