
I Went from Grad School to Prison - theoutlander
http://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/a29775/cecily-mcmillan-grad-school-to-jail/
======
mabbo
What does society _gain_ from a prison like that?

Imagine a person spends 10 years in that situation, and gets out, what the
hell are they supposed to do now? They have no job skills, no life skills,
they're psychologically damaged. The rate of re-offense isn't high because
'bad people are bad', it's high because we take people in bad situations, and
break them further. We take someone almost-functional, and make them
completely disfunctional.

And anyone who disagrees with this model isn't "tough on crime".

~~~
a3n
> What does society gain from a prison like that?

No, you have to ask, what does a prison like that gain from society?

Once you understand that people are merely a resource for government, law
enforcement and business, things make more sense.

Think about that as you drive by a speed trap, that the police and city
undoubtedly portray as a safety operation, but where the cops hide themselves
because they're not trying to discourage speeding, they're trying to collect
taxes.

Think about that when you see various police organizations stating their
opposition to legalizing marijuana. Is their objection that it may promote
other, still illegal drugs, or that it would reduce LEO job opportunities?
Their only proper stance on the issue, as LEO organizations, is to enforce the
laws that society tells them to.

Think about that as an apparently overzealous prosecutor bullies a plea
bargain out of someone with the threat of life in prison. She's not
overzealous, she doesn't care about society; the victim/defendant is merely a
line on her resume. When a prosecutor's job performance depends on
_convictions_ (rather than truth), then she's going to maximize convictions.

Think about that as you, just a normal citizen who is no threat to anyone, are
monitored, threatened and controlled by unconstitutional surveillance and
police tools that are supposedly intended for, you know, actual terrorists
threats.

~~~
archgoon
> Once you understand that people are merely a resource for government, law
> enforcement and business, things make more sense.

Then why is it that other places in the world, such as Norway, prisons are not
like American prisons? You're claiming that the state in America is simply an
outcome of universal properties of Government, but this outcome is not
universal.

You can't just flippantly say "Things are bad 'cause Gubmint'", when it's
clear that other places have overcome these challenges.

~~~
a3n
I didn't say it's universal, and Norway is apparently a place where reason
wins more than America. They are also differently structured governments and
societies, and the people have different formative experiences.

We are not uniform, and no outcome is inevitable. The way things are in
America are probably more likely in America than elsewhere because of our
unique shared myths and the wieldability of government by evil people.

------
mcenedella
Ms. McMillan was convicted, unanimously, by a jury of her peers. The video of
her assault on the police officer is widely available and can be viewed here:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=devvY1cCVFE&oref=https%3A%2F...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=devvY1cCVFE&oref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DdevvY1cCVFE&has_verified=1)

You can draw your own conclusions, but what I see is somebody preparing,
consciously, to use the force of slamming their elbow into a police officer's
face in order to escape from that officer.

Perhaps you disagree with a lot of things -- police militarization,
incarceration rates in this country, unequal outcomes and opportunities based
on socioeconomic factors.

But I don't see how a fair-minded person can agree that we ought to go around
solving our problems by elbowing officers of the law in the eyeball:
[http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/15/nyregion/officer-
testifies...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/15/nyregion/officer-testifies-
about-encounter-with-occupy-wall-street-protester.html?_r=0)

The woman in this case has repeated problems with the law (and the truth) and
was arrested again last year for impersonating a lawyer in the subway and
interfering with an arrest:
[http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/nyregion/occupy-wall-
stree...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/nyregion/occupy-wall-street-
protester-is-out-of-jail-and-back-in-court.html)

As the prosecutors say in that case: "This new arrest mirrors what was on
display throughout the trial: the defendant’s utter contempt for the police
and the important job they do on a daily basis."

Fact-free magazines like Cosmopolitan may display sympathy for people like Ms.
McMillan, but here at HackerNews we should not.

~~~
readerrrr
_You can draw your own conclusions, but what I see is somebody preparing,
consciously, to use the force of slamming their elbow into a police officer 's
face in order to escape from that officer._

What is the point of the wording "preparing consciously"? Can you prepare for
something unconsciously? If someone gropes you from behind, some conscious
effort is required to defend yourself.

 _Fact-free magazines like Cosmopolitan may display sympathy for people like
Ms. McMillan, but here at HackerNews we should not._

Please don't use the term "we". I'm not a sociopath and I have sympathy for
people who were treated unjustfully.

~~~
SilasX
>What is the point of the wording "preparing consciously"? Can you prepare for
something unconsciously?

The point was probably to emphasize the premeditation of it, and I agree it
was needlessly verbose. But yes, you can prepare unconsciously, like when your
body has the fight-or-flight response.

------
nnq
Name one important person who ended up in jail for more-or-less-violent
protesting, and ended up having this as a "self transforming" experience. I
can name at least one... _Adolf Hitler_
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler))
...and I think Mr. _Joseph Stalin_ followed a similar career path, though I
know less about the details (but here's a cute mugshot of him:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_life_of_Joseph_Stalin#med...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_life_of_Joseph_Stalin#mediaviewer/File:Stalin%27s_Mug_Shot.jpg)
)

So, here you go:

Q: How do you severely radicalize a random semi-moderate non-violent
protester?

A: Send him/her to jail.

Thankfully this girl kept a cool head and drew a sane interpretation from it,
but seriously, what are you Americans trying to do, 'cook up' the next
generation of world-wrecking monsters in some insane social-engineering
experiment?!

~~~
jeffdavis
She was convicted of a violent offense.

Are you disputing the verdict or the punishment?

~~~
TophWells
The punishment, from the sound of it.

