3 ms·

Does the punishment fit the crime?

gambiting 5y ago
In my opinion - absolutely. If you're caught driving at 150mph you will go to jail even if you didn't hit or kill anyone, because the potential for harm was huge. It's the same here - even if no one suffered as the result of his jammer, it could have easily led to a situation where someone else was unable to call emergency services when necessary. The law about jammers is what it is for a very clear reason.
- jessriedel 5y ago
  It is not enough to be able to imagine a hypothetical very bad outcome. The expected negative impact (probability*badness) has to actually be large. I can imagine blocking an ambulance and a patient dying if I leave my car double-parked. I can imagine someone slipping and breaking their neck if I don't shovel my sidewalk as required by the city. I can imagine a car swerving to avoid me and hitting someone else if I jay walk. But we don't punish these crimes with jail time. The total negative impact of this jamming crime is probably dominated by the degradation of normal service for normal people (which I expect is large!), not rare events.
  - gambiting 5y ago
    The law against jammers(and the harsh punishment) is absolutely dictated by the fact that it blocks emergency services first and foremost though. It's messing with critical infrastructure of our society. The fact that it blocks someone's netflix access is only secondary.
    - jessriedel 5y ago
      1. All justifications I have read for these sorts of laws list both emergency services and daily services in the very first sentence of justification. 2. The current discussion is about what the law should be, not how it is; there are lots of stuff (e.g., laws combating terrorism) that are poorly justified using appeals to rare events.
  - Goronmon 5y ago
    I can imagine someone slipping and breaking their neck if I don't shovel my sidewalk as required by the city. I think its more like purposefully icing your sidewalk or driveway to make it harder for salesmen/canvassers/etc to make it to your door.
    - jessriedel 5y ago
      I agree that is even more analogous to the crime under discussion, but I think the point stands either way. We wouldn't put someone in jail for purposefully icing a sidewalk unless the risk was actually really large or someone actually got hurt.
- zarzavat 5y ago
  Usually (at least in common law countries) crimes are supposed to have an element of malicious intent. People shouldn’t be put in prison for making honest mistakes, and laws that do that are unjust. It is believable that he didn’t know that it would knock out the entire town’s connectivity, or that the device would extend beyond his property. He seems to be not very technically adept as he didn’t know how to use parental controls.
  - blunte 5y ago
    "involuntary manslaughter". This will incur a big penalty, and the theory is that there was not intent on behalf of the person who commited the crime.
    - xboxnolifes 5y ago
      Involuntary manslaughter only applies when the killing happened during another crime. So, even if the killing was unintentional, the happenstance was.
      - shkkmo 5y ago
        Not true. Generally involuntary manslaughter can be either due to a "unlawful act" or "criminal negligence" and your comment only applies to the former type.
  - gambiting 5y ago
    >>Usually (at least in common law countries) crimes are supposed to have an element of malicious intent. Really? You can go to jail(for a very long time) just for having some drugs on your person, or for some underage pornography on your computer. Just having those things, with "no malicious intent" is enough to sentence people to years in prison. That's in countries with common law. >>People shouldn’t be put in prison for making honest mistakes And he might not be, 6 months in jail is just one possible outcome - most likely he will get the 30k euro fine and a some community service. >> It is believable that he didn’t know that it would knock out the entire town’s connectivity, or that the device would extend beyond his property Maybe, but actually look at his setup - this isn't some $50 jammer bought off alibaba. He bought a very powerful device that affected a large area around his house - ignorance of technical details and ignorance of the law only stretches so far.
- teakettle42 5y ago
  I’m often curious as to whether people like yourself would feel the same after actually spending time in jail (much less prison). I don’t think the evil inherent in robbing someone of their autonomy is warranted outside anything but the most severe crimes.
  - gambiting 5y ago
    >>I’m often curious as to whether people like yourself would feel the same after actually spending time in jail yourself (much less prison) I would hate it, but I hardly see how that's relevant. My dislike for the idea of spending a night in jail is not as strong as my dislike for the idea of not being able to call emergency services because some idiot bought an illegal jammer to stop his kids going online. Out of the two I'd rather spend a night in jail than not be able to call an ambulance.
    - Jon_Lowtek 5y ago
      The parent post was lamenting that people find it far to easy to demand prison sentences instead of considering more humane forms of punishment. And "a night in jail" is not at all comparable to "six month in prison", including the likely loss of employment and employability, social stigma, straining of relationships, and so on. (ok, arguably the parent post was only about the restraint of freedom) The demand for imprisonment seen today in discussions like this is comparable to a medieval mob cheering for public executions. It is the most violent form of punishment our society uses, so the mob demands we use that - anything less would mean the unperson gets away easy. Most people seem to demand imprisonment with little idea how horrible that punishment actually is, or worse, they don't care, as long as there is blood for the blood god. Not to mention the costs. Let me reformulate it as a question of justification against alternatives: Why do you think imprisonment is necessary and useful in this case instead of a monetary fine or forced labor / "community service"?
      - gambiting 5y ago
        Well.....allow me to reprhase my original comment then. The crime comes with a range of punishments attached to it. One of them is jail time, the others are financial fines. In general I think that yes, jail time fits the crime of jamming critical infrastructure - like, in a general broad sense. You mess with emergency services, the punishment for that is jail. However, the law allows for lesser punishments - and I believe in this case he won't actually go to jail. As far as the article suggests, he wasn't acting maliciously so he will just get a financial fine. But I still think that the option of jail should be there for people who are found to be acting recklessly or maliciously.

