"Abolish the death penalty! Life in prison is a harsh enough punishment." A couple of years later, "Aw, what good does it do to keep them in prison after the age of 50?" Slippery slope may be a fallacy in logic, but when dealing with the species liberalensus californius, it's an inevitability. Never give an inch.

There are some people that deserve the death penalty. McVeigh, Manson, Dahmer and a whole host of others.

Then others need concurrent sentences such as a pedophile.

But if you keep the 18 year old in prison until they are 50 (32 years) do they deserve a second chance?

Yeah... So who would then say that "serious" crime, however defined, is our only concern, or should be? Or should even be more proportionately addressed?

I bet any of us could have our days, our summers and/or our lives ruin by the half-hearted, playful crimes of a fifty-year-old. At that hour, we'd want to hear that justice has decided to put its attention elsewhere. And there's nothing about ignoring 50yo's that makes criminal 20yo's any easier to deal with.

It's easy to imagine the Kleimans of the world chewing their beards, semester after semester, waiting their whole careers for Father Time to do deliver the inevitable upon the Department superstar, for the hubbub in the faculty lounge to die down enough to say something like that... But the wait doesn't make it worth hearing.

A second chance at what? Rape? Murder? Robbery? If an 18 year old is sentenced to, say, 40 years, or 50 years, or life, it must have been pretty dire. (And if not, your real argument is with the sentencing laws for a particular crime.) For these terms to mean anything, they must be carried out. 50 is not that old. At least some of us would like to think so. And a 50 year old who was never civilized enough to avoid prison in the first place, and was not well-behaved enough to get paroled through the normal process is unlikely to re-enter society successfully anyway. Which is a point worth repeating: We have a process for judging on an individual basis whether or not prisoners can safely be released. This appeal to age is - necessarily - for those who couldn't and didn't pass that process. The ones who could aren't still in prison. While parole boards certainly aren't perfect, it doesn't take many crimes to undo any savings you might realize. Destruction is easier than creation. With a $10 can of gas, an arsonist can burn down property worth millions of dollars, which he'll never be able to replace. With a $2 kitchen knife - or his bare hands - a criminal can snuff out a life of an entrepreneur.

So you're going to take a group of people with proven criminal tendencies and worrisome enough behaviors that they couldn't get past a parole board hearing, turn them loose on the streets en masse, and hope to save enough to make up for the damage caused by those who do go back to a life of crime.

This is basically taxation by lottery: "Sorry, random rape victim. We know you're traumatized, and that's a cost to you, but we saved some $$$ by letting that group of criminals out at 50. And they didn't all go back to it. Just the one who raped you. You were the unlucky person we essentially whored out to balance our budgets."

This is great news.
In two years i'll turn fifty and begin my life of crime. Scott Free, Baby!

What problem are we trying to solve? Crime, or the cost of confining criminals while they serve their sentences? We can save all sorts of money, and be like Somalia. That wouldn't be my choice, but you have to save money somewhere to pay for that train.

Or you could ask why it cost so much to imprison someone in CA, and who is in prison, and why. Some inconvenient fact come to light quickly. We have a lot of people in prison for nonviolent drug offenses. Can you afford to keep doing this? Your guards get great pay and pensions, which I'm sure they deserve, but Sheriff Joe in Arizona does it cheaper.

Or you could ask why China can execute someone for a nickel and it costs us millions. If you are going to execute them at all, why the endless delays? Yeah, there have been mistakes made and innocent people have been convicted. There are some cases where guilt is not in doubt at all. What kind of errors are you willing to tolerate in your justice system?

Undefined problems can't be solved.

What an idiot. Plenty of people over 50 commit crimes, even violent ones. Someone who is in prison at 50 either 1) committed a very violent crime at a young age so we KNOW he can and will commit violence or 2) committed a nonviolent crime very near the age 50 so we know he will commit crime.

I'm of the opinion that certain decisions and actions people can take, mean they don't get a second chance. Ever. Want to let adults make their own decisions? They have to live with the consequences of them. Even if it means they die old in prison.

I used to work in a jail. Some of the most dangerous men I ever met were fifty and older.

An interesting analogy considering the average age of NBA coaches is something like 52. (And this is after a slew of retirements by the near-70 crowd last year).

"..your real argument is with the sentencing laws for a particular crime."

^This or otherwise we get this.....

"This is basically taxation by lottery: "Sorry, random rape victim. We know you're traumatized, and that's a cost to you, but we saved some $$$ by letting that group of criminals out at 50. And they didn't all go back to it. Just the one who raped you. You were the unlucky person we essentially whored out to balance our budgets."

Nice post Jason!

A lady I used to work with, at the age of 51, murdered her husband in cold blood. She copped a plea and she'll be out on parole at 57. How will she have changed between 51 and 57? Some people you just have to keep locked up.

Seconding a nod to Jason for a great, insightful post. I especially liked: "(And if not, your real argument is with the sentencing laws for a particular crime.)".

A lady I used to work with, at the age of 51, murdered her husband in cold blood. She copped a plea and she'll be out on parole at 57.

Idiot. If she'd done it when she was younger and (presumably) prettier, she'd likely have walked.

but Sheriff Joe in Arizona does it cheaper.

On paper in the budget office maybe.

Once you figure in the increased insurabce costs, the 50 million in wrongful death lawsuits already settled and the hundereds(as in multipule of one hundered) of millions in lawsuits working their way thru the cort system hes a finacial nightmare

"Serious crime has about the same age structure as serious basketball."

Mostly because the "serious" criminals over 50 are either dead or in jail.

The serious basketball players over 50 are either coaching or reminiscing on a long career.

You can't play basketball over 50 because knees don't hold out forever and they don't take 40 minutes of pounding three times a week like they did when you were 20.

You can shoot a gun when you're over 50. You can stab someone when you're over 50. You can commit rape or robbery when you're over 50.

For any of you with undiagnosed aneurysms, do NOT read Raise the Crime Rate.

Thread winner, Jason or Crid? Tough call.

Interesting article, Jeff. And while I agree that some of the examples are agregious, I dont agree with the call to abolish the prison system all together.

Sure 15yrolds burning plies of leaves shouldnt get 8yr prison sentances, nor should none violent drug offenders be locked away.

But I litererally could not care less about the violonece rapists, murderers, and violent ffeders visit upon each other.

They have to be housed somewhere, and its illegal to give them their own room and keep anyone from interacting with them.

For gds sake the guy doesnt have a plan for what to do with killers and thugs other than release them into the population and put up governemnt cameras everywhere

The level of cognitive dissonance t come t that comclusion is staggering

Ok you do not want to lock past a certain use by date. Ok.

There are so many other options to consider.

1) Why jail em, shoot em all and let God sort them out.
2) Deport or ship them out to a penal colony.
3) We have the technology dum dum dum we can now track them all the time. Judicial application of shock and explosives will keep'em in line.
4) Allow them to pay of time. 200,000 dollars allows you to spend one less year in jail. Plus the government can get more revenue.
5) Crippling. Chop of limbs, confine to hospital.
6) Wow! Deferment. You are guilt, please show up to jail when you turn 65.
7) Conscription into some sort of federal service. Ala instant cannon fodder or slaves.

I have one more idea, but it would be too crazy for the government to consider it. Why not get rid of or change some laws. Do we need to keep all drug users locked up, or tax dodgers, or lobster importers detained. Why not also start using commonsense. Does everything need to be illegal. Come on missing class is a jail able offense.