~~~
jeffdavis
OK, how does the punishment for hitting a police officer in the US compare to
other countries?

~~~
justin66
It's worth noting that the punishment here was pretty over the top even by US
standards. In suburban middle America a college girl with no priors who
bruises a cop will not ordinarily get charged with a _felony._ Some cities
would even take the charge that she was manhandled by cops seriously and
investigate it.

~~~
jeffdavis
That seems like you're disputing the charge/verdict, not the punishment.

What is the normal punishment for felony assault of a police officer for
someone with no priors?

The reason this distinction is important is because disputing the
charge/verdict requires getting involved in the case and seeing the
prosecution's evidence.

~~~
justin66
I was actually with you until here:

> The reason this distinction is important is because disputing the
> charge/verdict requires getting involved in the case and seeing the
> prosecution's evidence.

I don't agree at all but I also think we've seen enough of the evidence that
there's not really much factually to dispute. (We know a lot more than the
jury did, which is a very common and very depressing situation but also a
separate topic)

Anyhow, felony charges are usually reserved for people who do a lot of damage,
on purpose, and who have prior convictions. I agree that there's a distinction
to be made between the seriousness of charges and the severity of those
charges associated punishment - they're determined by different parts of
government, if nothing else - but I don't think as much hangs on it as you
seem to, vis a vis the way different places treat crimes more or less
severely. Heavy handedness in one area correlates with heavy-handedness in the
other, after all.

------
ithought
_I 'll agree not to charge you with a felony and potentially lock in you in
cage if you agree not to have a third party examine the facts of this case,
and instead plead to a misdemeanor and pay a fine._

Is there any possible reform for the disaster that is the plea system? I
realize it's necessarily in some situations but the result is you are never
not guilty of some crime. The prosecution virtually never loses. Truth and
justice are nowhere to be found.

~~~
dunmalg
>Is there any possible reform for the disaster that is the plea system?

Prohibit prosecutors from going to trial with charges any higher than they
offered in the plea deal. If they offer to (say) let you plead to only
misdemeanor drug possession, then they shouldn't be allowed to then prosecute
for felony drug possession, resisting arrest, plus anything else they can
think of simply because you dared to ask for a jury trial. Sentencing can
still be somewhat variable, which would offer an actual incentive to those
that know they're caught-holding-the-bag guilty, but would not be such a
ruinously life destroying difference that it would frighten the innocent into
taking the pllea when they did nothing wrong. The argument against plea
bargain reform from prosecutors is always along the lines of "the courts could
never handle all those cases, so we have to discourage jury trials as best we
can", and frankly, that line of reasoning is bullshit. If there aren't enough
resources to offer a jury trial to every offender, then I say we have a crisis
of constitutional proportions, and dealing with it by gaming the system to
force people to forego their rights simply to improve efficiency is a far more
evil thing than most of the crimes people plead to.

------
S4M
> The judge didn't allow evidence that my attorney wanted to show the jury,
> including a range of videos of the incident.

That's the part I find the most shocking in this article. Aren't trials
supposed to be fair? What are the kind of evidences that are not allowed to be
shown?

~~~
mcenedella
NYTimes: "Jurors were also shown several YouTube videos of Officer Bovell, 35,
in March 2012 getting elbowed in his left eye by Ms. McMillan, 25, who is
charged with assaulting a police officer. She has maintained that Officer
Bovell groped her breast, and that she reacted without knowing he was a police
officer. He has denied that he touched her breast.

The shaky videos showed Ms. McMillan, a labor organizer, in a bright green
dress, jumping back and planting her elbow in Officer Bovell’s face.

“She crouched down and lunged backward, elbowing me in the eye,” Officer
Bovell said. “It’s like a white light in the face.”"

[http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/17/nyregion/officer-stands-
by...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/17/nyregion/officer-stands-by-his-
account-of-scuffle-at-occupy-wall-street-protest.html)

~~~
S4M
I don't disagree with what you are saying, but you are not answering my
question.

------
davidf18
I live in NYC and I didn't read the entire article, but what stood out for me
(beneath the picture) was the $167K per year that each prisoner on Rikers
costs NYC!

The story of her re-arrest for confronting a police officer in the NYTimes
story mentioned in the first comment suggests some underlying contributing
psychological issues.

------
transfire
One day a civilized nation will look back on America prisons as we now look
back on the Bastille.

~~~
pedrosorio
You don't need to wait for the future:
[http://m.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/09/why-s...](http://m.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/09/why-
scandinavian-prisons-are-superior/279949/)

------
auvrw
the grad school -> prison movement isn't new.. i recall a friend who, as far
as i know, went from a ritzy grad school to jail based on some fairly radical
eco-"terrorism".... incarceration is a really scary thing, and there's a gamut
of types there. i have a feeling that this was an experience for the article's
author for sure, but, although it may be a platitute, i feel as though i ought
to say, "it could be worse."

------
ryanmarsh
I'm glad she wrote this. In prison you don't just "serve your time". Instead
you are abused and neglected, criminally so.

Source: My brother went to prison with a 70 year sentence. He was 17.

------
dbg31415
I don't love cops, but you don't hit cops. No matter what the cop does, you
don't hit the cop. 58 days... she got off with a slap on the wrist.

~~~
mindcrime
Sure you do. A person has the right to defend themselves when assaulted, even
if the assaulter happens to be wearing a shitty tin badge and carrying a gun
and night-stick. We should not mistake the so-called "authority" of the State
as having any legitimacy that can trump our innate rights, of which self-
defense is about as fundamental as they get.

------
appleflaxen
prisons in the US are unconscionable. the abuse by guards, the prevalence of
prison rape (by an HIV-positive inmate, no less), the capricious behavior by
the staff. It is a shameful system.

------
digitalengineer
"... And the right to a fair trial...' Yeah right...

------
kukabynd
world done fucked up

------
guard-of-terra
Someone should become dead for this.

