Seriously, I don't know what to do with someone like this. Death Penalty? Isolation for the rest of their lives? What? I feel so helpless when I read about people like this. Is there a solution?
quote: The children, who ranged in age from 12 to 17, told officials that the Dollars struck them with a hammer, administered electric shocks and used pliers to pull off their toenails
quote:Twin 14-year-old brothers were severely malnourished, weighing 36 and 38 pounds each
quote:The children did not attend school and no other adults had regular contact with them, preventing authorities from intervening sooner, Tierney said.
quote:The children, who ranged in age from 12 to 17, told officials that the Dollars struck them with a hammer, administered electric shocks and used pliers to pull off their toenails
That makes me so sick to my stomach. I've had my toenails pulled out with pliers before, in a doctor's office with local anesthesia. It was by far one of the most painful things I've ever been through, yes even childbirth.
How anyone could inflict that kind of pain on another person, heck even my doctor said "I hate removing toenails, it's like torturing someone, even when I know it's going to help."
What do you do? I don't know. I don't support the death penalty, but cases like this appeal to my darker side and make me sometimes, wish I did.
My preference? A lifetime sentence to hard labor.
Posts: 14428 | Registered: Aug 2001
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posted
This kind of stuff is so upsetting. What I would really like to do is subject them to the same treatment they got but that would be deemed cruel and unusual punishment. Jail time, counseling and permanent probation (to make sure they have no contact with other children) would be a start.
Posts: 134 | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
Holy crap, you know what bugs me the most? The BIG SMILES on those abusers' faces in the photos. I wonder when was the last time their children smiled like that? Sickening.
Posts: 1539 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:I've had my toenails pulled out with pliers before, in a doctor's office with local anesthesia. It was by far one of the most painful things I've ever been through, yes even childbirth.
I've had my toenail ripped off when it got slammed in a door once (no anesthesia there) and I will always swear that is the WORST pain in the world (and I've had three kids).
I just cannot fathom someone who would do this to children! How sick are these people's minds? And I'll bet others around them thought they were just the best folks...... it's just sick.
posted
What I want to know is why they were free to disappear in the first place. They were charged with felonies, yet were not being detained in any way. It doesn't even mention them having made bond to stay free until their hearing.
quote:What I want to know is why they were free to disappear in the first place. They were charged with felonies, yet were not being detained in any way. It doesn't even mention them having made bond to stay free until their hearing.
Most bail acts nowadays will let most people accused of minor felonies out with little or no bail. Why this would be a minor felony, I have no idea. But it's not uncommon.
And, it's pretty successful in general. There's remarkably few no-shows when you look at the numbers.
posted
But, Dag, doesn't a judge decide whether that applies or whether they're a flight risk based on the severity of their crime(s) and how much punishment they'd be looking at, among other things?
I wouldn't let them out of the state's sight.
By the way, how much time would they get if they stood trial and were convicted?
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
Yes, the primary factor is whether the defendant will appear as orderd. Protection of the community is a secondary concern.
I have no idea what the possible sentence is. Sounds like multiple cases of aggravated assault/malicious wounding to me. Throw in some child abuse and child neglect. I have no idea what the laws are in that state, though.
I'd put everything I could but the kitchen sink in that indictment.
That one's not nearly as bad, though, as this new story. Six kids . . . a 36 pound 14-year-old. Geez. I worry because my six-year-olds only weigh that much. I can't imagine a fourteen year old. These parents didn't just find themselves overwhelmed or whatever, they got off on torturing their kids. Look at how they moved to where nobody knew them, kept their kids out of school, and kept them prisoners.
You know, we already have a thread for this sort of thing, lem. Slash's ass-kicking thread.
*sigh*
I read these stories, and, I dunno . . . I can read about all kinds of horrific things, and be horrified or outraged on some level, but when I read about things like this happening to kids, I quite literally have to work at holding back tears. And I don't consider myself real prone to crying or anything. I find this reaction in myself intriguing. One of the things I can't help thinking about is how these assholes don't just cause pain in the instant. They very often ruin these kids' entire lives. And even when they don't, they certainly diminish it, and give them a burden to bear forever, even through the good times.
Punisment? Well, I'm generally in favor of the death penalty. I also think we define "cruel and unusual" way more liberally than the framers of the constitution intended. But then it all comes down to whether the purpose of the justice system is revenge/punishment, rehabilitation, or deterrence. I don't see us having a lot of success with rehabilitation, so I tend to lean toward the other two.
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
Joe, I know exactly what you mean. Ever since we had Ryan, reading about cases like this hit me much harder.
There was another case like this in Florida a year or so ago. A couple had several foster children in addition to their own children. The foster children were kept locked in a room, fed very little, etc. One of the worse things was how the couple's own children would abuse the foster children. They would box one of the smaller ones in 2 milk crates and throw him in the pool to watch him almost drown.
Posts: 4625 | Registered: Jul 2002
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quote:One day, I'll put someone like that in jail for a very long time.
Despite alol the lawyer jokes and how I think we rely on lawyers too much, there are times when I look at lawyers with admiration, respect, and a recognition of my dependance for them to see justice done.
posted
The death penalty is too merciful. I support eye for an eye, with the addition of life in prison.
