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Database Finds Fugitive After 35 Years
Hugh Pickens writes "The Guardian has a story on a woman who was claims she is innocent and was apprehended 35 years after escaping prison by a computer database created by the Department of Homeland Security. Linda Darby was convicted of killing her husband in 1970 and sentenced to life at an Indiana prison but escaped two years later by climbing over a barbed-wire fence at the Indiana Women's Prison. She knocked on a stranger's door in Indianapolis, telling the woman who answered that her cuts and scratches were from a fight with her boyfriend. In Indianapolis she met the man who would become her third husband and moved to his hometown of Pulaski, where they raised their two children and watched eight grandchildren grow up. As Linda Jo McElroy, she used a similar date of birth and social security number to her real ones which allowed a computer database created by the Department of Homeland Security to identify her. Darby says she is innocent and fled prison because she did not want to serve time for another person's crime."
At last ... firt post for thr first time in my life!
Of course, even if she was innocent of murder, she's now guilty of whatever charge Indiana has on its books for escaping from prison...
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
The country is now safe from terrorist grandmothers!
I guess the real question is, since the program they were using apparently looks for things that are similar to known criminals, how many innocent people were fingered in the attempt to track down a 64-year old woman? I bet we'll never hear about them until long after we're gone...
The authorities should focus on finding the one-armed man.
I'd say if she hasn't re-offended then, who cares. (shrugs)
What is interesting is that we have this story probably flagged up by the authorities. I suspect that it is to make us think that the ''big government databases'' are a good thing and that we should approve their continued use. What is buried are the stories where these databases have screwed up and inconvenienced (or worse) innocent people.
Back in the 80's I was setting up a call center for the computer company where I worked and one of the steps was to search for duplicate serial numbers and standardize model numbers, customer names, etc. I'm sure anyone who worked with databases understands this process.
Our databases were regional, so while searching for duplicates a whole computer system suddenly disappeared from the Northeast and mysteriously showed up in Florida. I started researching thinking that the system perhaps was stolen but instead I accidentally uncovered a CIA operation. Don't know if it is still active so I won't say anything else about it except database integration can give insights and glimpses into situations that are at first very transparent.
This sounds like what caught Linda.
And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make
The title off the post is irritating.
The database did nothing. It is a process running on a computer. Information flows in, (potentially useful) information flows out, a suspected criminal is arrested. One could as well claim that the piping system in a house effected the drowning of someone. Water flowed in, water flowed out, and someone died.
The database is just an occasionally useful tool. The code for it is written by people, and the outputs are intrepreted and acted upon by people.
Could we eschew this slipshod causal analysis?
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
Even if she's guilty, I think this case just shows that criminals can be integrated into society and there's really no reason to automatically lock up a murderer for the rest of his/her life.
Tricky one.
Rather then attempt to clear her name shed escaped from jail and started a new life - a felony in itself.
On one hand you take the argument that they system has an appeals system designed to right injustice so if she believed she was innocent she should of tried to clear her name, on the other hand you have a possibly inept defense lawyer who seemed not to be dong their job and the possibility that left on her own she would rot in jail.
It is clear that the police have significant evidence to pin the crime on her, and the original jury clearly thought so. And we only have to facts as stated from TFA that make her seem like a saint based on the new life after the original murder.
And a justice system only works if all judgments and laws are upheld.
I am slightly disturbed by the final comment about this database "But there also were other clues that he said he could not talk about." - WTF? has this person never heard of conspiracy theorists? give them a single clue like that and they can invent ten secret organizations by lunchtime.
So basically you are saying murder is OK. Wow. Innocent until proven guilty but that takes some really... interesting thinking to claim that murder is somehow forgivable.
Some years ago, there was case of a black man who escaped from an Alabama prison and lived a quiet life for fifty years before getting caught, believe it was a serious charge like murder. The case was examined and it looked like he had been treated unfairly (i.e. young black fighting the 'Man' in the deep south in the 30's, not a win situation for him at all, he didn't stand a chance). It was sort of a choreographed ballet but the governor of Alabama went through the motions of requesting extradition and the governor of Illinois turned him down saying the evidence was questionable and he lived with no further problems. I guess the black guy had to live with the prospect of never being able to go to Alabama.
