# Have a majority of Americans committed a felony? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 29, 2014, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888 "2014-08-29T17:43:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/1 "2014-08-29T17:43:09Z")
I was asked to start a thread to substantiate the claim that a majority of Americans have committed a felony. Here are my general assumptions/framework: [ol] [li] **I’m assuming we’re talking about teens and adults.** A more carefully-worded version of my claim would be that the average American commits a felony crime some time in their lifetime. But that’s a bit harder to do back-of-the-envolope math on, so let’s construct the claim as being that the majority of those 12+ have committed a felony.[/li][li] **I’m assuming that if self-reporting is biased, it is biased toward not admitting criminal behavior**. The only real measure of whether someone has committed a crime and not been caught is self-reporting. Naturally, this is prone to some error. But I think any such errors work against me since people are more likely to underreport their own criminal behavior. [/li][li] **I’m mostly looking at federal law, but where I’m not, I’m assuming that is something is a felony in more than a handful of states then we can call it a felony for our purposes**. If someone is a nominal felon under one state’s laws but not in another then my point is just as strongly established (which is that criminals, as an undifferentiated category not fundamentally different from you and me—they are just less lucky based on their race, where they live, policing tactics, etc., and the fact that your state happens to draw the felony line slightly differently is part of that same category of things).[/li][li] **I’m assuming there is not 100% overlap between offenders**. The biggest issue is that we’re going to be looking at survey data for multiple crimes, and there’s not a lot of information about how much overlap there is between individuals. For example, are we to assume that the millions of people who drive drunk are co-extensive with the millions who upload pirated movies and the millions who have possessed cocaine? I think there probably is a lot of overlap, but that it’s not perfectly co-extensive. If and when there’s data, I’ll try to find it. Otherwise, I’ll make conservative assumptions about overlap.[/li][/ol] There are thousands of felony crimes in the United States under federal law alone. The sheer proliferation of crimes—many of which you probably don’t even know about—is part of my overall argument that most people have committed felonies. But I nevertheless intend to limit myself to a handful of felonies that are very common and for which we have some data on prevalence. I propose that we examine the following crimes: [ul] [li]Use of controlled substances[/li][li]Tax evasion with focus on willfully not reporting tips (6 U.S.C. § 7201)[/li][li]Criminal File-sharing (17 U.S.C. 506(a)(1)(B) & ©)[/li][li]DUI[/li][li]Sexual Assault[/li][/ul] This list will miss a huge number of crimes that many people have committed. But I think it will nevertheless be enough, alongside some conservative assumptions, to prove my point. I’ll start with the first one. I’ll move on to the others as time allows, but if someone wants to get there first, I welcome you. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/2 "2014-08-29T17:47:30Z")
\*\*When is it a felony? \*\* Under federal drug law, possession doesn’t become a felony until you’ve already been caught once. That makes talking about un-policed felonies sort of awkward, since by definition we’re talking about people who have not been caught. Reasonable people can disagree about whether—assuming the premises of our little thought experiment—someone who uses drugs twice is a felon. So I will instead rely on the fact that first-time possession is a felony for each of the illicit drugs (including marijuana) in more than a handful of states (see the laws of Arizona, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, and South Dakota for examples). I would add that the self-reported data does not indicate whether any drug paraphernalia was present (as it often is), or whether the circumstances would otherwise have kicked the possession up to a felony in places where it otherwise wasn’t. _See, e.g._, 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(3) (making it a felony to possess a gun while using drugs). So I think it’s fair to consider illicit drug users felons for the purposes of the OP. **How many have done it?** The best data on drug and alcohol usage are the SAMHSA [surveys](http://www.samhsa.gov/data/NSDUH/2012SummNatFindDetTables/NationalFindings/NSDUHresults2012.htm#ch3.1.10). The 2012 survey (which I think is the most recent) says that 48% of Americans over the age of 12 have used “illicit drugs” including 14.5% who have used cocaine, 14.6% who have used hallucinogens, and 20.9% who have used prescriptions drugs not prescribed to them. This data does not examine all those involved in the distribution networks of drugs. We might assume they are likely to have tried their product at least once and therefore not increase our number (though I don’t really know how true that is). But one thing that should be noted from the SAMHSA data is that “more than one half of the nonmedical users of pain relievers, tranquilizers, stimulants, and sedatives aged 12 or older got the prescription drugs they most recently used from a friend or relative” and that only “4.0 percent of these nonmedical users in 2011-2012 took pain relievers from a friend or relative without asking.” That means many of those people are also guilty of felonies, and would increase our number if they did not otherwise illegally partake. So I think this category alone, with room for lessening the topline number because of the gray legal aspects, gets us a substantial distance toward 50%. ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/3 "2014-08-29T17:52:15Z")