Posts: 1364 | Registered: Feb 2003
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I hate going day by day living, just chilling and playing my guitar, and knowing that stuff like this is happening constantly, always, somewhere.. and I can't do anything about it.. It drives me nuts everytime I think about it.. right now as i'm typing, someone is being murdered or raped or abused like this and I can't do anything to help because i'm not there.. ughhhhh... - Lifetime in Iso isn't much to ask for something like this- they should lose at least double the amount of time those children lost.. that's horrendous.. grrrrr...
posted
As satisfying as an eye for an eye approach might seem, doesn't that make our justice like them in the end? Except we didn't think of it first. I don't know.
Posts: 2010 | Registered: Apr 2003
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I'm pro-death penalty but I know how many are against it. The Oubliette is my compromise.
10x10 cell buried in the ground. No light, just a hole in the corner for their wastes. Feed them trough an airlock in the ceiling so that no light gets in. Randomize the feeding schedule so they can't use it to keep track of the days. Infrared camera to make sure they're not sick or dead.
They are completely denied the life they took from others (for murderers anyway) yet, if they are found to be innocent later (which is the only point I can see from the anti-death penalty people) then they can have the lid blow torched off and let out.
quote: They are completely denied the life they took from others (for murderers anyway) yet, if they are found to be innocent later (which is the only point I can see from the anti-death penalty people) then they can have the lid blow torched off and let out.
I'm not sure, Pix, that this is preferable to killing an innocent person. Personally, I think I'd rather be executed by lethal injection, despite my innocence, than spend twenty years in the environment you've described only to finally have my innocence acknowledged. I don't think your "compromise" destroys the person any less completely than state-assisted death.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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tom: conventional prisons destroy people just as well, either through the culture, through rape and AIDS or even through murder.
And I agree, I'd rather die than be placed in an Oubliette.
But if someone's main objection to the death penalty is that they can't be un-killed if they're later found innocent, then an Oubliette answers that objection.
You can't un-change them from the effects of an Oubliette, but you also can't un-change them from prison culture/AIDS either.
Posts: 7085 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Things like this are the sole reason I'm not completely against the death penalty. Otherwise I'd have no qualms about doing away with it entirely.
However, I don't advocate torture or lengthy imprisonment at all. If guilt is proven beyond a shadow of doubt, use the needle and use it quickly.
It's not eye-for-an-eye, it's not vengeance, it's not punishment, all of those bring us to a darker level that we don't need to visit and raise up dangerous emotions that are too similar to those that led to the crime itself. I advocate putting them down the same way I would a rabid dog, with as little personal satisfaction and as much sorrow.
Posts: 7790 | Registered: Aug 2000
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posted
I haven't read the articles either. I can't - it would upset me too much.
I'm pro-death penalty. As far as I'm concerned, it's also to make absolute damn sure that people like this don't ever have the opportunity to hurt children ever again. In Canada, if I recall correctly, life imprisonment is 14 years. It's a joke. It gives the perp many more opportunities after release to destroy the lives of more innocent victims.
But then, in Canada, sexual assault of a minor can mean a $100 fine, no jail time. So what would people like this get there?
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
*sighs* those poor children...I desperately hope that they are taken to a good and wonderful home to live and learn to love life and humans, despite the horrors that were inflicted upon them...
Posts: 1158 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
They're also apparently well-off, and she has a degree in education. Why would anyone do something like this? Why? Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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Because they can. Because they decide to. Because they care more for their own pleasure than anyone else's well-being. Because they're selfish and immoral and don't give a hoot who's hurt in the process, as long as it isn't them.
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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You know what I mean. It's just incomprehensible to me that anyone would want to torture a child. Like when I was reading Three Apples Fell From Heaven, about the Armenian Genocide. I just cried for days. Same thing with stories of the Holocaust. What is it about humans that we even have it in us to come up with ideas like this? Is it Satan's influence, or is it something we come up with ourselves? I just get very upset reading things like this.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
There are some things I just don't care to understand. Let's just kill them. Their existence is an insult.
Posts: 5663 | Registered: Jun 2000
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quote: I'm pro-death penalty but I know how many are against it. The Oubliette is my compromise.
If you think the "Oubliette" is a compromise for people who are against the death penalty then I think you're very much mistaken.
Some people, who are unmistakeably and disgustingly guilty, deserve to live no longer. But an eye for an eye makes the torturers no better that the person they are punishing. That is not humane or human.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
The only way you can do this sort of thing is if you live entirely in yourself. If you can tune out all you've done and see and hear, well, then what are you?
Posts: 1735 | Registered: Oct 2004
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I think you're right, ultimately. When I worked as a law clerk, I was really strongly anti-death penalty. But working for a while in a criminal court, and seeing the things people do to each other I had a very gut-level reaction to some defendants. I think there are some people for whom the death penalty is an appropriate punishment.
I would also note that I did not decide to go into criminal law. I think the application of the death penalty has to be made in a way that's fair and consistent, and not on the basis of a gut reaction, no matter how strong it is.
Posts: 516 | Registered: Aug 2004
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This presumes that killing crazy effing bastards is wrong.
And no, they aren't people. They are genetically human beings, but emotionally monsters. Society must rid itself of monsters. This isn't some guy that killed somebody because he was high. These are two evil individuals that deliberately hurt children.
In my opinion, of course... Posts: 5663 | Registered: Jun 2000
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