It does bring up a wider point, what is the purpose of the judicial system. Punishment/retribution or rehabilitation. Is this man or the woman rehabilitated and won't offend again? Is that enough or do we need to use deterrence and punishment to show others. It's a serious question for which I'm not sure of the answer.
And if she were railroaded and falsely convicted of the murder as she claims? Doesn't an innocent person deserve to live free? Isn't an innocent person entirely justified in escaping from a penal system which has erroneously imprisoned her because she had a shitty defense counsel? Or are you one of those law and order types that worship at the alter of State Authority, and who believes that it never wrongly convicts people?
Good heavens people, pause and reread what you're typing. The first sentence of the article summary is a crime against not only the English language, but of all human thought!
"Papers please." Americans never want to here these words. But even as far back as 1972, scholars of civil rights were aware of the dangers posed by compulsory provision of social security numbers. The uniqueness property of the SS numbers are so useful, it was quickly becoming necessary to use the number to transact a great deal of government and even private business.
At least it used to be that the FBI couldn't troll through every database the government had, looking for people. The idea was that people don't have a choice about providing their SS number and other information that personally identifies them, so that this information should not be requested unless there was a clear reason to collect it, and should never be used except for that purpose.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Whew! Glad we have her off the streets. Thank God for that database....
When you are convicted by a jury in the United States of a felony, you loose a number of rights by operation of law. You loose your right to freedom by having to go to jail, you loose your right to hold property, by having to compensate the victim and the state, and often, your right to vote. The reason why this is "ok" is because you lost these rights after "due process of law".
Escaping from jail is a serious criminal offense with serious additional penalties. There is no statute of limitation concerns because it is an ongoing crime...the statute would start to run after recapture, however.
Or are you just one of those tools who think everybody in innocent just because they say so. She was convicted by a jury of her peers.
Gone!
Oh how I loathe these kinda big brother success stories. One little glorious success validates the entire program and should make us forget about all the real and potential abuse that the system brings. Cause if we don't then we have something to hide and/or are pro-crime.
So... how much money was spent to make this event happen?
What is the 'cost per result' of GrandMotherland Security?
I was wondering how it was going...
I thought that such data - as in from massive wiretapping and data-mining - collected in the name of the War On Terror (tm) by the DHS & Co, et al were not to be used in the pursuit of "ordinary" domestic crime?
Ok, now that's funny.
Clearly the article is right that she couldn't have had a criminal record, as that should get her found immediately. Perhaps she didn't have the pristine life the article tries to paint, but chances are any dirt on her is nothing more than that which a free citizen might have on them. She clearly doesn't deserve to go back to prison; the proactive idea is supposed to be to reform inmates and get them to be able to go back to society, and she has demonstrated that she is a good citizen. After so many years, it wouldn't hurt to let her stay where she is. The only reason I can see for bringing her back is to set an example so inmates know there is no freedom from justice, by whatever definition. If her case is needed as an example, the database mustn't be doing much, as there should be enough examples that a one-time and one-time-only criminal doesn't have to be one. I just hope if she had to be the scapegoat to make the database look good, they put her right back out on parole and let her off easy.
My webcomic
35 years! What's the prescriptive periods for murder or escaping in Indiana ?
I vote he's a tool.
pursuing enemies of the United States. Undoubtedly they also have determined where Osama Bin Laden is hiding?
I am soooo pleased that we now have tens of thousands of otherwise unemployed white-collar workers working diligently to pursue terrorists such as this woman. If only one such terrorist is found by the trillions of dollars then I think the "War on Terror" must be declared a wild success.
Sheesh!
Does the government even have the right to use the database for that kind of domestic spying? I thought it was only supposed to be used for looking for terrorists. As soon as you start looking for criminals, the constitution and our right to privacy comes into play.
"She was convicted by a jury of her peers."
Jesus, I sincerely hope you get to face one of those one day.. Because juries are the pinnacle of intelligence, can't be mislead, deceived or swayed by irrelevant stuff, right? Just face it, it's a lottery as much as anything, especially if you can't afford a good defense.
Yes, she's an escaped murder, and it's good that she got caught.
What is unsettling about this article is that it puts the lie to the idea that all these new draconian anti-terrorism laws are only going to affect terrorists. Not the case, and anyone the least bit familiar with US law enforcement would know this - they will always use every tool, take any liberty they think they can get away with to "enforce the law".
