It includes a statement from the chief of police that one of the perpetrators in Chicago had been arrested 45 times but none of the charges were sufficient to warrant long term imprisonment. So he was out on the streets and a criminal trying to kill him accidentally hit his son instead. (so he was the victim of the crime, and the chief of police is saying he should have been imprisoned)
So, alright. Let’s suppose we give Garry McCarthy what he asks for. Anyone convicted for a misdemeanor in Chicago shall be imprisoned for not less than 10 years. Felony charges, that’s life.
Well. With no fathers around, wouldn’t the residents commit even more crimes? They can’t physically imprison every man in South Chicago. With those kind of sentences flying around, criminals would 1. *Always *murder anyone who might potentially snitch. 2. No one would talk to 5-0 in fear of #1.
Anyways, I think McCarthy already has what he’s talking about. A significant fraction of the older adults already are in the lockup. No one will talk to cops because nothing good comes of it.
I read some years back the police have been too successful in tearing apart the gangs in Chicago. It’s now just kids, some no more 10-14 years of age, with no direction from older gang members (dead or in jail) doing much of the shooting. What I don’t understand is why are so many on the street late at night and in the wee hours of the morning?
When I was between 10 and 14, I never wandered the streets unsupervised in the middle of the night.
Then again, I was lucky enough to have two loving parents who provided me a safe home, food, and education; who were involved in my life every day; and who would have taken action if I ever joined a gang or otherwise showed signs of going down the wrong path. Without them, I would probably have turned out very differently.
What needs to happen is twofold.
One: Enact a three times you’re out law. There are hundreds of people in Chicago who are responsible for thousands of arrests. Police are spinning their wheels and wasting their time arresting the same people for misdemeanors over and over. Three misdemeanors should equal felony and guaranteed jail time at that point.
Two: Make unlicensed weapons possession a felony with mandatory minimum sentencing (I believe three years is the current number being suggested). Right now it’s a misdemeanor with no more tooth than shoplifting (six months probation with time served is common). That’s ridiculous. Superintendent McCarthy has used New York as an example of mandatory minimum sentencing for illegal weapons possession being a better deterrent. Illegal possessions went down exponentially when that law was enacted there, and it would do the same here.
There is simply no real deterrent at this time, to keep people from getting arrested for the same crap - including carrying handguns in their pants - over and over. Lets face it, the people being arrested multiple times for misdemeanor stuff, aren’t exactly losing jobs over a few weeks in jail now and then. Maybe the possibility of being shipped off to a state prison for a number of years instead of jailed in Cook County where friends and family still stop by, and not much changes about where they can rest their head when they get out, would be a little more effective.
You DO understand the person you’re trying to coddle as a “victim” is a long-time gang leader, criminal, responsible for distributing illegal weapons, trafficking, and heroin, cocaine, you name it, right? The only victim here was a young child who was shot ONLY because he was nearby his longtime criminal gang-entrenched father. And because idiots with illegal handguns can’t hit a target.
And you’re saying that the police have evidence of this and yet have not managed to get him sentenced to decades in prison? Seems to me that the way the “system” failed is the police did not do their job. The standard prison sentence for distribution of large quantities of illegal drugs - or leading an organization that does the same - is more than 10 years.
And you’re saying that the police have evidence of this and yet have not managed to get him sentenced to decades in prison? Seems to me that the way the “system” failed is the police did not do their job. The standard prison sentence for distribution of large quantities of illegal drugs - or leading an organization that does the same - is more than 10 years.
I don’t know if I’d lay the blame at the feet of the police - they don’t control prosecution, sentencing, length of time behind bars, prison and/or jail overcrowding, plea bargains, causes of recidivism, etc. I’m no sociologist, but I hardly think it’s the fault of the police.
It’s hard to imagine that these kids’ lives would be better with their habitually criminal fathers in the picture. They are, basically from the moment they are born, doomed to lives of poverty at best and imprisonment or murder at worst.
Moreover, if we throw enough money at the problem, we will eventually reach an equilibrium where all the criminal underclass males are incarcerated and consequently unable to reproduce. Then the problem takes care of itself.
Moreover, reducing penalties to encouraging fatherhood will only have the perverse effects of making crime more attractive and providing even more incentive for criminals to have kids. Best to eliminate the problem as opposed to palliative treatment.
Might be. Might be that if you lock up all the criminals stupid enough to get caught, the males who you didn’t catch will each breed with 2-3 women each and give you a new generation of more clever criminals.
My thought is that mass incarceration has been tried on a colossal scale, larger than any other nation on the planet, and we have a crime problem in certain areas. What you are saying is that we aren’t incarcerating enough - that only locking up the number we lock up isn’t adequate, even though the current policy does not appear to be as effective as other countries which lock up less people.
Maybe if we lock up 10% of all men, or 50%, we’ll finally lock up enough that the placid remaining men will breed law abiding citizens.
It’s not the police officers job to prosecute, or sentence, or incarcerate the dirt bag gang member.
City Hall aldermen and state legislators pass laws that minimize sentences and allow felons quick release back into their old hunting grounds.
Instead of blaming the police, why don’t you blame the gang banger who was hiding behind his son while the other dirt bag gangbanger was shooting at him?
There’s something to be said for the idea that locking up a certain set of people will go a long way to reducing crime. The 80/20 law applies to crime, and there’s a famous study of crime in Philadelphia that showed just over half of all crimes were committed by about 7% of offenders.
But the problem remains of (relatively) innocent people being swept up in the arrests. Also, a lot of crime stems from the War on Drugs, which is an unmitigated disaster. I think changing the laws on drugs would have a huge effect on changing the issues with crime in the nation.