In my opinion - absolutely. If you're caught driving at 150mph you will go to jail even if you didn't hit or kill anyone, because the potential for harm was huge. It's the same here - even if no one suffered as the result of his jammer, it could have easily led to a situation where someone else was unable to call emergency services when necessary. The law about jammers is what it is for a very clear reason.

jessriedel 5y ago
It is not enough to be able to imagine a hypothetical very bad outcome. The expected negative impact (probability*badness) has to actually be large. I can imagine blocking an ambulance and a patient dying if I leave my car double-parked. I can imagine someone slipping and breaking their neck if I don't shovel my sidewalk as required by the city. I can imagine a car swerving to avoid me and hitting someone else if I jay walk. But we don't punish these crimes with jail time. The total negative impact of this jamming crime is probably dominated by the degradation of normal service for normal people (which I expect is large!), not rare events.
- gambiting 5y ago
  The law against jammers(and the harsh punishment) is absolutely dictated by the fact that it blocks emergency services first and foremost though. It's messing with critical infrastructure of our society. The fact that it blocks someone's netflix access is only secondary.
  - jessriedel 5y ago
    1. All justifications I have read for these sorts of laws list both emergency services and daily services in the very first sentence of justification. 2. The current discussion is about what the law should be, not how it is; there are lots of stuff (e.g., laws combating terrorism) that are poorly justified using appeals to rare events.
- Goronmon 5y ago
  I can imagine someone slipping and breaking their neck if I don't shovel my sidewalk as required by the city. I think its more like purposefully icing your sidewalk or driveway to make it harder for salesmen/canvassers/etc to make it to your door.
  - jessriedel 5y ago
    I agree that is even more analogous to the crime under discussion, but I think the point stands either way. We wouldn't put someone in jail for purposefully icing a sidewalk unless the risk was actually really large or someone actually got hurt.
zarzavat 5y ago
Usually (at least in common law countries) crimes are supposed to have an element of malicious intent. People shouldn’t be put in prison for making honest mistakes, and laws that do that are unjust. It is believable that he didn’t know that it would knock out the entire town’s connectivity, or that the device would extend beyond his property. He seems to be not very technically adept as he didn’t know how to use parental controls.
- blunte 5y ago
  "involuntary manslaughter". This will incur a big penalty, and the theory is that there was not intent on behalf of the person who commited the crime.
  - xboxnolifes 5y ago
    Involuntary manslaughter only applies when the killing happened during another crime. So, even if the killing was unintentional, the happenstance was.
    - shkkmo 5y ago
      Not true. Generally involuntary manslaughter can be either due to a "unlawful act" or "criminal negligence" and your comment only applies to the former type.
- gambiting 5y ago
  >>Usually (at least in common law countries) crimes are supposed to have an element of malicious intent. Really? You can go to jail(for a very long time) just for having some drugs on your person, or for some underage pornography on your computer. Just having those things, with "no malicious intent" is enough to sentence people to years in prison. That's in countries with common law. >>People shouldn’t be put in prison for making honest mistakes And he might not be, 6 months in jail is just one possible outcome - most likely he will get the 30k euro fine and a some community service. >> It is believable that he didn’t know that it would knock out the entire town’s connectivity, or that the device would extend beyond his property Maybe, but actually look at his setup - this isn't some $50 jammer bought off alibaba. He bought a very powerful device that affected a large area around his house - ignorance of technical details and ignorance of the law only stretches so far.
teakettle42 5y ago
I’m often curious as to whether people like yourself would feel the same after actually spending time in jail (much less prison). I don’t think the evil inherent in robbing someone of their autonomy is warranted outside anything but the most severe crimes.
- gambiting 5y ago
  >>I’m often curious as to whether people like yourself would feel the same after actually spending time in jail yourself (much less prison) I would hate it, but I hardly see how that's relevant. My dislike for the idea of spending a night in jail is not as strong as my dislike for the idea of not being able to call emergency services because some idiot bought an illegal jammer to stop his kids going online. Out of the two I'd rather spend a night in jail than not be able to call an ambulance.
  - Jon_Lowtek 5y ago
    The parent post was lamenting that people find it far to easy to demand prison sentences instead of considering more humane forms of punishment. And "a night in jail" is not at all comparable to "six month in prison", including the likely loss of employment and employability, social stigma, straining of relationships, and so on. (ok, arguably the parent post was only about the restraint of freedom) The demand for imprisonment seen today in discussions like this is comparable to a medieval mob cheering for public executions. It is the most violent form of punishment our society uses, so the mob demands we use that - anything less would mean the unperson gets away easy. Most people seem to demand imprisonment with little idea how horrible that punishment actually is, or worse, they don't care, as long as there is blood for the blood god. Not to mention the costs. Let me reformulate it as a question of justification against alternatives: Why do you think imprisonment is necessary and useful in this case instead of a monetary fine or forced labor / "community service"?
    - gambiting 5y ago
      Well.....allow me to reprhase my original comment then. The crime comes with a range of punishments attached to it. One of them is jail time, the others are financial fines. In general I think that yes, jail time fits the crime of jamming critical infrastructure - like, in a general broad sense. You mess with emergency services, the punishment for that is jail. However, the law allows for lesser punishments - and I believe in this case he won't actually go to jail. As far as the article suggests, he wasn't acting maliciously so he will just get a financial fine. But I still think that the option of jail should be there for people who are found to be acting recklessly or maliciously.