I don’t know anyone who hasn’t committed at least one of those felonies and got away with it. ---
**Author:** ![Debaser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3da27b/32.png) [@Debaser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Debaser)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/4 "2014-08-29T18:00:01Z")
A better thread might be “Is it possible to reach the age of 30 without committing a felony.” I don’t see how it would be possible unless you live a very boring life. There are too many laws in this country. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/5 "2014-08-29T18:03:38Z")
According to this guy Americans unwittingly commit three felonies per day. > [@](#): > > Boston civil-liberties lawyer Harvey Silverglate calls his new book “Three Felonies a Day,” referring to the number of crimes he estimates the average American now unwittingly commits because of vague laws. New technology adds its own complexity, making innocent activity potentially criminal. > > Mr. Silverglate describes several cases in which prosecutors didn’t understand or didn’t want to understand technology. This problem is compounded by a trend that has accelerated since the 1980s for prosecutors to abandon the principle that there can’t be a crime without criminal intent. > > SOURCE: [http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748704471504574438900830760842](http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748704471504574438900830760842) Anecdotally I was having some drinks with a friend of mine who had recently become a Chicago cop. He mentioned to me that pissing off a police officer is a bad idea because they can almost always find _something_ you did wrong to arrest you for and make your life miserable. A bit of hyperbole but not a lot I suspect. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/6 "2014-08-29T18:05:02Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > \*\*When is it a felony? > \*\* > Under federal drug law, possession doesn’t become a felony until you’ve already been caught once. That makes talking about un-policed felonies sort of awkward, since by definition we’re talking about people who have not been caught. Reasonable people can disagree about whether—assuming the premises of our little thought experiment—someone who uses drugs twice is a felon. So I will instead rely on the fact that first-time possession is a felony for each of the illicit drugs (including marijuana) in more than a handful of states (see the laws of Arizona, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, and South Dakota for examples). I would add that the self-reported data does not indicate whether any drug paraphernalia was present (as it often is), or whether the circumstances would otherwise have kicked the possession up to a felony in places where it otherwise wasn’t. _See, e.g._, 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(3) (making it a felony to possess a gun while using drugs). So I think it’s fair to consider illicit drug users felons for the purposes of the OP. > > **How many have done it?** > > The best data on drug and alcohol usage are the SAMHSA [surveys](http://www.samhsa.gov/data/NSDUH/2012SummNatFindDetTables/NationalFindings/NSDUHresults2012.htm#ch3.1.10). The 2012 survey (which I think is the most recent) says that 48% of Americans over the age of 12 have used “illicit drugs” including 14.5% who have used cocaine, 14.6% who have used hallucinogens, and 20.9% who have used prescriptions drugs not prescribed to them. > > This data does not examine all those involved in the distribution networks of drugs. We might assume they are likely to have tried their product at least once and therefore not increase our number (though I don’t really know how true that is). But one thing that should be noted from the SAMHSA data is that “more than one half of the nonmedical users of pain relievers, tranquilizers, stimulants, and sedatives aged 12 or older got the prescription drugs they most recently used from a friend or relative” and that only “4.0 percent of these nonmedical users in 2011-2012 took pain relievers from a friend or relative without asking.” That means many of those people are also guilty of felonies, and would increase our number if they did not otherwise illegally partake. > > So I think this category alone, with room for lessening the topline number because of the gray legal aspects, gets us a substantial distance toward 50%. If you agree that (except for Arizona, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, South Dakota, and any other state that makes it a felony to possess any marijuana) marijuana use is not per se a felony, then I don’t agree you’ve gotten substantially towards 50%. And I think the overlap is going to be immense – that is, many of the folks that are cavalierly taking other people’s meds are also the people happily firing up doobies. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/7 "2014-08-29T18:05:08Z")
