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No, we are not. I’ve worked as a defense attorney. It is was terrifying to see how much leeway and how many extra chances were given to violent criminals. The D

No, we are not. I’ve worked as a defense attorney. It is was terrifying to see how much leeway and how many extra chances were given to violent criminals. The DAs job is impossible.

hgomersall 3y ago
Maybe you should try being a defendant to actually get a balanced perspective (a good thing to try would be to get yourself arrested for something that you didn't do but is just your word against theirs). For extra experience try doing that whilst being black. For reference, I have being on the receiving end of an entirely unwarranted accusation for a trivial crime in the UK (which is often held up as being a good example of a fair system). It occupied an unbelievable amount of headspace and was hugely stressful. I'm educated, reasonably well off and white. The system felt very very powerful and unpredictable from my position and I was never even arrested (just accused, which is enough for the police to treat you as a perpetrator). If the prosecution had happened and had gone anywhere (it didn't) and I'd been convicted I would have got a small fine, but I was still far too worried that my innocence was insufficient to protect me. All the way through you're treated as though you are guilty, and the accuser is the "victim". Honestly, the only victim in the whole sorry affair was me. I can't imagine what it must feel like if you're on the receiving end of an unwarranted accusation for a more serious crime. Especially if everyone thinks you're guilty because your have priors and "look guilty".
93po 3y ago
People who commit violent crimes are almost always a victim of a fucked up system themselves that led them to those actions. Putting them in prison perpetuates and worsens the cycle. It is still less harm on the whole to give them leeway and extra chances. The solution is fixing the social safety net for the poor and disadvantaged. Not throwing people in prison for trying to survive and making mistakes along the way.
- anthony_d 3y ago
  That looks a lot like satire but I can’t quite tell. So, to clarify: if someone is clearly a violent criminal, are you really saying we should feel bad for them and assume they are a victim of “the system”? Do we drop charges? What’s the actionable plan for reducing violent crime?
  - 93po 3y ago
    > are you really saying we should feel bad for them and assume they are a victim of “the system”? Yes, absolutely. 100%. We should feel bad for people who find themselves in circumstances and life experiences that have driven them to violence. We should feel bad for sociopaths who inflict violence because the life and experience of a sociopath is objectively a sad thing. We should feel bad for non-sociopaths who were driven to desperation and extremes due to a lack of healthy coping mechanisms for stress and anger or anything else. > Do we drop charges? What’s the actionable plan for reducing violent crime? My comment isn't suggesting that dropping charges is going to fix the problem - it's the opposite. It's that we need a system of accountability that is a net-positive for society. Incarceration as-is in the US worsens the problem severely. It needs reform to be a place of actual rehabilitation and many people who need rehabilitation due to violent offenses absolutely need to be forced into doing so. But it needs to not be at the expense of their families, it needs to not further generational harm, and it needs to not harm the people being incarcerated. Harm for harm is a fucked up concept that doesn't help anyone except shallow people who crave a sense of justice, who are themselves inflicting violence too. People should leave prison in a better position than when they entered (in terms of dealing with their life better and in more healthy ways) and the opposite is happening. We're actively harming peaceful society with prisons today.
  - kevviiinn 3y ago
    How about fixing the system. Why do people have such a tiny, narrow view of life?
    - akhosravian 3y ago
      What does that mean, specifically? What policy changes need to be enacted to fix the system, and how do we verify they worked?
- DanHulton 3y ago
  I agree with this 100%, but the last paragraph is worded poorly, and almost guaranteed to attract debate from both honest and bad-faith dissenters. Restated: Throwing people in prison does not fix the problem. We have tried it for a long time at various levels of intensity and it has provably not worked, and no additional level of intensity has improved things. We can't _just keep doing this_ and expect that at some point things will get better. We need to address the root causes that lead so many people into situations where they find it reasonable or are desperate enough to commit those crimes. That's how you make a dent in this problem, and that's what we should work on transitioning to. Fix the top of the funnel, and you won't have nearly as many concentrated violent problems down at the bottom of it to deal with.
  - 93po 3y ago
    I agree, and thanks.
  - ggariepy 3y ago
    Some percentage of the population is comprised of violent sociopaths. Those people need to be locked up for the safety of the rest of us. People who have committed victimless crimes, like minor drug use, should almost never be incarcerated. People who have defrauded other people in some way, including petty larceny, should be punished by some means other than incarceration. Pretty much what I'm saying is that jail time should be reserved solely for the violent.
    - DanHulton 3y ago
      A very, very, very small percentage of the population is "violent sociopaths", though, and optimizing your society for solving that problem incurs huge amounts of waste. Which isn't to say there should be _no_ answer to that question, but more that the answer to that question shouldn't also be the answer to all the other crime encountered. Not even all the violent crime, which is frequently a product not of the individual, but of the situation that individual is placed in.
  - ddingus 3y ago
    This is a solid comment. People in general often failed to see these matters in an inclusive way.
- ddingus 3y ago
  I agree with you and Dan commenting in reply.
- injb 3y ago
  I can only assume that you have very little experience of violent crime. Have you ever been attacked and beaten up by a random stranger? I have and I can hardly think of any of my friends from my progressive, soft-on-violent-crime country who hasn't. Several of them have been stabbed and many hospitalised. None of the perpetrators were trying to survive or had any other excuses. Poverty and other social disadvantages might breed crime, but they do not breed violence. What we should do is stop locking people up for non-violent crimes and free up space for violent offenders. Frankly they can stay locked up for all I care. They are a tiny enough minority that it wouldn't cost that much. We are causing irreparable damage to non-violent people by locking them up for minor crimes that can be rectified. We are basically feeding them to the real criminals and making them stronger.
  - 93po 3y ago
    I have worked very closely with lots people who are currently incarcerated for violent crimes and while there's definitely shitheads there, there is also a lot of people who made mistakes and didn't have the structure and support in their lives to avoid getting to the place of making that mistake. Most of these people would not have committed violence if they had the proper social structures in place throughout their life - supportive family, friends, mentors, and peers that allow for meaningful personal development and mental tools to deal with life's difficulties in a healthy way. A lot of it wouldn't happen if there wasn't financial constraints that prevented that healthy development. Growing up in survival mode is a traumatic experience that many people never recover from. And many people are driven into a place of desperation and extremes when they lack basics for themselves and their families. They're all humans. Humans are largely a product of their environment. Sociopaths obviously exist, but most people in prison for violence are not sociopaths.
    - ddingus 3y ago
      Good comment! I am mentoring one who you mean. Left on the streets at 13. That is the root cause of their trouble. The baggage is incredibly difficult to get past. A lot of that is systemic.
giantg2 3y ago
With conviction rates being about 75% depending on jurisdiction and grading, I'd say it doesn't seem so impossible.
ddingus 3y ago
Well, the Defense attorneys I know differ in their opinion of public defenders. And defense in general? Necessary, unless we intend on jailing lots of people who do not deserve it. I also feel we need to break this down too. There is a big difference between felony violent criminals and the average Joe who gets caught up in a resisting or interfering charge.
flangola7 3y ago
This you? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33016632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33016632 Bluntly, I think you're lying.

