
My life after 44 years in prison - doppp
http://interactive.aljazeera.com/aje/shorts/life-after-prison/
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Asbostos
What I've started to realize about people is that you can't influence them all
with deterrents. No matter how long the sentence, or how permanent the memory
of the justice system (8 months in prison for robbery, 50 years later), none
of that is bad enough to actually stop people committing crimes in the first
place. Essentially, people aren't rational. They don't act in their own self
interests.

I saw this also when I was a teacher. No amount of detentions or removal from
class would change the behavior of some students. Saying clever thing to them
however, would. Many people respond more strongly to their animal instincts
than to logic. You could trick a student into not distrupting class (eg offer
them two choices and a minute to make a decision - they somehow forget they
really have more choices), but for many, you couldn't incentivize them.

~~~
rtpg
There's a decent amount of experimental evidence to counter this realisation
though.

The yakuza basically never carry guns around anymore because the charges for
carrying around a handgun are so high that it's just not worth it.

We always say that "well if someone wants a gun they're gonna get it", which
is pretty true. But some deterrents can slow down the transition from " I
don't like that guy" to "I'm going to kill him" (hell, if we stop at "going to
beat him with a bat", that's still a bit better).

People aren't rational, but things like advertising works, so some form of
deterrents must work too I think.

~~~
pakled_engineer
The made Yakuza guys have underlings who carry guns and do violence for them
though with the understanding they are to do the time if caught, so in effect
nothing has changed.

The criminals shooting at each other weekly where I live are all 18-25yr old
drug delivery drivers working for established bosses they clearly aren't
rational or else they'd realize a few thousand a week isn't worth life in
prison. Plenty of these guys get caught but there doesn't seem to be any
shortage of violent replacements.

~~~
thelastguy
>they clearly aren't rational or else they'd realize a few thousand a week
isn't worth life in prison.

Actually, they are pretty rational. You can't say no to the boss. You say no
to the boss, you die. So they either deliver that drug, or die. They choose to
deliver the drug, even if it means getting caught and doing life in prison.
That's better than the boss killing you for not delivering the drug.

>The criminals shooting at each other weekly...

Again, they're not being irrational here. If you don't shoot, the other guy
will shoot you. You either shoot, or you die because the other guy shoots you.

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leftnode
Everything about this is ridiculous, but this especially so:

"Johnson’s release date was originally scheduled for earlier, but he ended up
serving an additional eight months at the age of 69 for a juvenile shoplifting
charge he received when he was 17."

How in any reasonable society is this justifiable? I re-read the sentence
probably five times because I simply couldn't believe it.

~~~
badloginagain
I'm surprised the sentences stack, I would have expected that if you have 5
jail-terms assigned to you, you would serve until the longest one.

American law sure favours punishment.

~~~
mrec
Once you'd committed one crime, that would remove the primary deterrent
against committing more (as long as they were no more serious than the first).

~~~
vacri
It doesn't seem to be working that way as a deterrent, then, given that the US
has an incarceration rate five times higher than it's developed-nation
contemporaries (750/100k vs ~100-150/100k population).

~~~
ewzimm
It's working well as a deterrent, but the goal is not to deter people from
committing crimes; it's to deter minorities from going to white neighborhoods
for fear of getting arrested. America's cities are very well segregated as a
result.

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jacquesm
44 years for _attempted_ murder of a police officer, I guess with such a
benchmark the next police officer murdering a civilian will be sentenced to at
least double that given that they're supposed to set an example. Incredible.
What standard of sentencing would essentially take someone's life away for an
_attempt_. Makes you wonder how big a sentence you'd get if you succeeded,
more than a lifetime?

~~~
cstross
His time served is actually _twice_ as long as the average life sentence
served for actual murder in the UK. (Some murderers are in for a "whole life"
tariff -- ineligible for release on license -- but in general most are
eligible for parole hearings after between 8 and 12 years and on average they
serve roughly 20 years.)

Just in case anyone was thinking that 44 years for attempted murder is a light
sentence.

~~~
lemevi
In Crime & Punishment Rodya only has to serve 8 years for the double axe
murder of two women in the commission of a robbery. It's a fictional tale
about justice in 19th century Russia, but still an interesting comparison I
think of when reading about modern sentencing.

~~~
tosseraccount
Wasn't "8 years in Siberia" likely a death sentence?

~~~
juhanima
Not in the imperial time, no. Dostoyevsky's The House of the Dead is an
interesting account of his time in Siberia, and it wasn't all that bad.

It was different in Stalin's time, though. Varlam Shalamov's Kolyma tales
tells a very different story. But even he survived after having served 15
years.

~~~
jpatokal
The mortality rate in the Kolyma gulags was estimated at 27%/year, meaning the
odds of survival for 15 years were <1%, and virtually zero for general work
(mining etc). Shalamov survived because he managed to land a position as a
hospital attendant.

~~~
resc1440
This assumes that random people die each year. However, if you survive for a
year, you are probably very tough, and your life expectancy might actually go
up.

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webo
This man's experience and attitude towards life is amazing. Very inspiring.
Props to him. 44 years is ridiculous amount of time for an assault when others
are getting away with a few years for an actual murder or slavery.

Don't prisons have common areas with TVs, radios, or magazines? It worries me
that inmates don't have access to basic development as a human/society.

~~~
ChrisLomont
Who got a few years for murder?

~~~
chillwaves
Have you attempted to answer this question yourself?

[http://abcnews.go.com/US/affluenza-dui-case-deposition-
tapes...](http://abcnews.go.com/US/affluenza-dui-case-deposition-tapes-reveal-
details-fatal/story?id=34505481)

I'm sure there are many cases with people getting away with murder.

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dayon
Out of society since 1975 and landing in Times Square... that's gotta be like
stepping out into an alien world.

~~~
avmich
We as the society can probably learn a lot from these people. A sort of live
time capsules, you know, providing some "more stable" benchmarks for our life,
habits, intents.

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tomcam
Don't understand the title--article is not in first person

~~~
MIKarlsen
But the video is somewhat first person.

~~~
tomcam
Thank you. I didn't even realize there was a video :-O

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id
I wasn't aware that there was a "Steve Jobs era".

~~~
seesomesense
It happened at the around the same time as the Jack Welch era and a little
after the Charles Kettering era. It will be just as well known as those in 20
years.