So the next time Congress passes another anti-terrorism law, and your Congressman stands there and tells you it's a vital weapon in the "War on Terror" - keep in mind, it will be used on everyone in law enforcement's "War on Crime" - and grandmothers are a hell of a lot easier to catch than most terrorists.
... apprehended 35 years after escaping prison by a computer database created by the Department of Homeland Security. This database is so powerful it actually apprehended the woman!Seems to me I've been reading a lot recently about people who have been convicted and then found to be innocent (in various ways). There are a bunch of factors here - many prosecutors gain (promotions, publicity...) from convictions, so it is in their interest to convict people - and a dubious conviction is probably better than no conviction. (Not saying that they do it deliberately, though some probably do, more that they convince themselves that the person is really guilty - perhaps even unconsciously.) Often, once the justice system has a good candidate for a crime they focus more on convicting that person than looking for other possibilities. Witnesses are often mistaken. Lots of times people who cannot afford good legal representation get convicted just on that factor.
I don't know anything about this particular case, but the implication that anyone convicted by a jury is really guilty seems unlikely.
No, he's saying that this massive database that spies deeply into our lives that's supposed to catch terrorists is now catching little 'ol grandmas (who killed a person, but is not a terrorist), and that we're supposed to be happy about it. I am not.
I would rather have her free on the street than lose some of my civil liberties. She didn't re-commit crimes, and she led a good life. She did/does deserve to be in jail, but this database is obviously not being used in the context that it was expected to be used in, and that's disturbing.
If you've ever watched an old western, or any outlaw movie -- there's a very romantic idea in America of old criminals righting their ways by themselves, relocating and turning into great, good productive citizens. Then in the end of the movie, some asshole sheriff shows up and drags the ex-criminal back into court/jail to the sadness of the whole town who then rallies behind him. So, yea, internally a lot of people are conflicted -- this person should be in jail, but there's some part of the rough and tumble American ideal inside of people still that says she made it right and should be left alone. She needs to go back into jail for precedence reasons (can't just let her go once they've found a jail-bird), but a part of me is disgusted at the way she was caught -- by this TERRORIST DATABASE, and not by something that would have happened if the government wasn't actively data-mining in places that they normally wouldn't be if it weren't for 9/11/PATRIOT ACT/Bush.
So yea, lock up the criminals (even better, rehabilitate), but don't justify a massive infringement in civil liberties by saying that it has allowed you to lock up grandma.
The news is full of stories lately about people who where convicted by juries of their peers, spent 15-20 years in jail and eventually proven innocent by DNA evidence. Also, OJ was not convicted by a jury of his peers. That pretty much illustrates the value of a jury of your peers.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Are you one of those tools that believes that everybody is guilty because the police allege it? Convicted by a jury of her peers. Pfft.
The cost of that cleanup, of course, will be borne by taxpayers, not industry.
You do understand that she ostensibly MURDERED someone? She didn't just steal his ipod or wreck his car - she MURDERED him.
"Given that she spent 35 years on the outside with no further crimes, I'd say that she's pretty rehabilitated already.... but I guess not."
Maybe prison is meant to be *punishment*, and no, I don't think she's done her time if she was in fact guilty.
Or would you agree that someone who kills YOUR sister, son, cousin, father - and managed to evade capture for 35 years should just be therefore forgiven?
-Styopa
They will get you on the plan one way are the other.
Even if she had committed the crime it's clear that after serving two years she was rehabilitated enough to not murder again, since she hasn't killed anyone else. And unless you admit that jail time is more about punishment than rehabilitation it has served its purpose in this case.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
It's interesting to read this article and wonder where the husband's story has been gone. By carefully eliminating any possibility of sympathising with the victim of the murder, and by introducing fairly spurious ground for doubting the verdirct we're steered carefully towards reaching the writer's conclusion that this woman is innocent, and didn't deserve to be recaptured.
What about her ex-husband's relatives, who have had to live a lifetime knowing the woman that was convicted of murdering their son/brother/father, ran away from justice and never served the punishment for her crime? What are their feelings that the person who had escaped a horrible crime to live a free life has been recaptured? Should they not feel relieved and even happy that a fugitive murderer has been apprehended to serve her time?
