Of course, this leads to tremendous societal problems. When a family loses a father, a husband or a son to prison terms of pisstake proportions, the family breaks down. The older folks don't have the support of their offspring when they need them. The younger folks grow up without fathers. Lots of pressure is placed upon the mothers, sisters and remaining family members.
It's a system that feeds upon itself.
That's a very good point.
On top of that you start getting areas where there are young men hanging around with nothing to do because of high unemployment in their local areas because of lower levels of education because of underfunded public schools because of lower levels of tax collected because of high unemployment in their local areas because of lower levels of education because of underfunded public schools because of lower levels of tax collected because of lower levels of unemployment because...
As you say it's a system that feeds upon itself.
Add to that of course that in the area that this guy operated there are still young men running around with guns because of high levels of unemployment....(you get the picture).....except that this time, when the armed police come running up the stairs to arrest him for armed robbery he's going to be thinking "Fuck that! I'm not going to prison for a century and a half to be bum raped by Johnny "Footlong" McGee". Now you've just put the people who are trying to uphold the law in danger on a daily basis making them less effective, and more aggressive in order to protect themselves, which means you're going to have young men running around with guns (because of the police's desire not to get shot and over victimising everyone in that community) which leads to more young men running around with guns.....
Added to that is the fact that the DA is an offical who may have designs on running for higher office, and seeing as he was appointed by that Commie Liberal in the White House, has to appear tough on crime in a historically conservative state. So woe betide any young offender coming up before him....
Added to that is the fact that extremely powerful coporations want more young men with guns running around so that they can build more prisons, so that they can make more money, so that they can lobby for longer sentencing, so that they can have more young men for longer, which leads to more young men not giving a shit about the consequences and perhaps shooting a cop or two, which pisses off the cops, which leads to a tougher crackdown on everyone in a particular neighbourhood, which leads to more young men getting disenfranchised, which leads to more young men running around with guns because of....[Return to Top].
What ever you think this particular guy deserves in line of punishment the context of the whole situation has to be taken into account first. Just go to the "Man kills daughter's rapist..." thread to see that is key. Saying "7 armed robberies? Yeah, fuck him. Lock him up for the rest of his life (and in case he's Buddist, throw another one on there)" is lazy. And it isn't working.
Don't, whatever you do, look into how other societies deal with criminals. Don't take any notice of the fact that in the US, where punishment is paramount, that 7 of every 10 inmates released will re-offend and be back inside within 3 years, while in Norway, where rehabilitation and education are key, that figure is only 3 out of 10. That's an anomaly based on North Sea cod, or something....
Keep locking them away, in ever increasing numbers, completely outstripping the rate of population growth. "More walls, more bars, more guards" is where we should be investing, because it's so obviously working. Right?