I don’t have any figures to back it up, but remember that laws are not made against things that no one ever does. Laws are passed to regulate things that people do. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/8 "2014-08-29T18:06:12Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > According to this guy Americans unwittingly commit three felonies per day. > > Anecdotally I was having some drinks with a friend of mine who had recently become a Chicago cop. He mentioned to me that pissing off a police officer is a bad idea because they can almost always find _something_ you did wrong to arrest you for and make your life miserable. A bit of hyperbole but not a lot I suspect. A vague law is constitutionally infirm. A law that fails to clearly define the behavior that is prohibited is no law at all. ---
**Author:** ![dzeiger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/46a35a/32.png) [@dzeiger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dzeiger)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/9 "2014-08-29T18:11:18Z")
None of those specific ones for me, but I do know that Grand Theft is a felony most everywhere, though the exact amount varies between states. Still, that variation is mostly in the $300-$1000 range, which isn’t all that much nowadays–a crap ton of school/college-level pranks probably qualify (some of mine certainly did) ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/10 "2014-08-29T18:13:24Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > A vague law is constitutionally infirm. A law that fails to clearly define the behavior that is prohibited is no law at all. He gives some specific examples of overly broad laws and people actually being prosecuted for them here: [Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent | Find Legal PDF Forms](http://www.threefeloniesaday.com/Youtoo/tabid/86/Default.aspx) ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/11 "2014-08-29T18:28:13Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > If you agree that (except for Arizona, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, South Dakota, and any other state that makes it a felony to possess any marijuana) marijuana use is not per se a felony, then I don’t agree you’ve gotten substantially towards 50%. Then you should address my arguments for why it is reasonable. In particular, from the OP: “If someone is a nominal felon under one state’s laws but not in another then my point is just as strongly established (which is that criminals, as an undifferentiated category not fundamentally different from you and me—they are just less lucky based on their race, where they live, policing tactics, etc., and the fact that your state happens to draw the felony line slightly differently is part of that same category of things).” I submit that it is the rare and exceptional person who looks to his state law on possession before deciding whether to smoke that doobie in college. Nor am I clear on why such a person, if he otherwise would have smoked it, should be excluded for our analysis of whether most people are “criminals” in this sense. You should also address the fact that the vast majority of that number are people who have used multiple times (a felony if caught both times), and that these numbers underreport the true number of drug felonies solely by possession because they do not include aggravating circumstances that make it a felony (gun ownership, for example, which is very common in America). I’m eager to hear you out, but I put all that information in my first two posts for a reason and you’ve largely ignored it and just said “nuh uh.” [Also note that even if you exclude marijuana entirely the number is 30%] > [@Bricker](#): > > And I think the overlap is going to be immense – that is, many of the folks that are cavalierly taking other people’s meds are also the people happily firing up doobies. The 48% figure is not cumulative, so the overlap you state there is irrelevant. I agree that there is probably overlap with the people giving away their meds, and so I didn’t even put a figure on that. But even if only 10% of those giving them away do not use illegal drugs, that increases the numbers significantly because of how common it is. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/12 "2014-08-29T18:30:41Z")
**A friend of mine** once figured that if he got the average sentence for every felony he had committed by age 25, he’d be in jail for several life sentences. The state he lived in didn’t have “Romeo & Juliet” laws on the books, so every time he (18) went over to his 17 year old girlfriend’s house with the intent of sexing her up, he committed statutory rape, burglary, several “deviant sexual acts,” and probably a few more. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/13 "2014-08-29T18:33:18Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Criminal File-sharing (17 U.S.C. 506(a)(1)(B) & (C)) I don’t know how to search on this - this is usually considered a felony? > [@](#): > > Under federal drug law, possession doesn’t become a felony until you’ve already been caught once. Again, this does not do much to establish that most adults are felons. > [@](#): > > But one thing that should be noted from the SAMHSA data is that “more than one half of the nonmedical users of pain relievers, tranquilizers, stimulants, and sedatives aged 12 or older got the prescription drugs they most recently used from a friend or relative” and that only “4.0 percent of these nonmedical users in 2011-2012 took pain relievers from a friend or relative without asking.” That means many of those people are also guilty of felonies, and would increase our number if they did not otherwise illegally partake. Does that depend on the amount of drugs transferred - i.e. taking two Vicodin is a misdemeanor but taking the whole bottle, or selling them, is a felony? I am asking because I don’t know, not as a gotcha. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/14 "2014-08-29T18:41:15Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > I don’t know how to search on this - this is usually considered a felony? Some but not all illegal downloading/uploading is a felony. If you upload (or even just seed) a movie that hasn’t been released to DVD, for example, it is a felony. If you download more than a certain value of music, games, whatever in a 180-day period it is a felony. My intent was to spell this out more when I got to that particular post. I realize the serial posts is a little annoying, but I wanted to be thorough. > [@Shodan](#): > > Does that depend on the amount of drugs transferred - i.e. taking two Vicodin is a misdemeanor but taking the whole bottle, or selling them, is a felony? I am asking because I don’t know, not as a gotcha. As you might imagine, it varies from state to state and drug-to-drug. Distribution of drugs is generally treated more harshly than possession, and distribution need not be for profit. I believe giving away all but Schedule V drugs is a felony under federal law, but am not 100% sure. This was part of the reason I did not try to quantify that number. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/15 "2014-08-29T18:42:06Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > He gives some specific examples of overly broad laws and people actually being prosecuted for them here: [Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent | Find Legal PDF Forms](http://www.threefeloniesaday.com/Youtoo/tabid/86/Default.aspx) When you drill down, though, they stop being as absurd as the overview suggests. For example, he says: > [@](#): > > Hypothetical: You are a small business proprietor who supplies restaurants with fish and produce. One shipment of lobsters comes in unusual packaging—usually sent in cardboard boxes, these lobsters arrived in clear packaging. By purchasing this shipment, you have arguably committed a federal felony. The imported lobsters originated in a country that bans the shipping of lobsters in clear plastic bags, and the U.S. Lacey Act makes criminal an importer who violates “any foreign law”—regardless of whether you knew of the foreign regulations. > > Real-life example: American businesswoman Diane Huang was convicted under this far-reaching provision, despite her unawareness of the supposed Honduran law banning the shipment of lobsters in clear plastic bags. Lack of criminal intent, the Washington Legal Foundation argued on behalf of Huang and her co-defendants, should make the government’s criminal charges inappropriate. To make matters worse, the Honduran law governing such shipments was not valid at the time of Huang’s arrest—a fact that the Honduran government pointed out to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. Nonetheless, the federal court found Huang guilty in March 2003 and imposed a two-year prison sentence. Wow. Clear plastic bags! An outrage. But from the 11th Circuit opinion: > [@](#): > > The inspection confirmed that the seized lobsters were packed in bulk plastic bags without being processed and revealed that a significant number had a tail length that was less than the 5.5 inches required by the Honduran size limit restriction. In addition, many of the lobsters were egg-bearing or had their eggs removed. > > In March of 2000 two Honduran officials, a legal advisor in the Despacho Ministerial and a SAG legal advisor, traveled to Alabama to meet with government prosecutors and investigators. Both legal advisors provided written statements that cited Resolution 030-95 as a valid law regulating the lobster fishing industry. They also described the processing requirements mandated by Regulation 0008-93.[4] They further explained that Honduras prohibits the harvesting of egg-bearing lobsters. The issue wasn’t the clear plastic – it was the processing and the harvest of under-sized and egg-bearing lobsters, things that the United States ALSO prohibits. A reasonable importer ought to understand that if U.S. law prohibits something, it’s prudent to check if foreign law does also. In other words, this law doesn’t come out of left field. The next case: > [@](#): > > Hypothetical: You are an avid outdoorsman, and you’ve decided that your next thrill-ride is a snowmobiling trip in Colorado. You set out on a sunny day, but you soon find foreboding clouds above. Before you can turn back, a blizzard has set in. Lost from your original path, and with your snowmobile out of gas, you abandon it and walk to seek rescue. Luckily, a park ranger eventually finds you. After authorities retrieve your vehicle, however, you come to find that you have arguably committed a federal felony. When you strayed from your path, you ended up snowmobiling in federally-protected wilderness area, thus violating the Federal Wilderness Act. > > Real-life example: Well-known automobile racer Bobby Unser found himself in this position in 1997. He spent two nights in blizzard conditions; when he was finally rescued by Forest Service rangers, they charged him with a provision of the Wildness Act that prevented motor vehicles in protected areas. His presumed accident—he claimed he never meant to end up on that territory—did not spare him from the subsequent charges. The actual facts: > [@](#): > > The trial judge did not credit Unser’s testimony in its entirety. In particular, the judge