No, we are not. I’ve worked as a defense attorney. It is was terrifying to see how much leeway and how many extra chances were given to violent criminals. The DAs job is impossible.

hgomersall 3y ago

Maybe you should try being a defendant to actually get a balanced perspective (a good thing to try would be to get yourself arrested for something that you didn't do but is just your word against theirs). For extra experience try doing that whilst being black. For reference, I have being on the receiving end of an entirely unwarranted accusation for a trivial crime in the UK (which is often held up as being a good example of a fair system). It occupied an unbelievable amount of headspace and was hugely stressful. I'm educated, reasonably well off and white. The system felt very very powerful and unpredictable from my position and I was never even arrested (just accused, which is enough for the police to treat you as a perpetrator). If the prosecution had happened and had gone anywhere (it didn't) and I'd been convicted I would have got a small fine, but I was still far too worried that my innocence was insufficient to protect me. All the way through you're treated as though you are guilty, and the accuser is the "victim". Honestly, the only victim in the whole sorry affair was me. I can't imagine what it must feel like if you're on the receiving end of an unwarranted accusation for a more serious crime. Especially if everyone thinks you're guilty because your have priors and "look guilty".

93po 3y ago

People who commit violent crimes are almost always a victim of a fucked up system themselves that led them to those actions. Putting them in prison perpetuates and worsens the cycle. It is still less harm on the whole to give them leeway and extra chances. The solution is fixing the social safety net for the poor and disadvantaged. Not throwing people in prison for trying to survive and making mistakes along the way.

anthony_d 3y ago
That looks a lot like satire but I can’t quite tell. So, to clarify: if someone is clearly a violent criminal, are you really saying we should feel bad for them and assume they are a victim of “the system”? Do we drop charges? What’s the actionable plan for reducing violent crime?
- 93po 3y ago
  > are you really saying we should feel bad for them and assume they are a victim of “the system”? Yes, absolutely. 100%. We should feel bad for people who find themselves in circumstances and life experiences that have driven them to violence. We should feel bad for sociopaths who inflict violence because the life and experience of a sociopath is objectively a sad thing. We should feel bad for non-sociopaths who were driven to desperation and extremes due to a lack of healthy coping mechanisms for stress and anger or anything else. > Do we drop charges? What’s the actionable plan for reducing violent crime? My comment isn't suggesting that dropping charges is going to fix the problem - it's the opposite. It's that we need a system of accountability that is a net-positive for society. Incarceration as-is in the US worsens the problem severely. It needs reform to be a place of actual rehabilitation and many people who need rehabilitation due to violent offenses absolutely need to be forced into doing so. But it needs to not be at the expense of their families, it needs to not further generational harm, and it needs to not harm the people being incarcerated. Harm for harm is a fucked up concept that doesn't help anyone except shallow people who crave a sense of justice, who are themselves inflicting violence too. People should leave prison in a better position than when they entered (in terms of dealing with their life better and in more healthy ways) and the opposite is happening. We're actively harming peaceful society with prisons today.
- kevviiinn 3y ago
  How about fixing the system. Why do people have such a tiny, narrow view of life?
  - akhosravian 3y ago
    What does that mean, specifically? What policy changes need to be enacted to fix the system, and how do we verify they worked?
DanHulton 3y ago
I agree with this 100%, but the last paragraph is worded poorly, and almost guaranteed to attract debate from both honest and bad-faith dissenters. Restated: Throwing people in prison does not fix the problem. We have tried it for a long time at various levels of intensity and it has provably not worked, and no additional level of intensity has improved things. We can't _just keep doing this_ and expect that at some point things will get better. We need to address the root causes that lead so many people into situations where they find it reasonable or are desperate enough to commit those crimes. That's how you make a dent in this problem, and that's what we should work on transitioning to. Fix the top of the funnel, and you won't have nearly as many concentrated violent problems down at the bottom of it to deal with.
- 93po 3y ago
  I agree, and thanks.
- ggariepy 3y ago
  Some percentage of the population is comprised of violent sociopaths. Those people need to be locked up for the safety of the rest of us. People who have committed victimless crimes, like minor drug use, should almost never be incarcerated. People who have defrauded other people in some way, including petty larceny, should be punished by some means other than incarceration. Pretty much what I'm saying is that jail time should be reserved solely for the violent.
  - DanHulton 3y ago
    A very, very, very small percentage of the population is "violent sociopaths", though, and optimizing your society for solving that problem incurs huge amounts of waste. Which isn't to say there should be _no_ answer to that question, but more that the answer to that question shouldn't also be the answer to all the other crime encountered. Not even all the violent crime, which is frequently a product not of the individual, but of the situation that individual is placed in.
- ddingus 3y ago
  This is a solid comment. People in general often failed to see these matters in an inclusive way.
ddingus 3y ago
I agree with you and Dan commenting in reply.
injb 3y ago
I can only assume that you have very little experience of violent crime. Have you ever been attacked and beaten up by a random stranger? I have and I can hardly think of any of my friends from my progressive, soft-on-violent-crime country who hasn't. Several of them have been stabbed and many hospitalised. None of the perpetrators were trying to survive or had any other excuses. Poverty and other social disadvantages might breed crime, but they do not breed violence. What we should do is stop locking people up for non-violent crimes and free up space for violent offenders. Frankly they can stay locked up for all I care. They are a tiny enough minority that it wouldn't cost that much. We are causing irreparable damage to non-violent people by locking them up for minor crimes that can be rectified. We are basically feeding them to the real criminals and making them stronger.
- 93po 3y ago
  I have worked very closely with lots people who are currently incarcerated for violent crimes and while there's definitely shitheads there, there is also a lot of people who made mistakes and didn't have the structure and support in their lives to avoid getting to the place of making that mistake. Most of these people would not have committed violence if they had the proper social structures in place throughout their life - supportive family, friends, mentors, and peers that allow for meaningful personal development and mental tools to deal with life's difficulties in a healthy way. A lot of it wouldn't happen if there wasn't financial constraints that prevented that healthy development. Growing up in survival mode is a traumatic experience that many people never recover from. And many people are driven into a place of desperation and extremes when they lack basics for themselves and their families. They're all humans. Humans are largely a product of their environment. Sociopaths obviously exist, but most people in prison for violence are not sociopaths.
  - ddingus 3y ago
    Good comment! I am mentoring one who you mean. Left on the streets at 13. That is the root cause of their trouble. The baggage is incredibly difficult to get past. A lot of that is systemic.

giantg2 3y ago

With conviction rates being about 75% depending on jurisdiction and grading, I'd say it doesn't seem so impossible.

ddingus 3y ago

Well, the Defense attorneys I know differ in their opinion of public defenders. And defense in general? Necessary, unless we intend on jailing lots of people who do not deserve it. I also feel we need to break this down too. There is a big difference between felony violent criminals and the average Joe who gets caught up in a resisting or interfering charge.

flangola7 3y ago

This you? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33016632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33016632 Bluntly, I think you're lying.