found that the two riders left the Jarosa Peak area before any emergency arose and that they were intentionally riding northwest, further away from where they had begun their ride, because they were still just riding for fun. > > The judge found that Mr. Martin’s testimony as to the location of the first snowmobile was the most credible, and he gave several reasons for this finding. The fact that the second machine was eventually recovered almost due east from where Mr. Martin fixed the location of the first machine was consistent with the Unser’s statements, both in the interview with Burd and in his trial testimony, that after abandoning the first machine he and Gayton attempted to follow the windrows, which the evidence established ran west to east. The judge found that the odometer reading on the first machine, when it was recovered, was a little over eight miles. > . > . > . > The judge then proceeded to consider Unser’s contention that if he had entered the wilderness area with a snowmobile, he had done so only under a life-threatening emergency. The judge had held before trial that Unser would have the burden of proving this defense by a preponderance of the evidence. This conclusion was based on another holding made before trial, i.e., that the offense charged was a strict liability offense and accordingly the government would not have to prove any intent to snowmobile in the wilderness area, nor would the government have to prove that Unser knew that he had entered a wilderness area. The judge stated, “[T]he law ought to afford, and I believe does, a measure of defense to the citation issued here based upon emergency and defenses otherwise known essentially as a necessity defense, sometimes called a choice of evils defense.” II App. at 687. > > Accordingly, in the judge’s view it was critical to determine whether emergency conditions had arisen before or after Unser had entered the wilderness area. > . > . > . > Based on his finding that the more credible evidence was that the first machine had been found inside the wilderness boundary, the judge concluded and held that the defense had failed to carry the burden of establishing the necessity defense, and pronounced the defendant guilty. Is there any case there that you feel actually establishes the claim? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/16 "2014-08-29T18:49:10Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Then you should address my arguments for why it is reasonable. > > In particular, from the OP: “If someone is a nominal felon under one state’s laws but not in another then my point is just as strongly established (which is that criminals, as an undifferentiated category not fundamentally different from you and me—they are just less lucky based on their race, where they live, policing tactics, etc., and the fact that your state happens to draw the felony line slightly differently is part of that same category of things).” > > I submit that it is the rare and exceptional person who looks to his state law on possession before deciding whether to smoke that doobie in college. Nor am I clear on why such a person, if he otherwise would have smoked it, should be excluded for our analysis of whether most people are “criminals” in this sense. No, no. You don’t get to make a claim like this and then cast the net wider by choosing the most restrictive laws anywhere in the country and then applying them to the whole country. People may not look up state laws, but are certainly generally aware of what kind of penalties and how serious those penalties are for various acts. > [@](#): > > You should also address the fact that the vast majority of that number are people who have used multiple times (a felony if caught both times), and that these numbers underreport the true number of drug felonies solely by possession because they do not include aggravating circumstances that make it a felony (gun ownership, for example, which is very common in America). How many of those people, if caught once, would have continued to use? ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/17 "2014-08-29T18:53:42Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Some but not all illegal downloading/uploading is a felony. If you upload (or even just seed) a movie that hasn’t been released to DVD, for example, it is a felony. **If you download more than a certain value of music, games, whatever in a 180-day period it is a felony**. My intent was to spell this out more when I got to that particular post. I realize the serial posts is a little annoying, but I wanted to be thorough. (my bold) I think this would probably snag a decent number of people. One [site](http://itlaw.wikia.com/wiki/Copyright_infringement) I saw said that if you copied more than $2,500 worth of copyrighted material in 180 days, it could be a felony. Assuming that number is correct, I imagine a large number of people have downloaded enough copyrighted porn to hit that number. What’s the average retail value of a porn DVD? Maybe $30? So, downloading the equivalent of 83 porn movies over the course of half a year? That’s gonna be a lot of people. Does watching a streaming movie count? If so, then a ton of people will probably cross the threshold into felony land. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/18 "2014-08-29T19:00:23Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > People may not look up state laws, but are certainly generally aware of what kind of penalties and how serious those penalties are for various acts. I don’t believe that. Cite? > [@Bricker](#): > > How many of those people, if caught once, would have continued to use? I don’t know. It’s your assertion that there’s a relevant difference between using twice and using once getting caught and using again. Feel free to back your assertion. I don’t think it’s a good one for the reason I put in the OP, repeated for you, and that you still haven’t addressed. I also don’t think it’s a good one because my speculation is that most people caught using once do use again. But I welcome you to prove your point. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/19 "2014-08-29T19:10:21Z")
Plus, I don’t know if this is a nitpick or not. But how can one be sure that a given act is a felony until one has been charged as a felony? Sure, maybe in theory I could be charged with a felony if I don’t report my tips to the IRS. But how likely is it that I can get off with paying back taxes with penalties and interest? And if I do, is that still a felony? If I plead to a misdemeanor, am I still guilty (in the sense of this thread) of a felony? Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2014, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888/20 "2014-08-29T19:20:13Z")
How to interpret the scope of the question in the thread title turns on the purpose for which this argument is deployed, I think, **Shodan**. That’s true for your questions as much as it is for whether it is reasonable to count people who violated many state laws but not the laws of the state they were in. I think **Jimmy Chitwood** put it well: > [@](#): > > The point is that there are two versions of the world being discussed here. The more law-and-order types are saying, among lots of other things, that when you are the kind of person, like Michael Brown, who commits crimes, then when you get killed by the police you’ve gotten no more and no less than what you’ve bargained for. If you don’t fuck with the bull, you don’t get the horns, more or less. Shodan said that the reason he hasn’t been arrested for a felony is that he doesn’t commit felonies. In other words, he’s categorically excluded from the kind of person who might get killed by the police: there’s criminals and then there’s us. In that version of the world, every person has a choice: be a criminal, and possibly get killed by the police if things go badly for you, or don’t be a criminal, and thus have no reason to fear. If you’re a criminal, these rules apply; if not, don’t worry about it. If a person who gets killed by the police then turns out, when you check the label, to have been a criminal, well there you have it. The wages of sin is death, sort of thing. > > In the other view of the world, whether or not you’re fucking with the bull has a lot to do with circumstances that are not your own to control. Whether you’re a “criminal,” and what kind of criminal you are, is often more a matter of somebody’s opinion than concrete fact, and has only partial influence over whether you find yourself confronted with police officers. Being in a car with alcohol and marijuana, for instance, can either be interpreted as youthful hijinks, or as part of a criminal enterprise, depending on what the car is, where it is, and who you’re in it with, and depending on those things you can be either much more likely or less likely to ever be in a position to find out what the police think. Teenagers leaving a store with the store owner’s property might need a good talking to, or they might be hardened thugs, depending on what they look like, where the store’s located, and how the proprietor treated them. Moreover, some people will be called criminals even though they aren’t, and many people will not be called criminals even though they are! And some people are much more likely to be called criminals when they aren’t, and some people are much more likely not to be called criminals even though they are. In this version of the world, the label criminal has a lot more fluid meaning, and is a much less concrete grounds to base any significant differences on. > > Lots of people do shitty, inexcusable things. All, in fact. Most do things that are actually criminal offenses or would be charged as criminal offenses in different circumstances. Only some of them are, by virtue of the shitty things they do, classified as shitty and irredeemable people. That kind of system of categorization can cause all kinds of problems down the line when you’re treating one category of people one way, and another category a different way, when you don’t have legitimate reasons for drawing the distinctions in the first place. > > And when you look at the world as being one of those versions as compared to the other, you’re going to have a very different idea about what’s an acceptable amount of accidentally-dead criminals. That’s more or less what I was trying to express with this argument about the majority of people committing felonies. But it’s relevant to other things too, like felony disenfranchisement. The fact that some people are charged with a felony and not others is the whole point. If you’re a white guy smoking pot in his suburban basement, the likeihood of you being charged with a crime approaches 0. If you’re a black guy smoking pot in a public park, the odds are much higher. Ditto the enforcement of tax evasion versus other in-person thefts, or weapons violations in high-crime neighborhoods versus the gun range. The big variable isn’t as much how people behave as it is their circumstances. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-a-majority-of-americans-committed-a-felony/696888.md?page=2)