Take whichever side you will, and believe what you will. But at the very least acknowledge the victim's side of the story, and that this article was one-sided and emotionally manipulative.
The purpose of prison is not to rehabilitate. That idea was pretty conclusively ruled out in the last century. Prisons function as schools for crime; those who are imprisoned not only fail to reform, but go on to greater crimes. Prison is also not to deter. Most crimes are committed by people in the heat of passion or the youthful delusion of invulnerability. Punishment simply is not considered by such people. The purpose of prison is to compensate society for the wrong the criminal has done by giving it the joy of seeing the criminal suffer for the wrongdoing. This woman has deprived society of its revenge. She now owes her late husband's family not only revenge for the murder, but also revenge for missing out on thirty-five years of schadenfreude. She also owes her new family revenge for being taken from them. And she owes society revenge for the expense of searching for her, and the expense of guarding her for the rest of her natural life. Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth.
Anyone who thinks the system works otherwise is deluded. Anyone who thinks the system should work otherwise should be working to change it.
Is it just me, or does this sound like it could be the "intersect" on Chuck? Okay, I really doubt it, but that was the first thing that came to my mind.
Punishment? No, you mean Revenge.
Revenge is about hate.
The supposed purpose of the police system is to ensure that people are free of fear and hate. That we are safe to live in peace. Prison is supposed to remove people from society as long as they pose a threat, and it is meant to rehabilitate people so that they can lead peaceful lives. That is the end purpose of the law. That is the way we protect ourselves.
Without knowing more about the woman and the life she has lived, we cannot judge. Perhaps she was being abused and her killing the man was an accidental result of self-defense. Or perhaps she was a jealous lunatic. Or perhaps she really was falsely accused. We do not know. But I DO know that revenge is not why I pay taxes. If this woman today poses no threat, if she has become a giving person who helps society, then containing her and ruining her psyche in a prison system which has a lousy track record of actually rehabilitating people, then what has happened here is a step backwards.
You cannot un-kill people. The past is the past, and it may be very sad. But the future is not well served through revenge and further acts of hate. As Gandhi put it, "An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind."
-FL
But, isn't the purpose of homeland security supposed to be to protect citizens from non-citizens or are they just a universal police force to be used against Americans now?
In the People's Republic of California, a conviction equals guilt. It never matters if a crime actually occurred, or who did it. Just round up the usual suspects and see if any plausible story can be cooked up with the DA. Who is the jury gonna believe? We are all just out on our own recognizance until they find out who didn't bring a lawyer. A litmus test for people I meet is to tell about one of the times that I was grabbed off the street as a likely suspect. A witness was brought by my cell, he told the cop "That ain't the guy" cop says "Are you sure? look again." Witness got pissed off that the cops dragged him out there, cop was pissed that the witness wouldn't finger me. I reckon a lot of folks go "well maybe it could have been him". Its not like it was a line-up either, just me, alone in a box. An amazing (to me) number of people say I wouldn't have been arrested if I didn't do anything, and shun me. Those are MY peers.
The cost of that cleanup, of course, will be borne by taxpayers, not industry.
A guy at our church used to be a domestic terrorist. He had joined a KKK group. When he was finally caught and imprisoned, he had bombed dozens of black churches and synagogues. Initially, prison made him worse. But during a long stretch of solitary confinement, he finally took stock of his life and asked God to help him change into a better person.
and its what drives all human endeavor.
Just look at this entire industry...
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
I suppose ... it's pretty obvious that she didn't want to go back.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Hi,
if I remember correctly the department of homeland security was created to fight dangers for the national security, that is terrorists. How does a database of Americans fit into this? And why was it used to catch a fugitive prisoner - no matter whether she was was acutally a murderess or not? What's next? Catching people for speeding?
twm
2.4 Trillion dollars, to one (probably innocent as she claims) Grandmother, one guy so whacked that they can't figure out what he was going to do and are not sure if he ever could have done it (the radiological bomb guy), and one shoe bomber. Did I miss anything? Oh, yeah, there was a band of disaffected teen agers turned radical islamic extremists somewhere a while back. They might have become a real threat, one day. Hrm... come to think of it, the shoe bomber got himself caught, and isn't the product of any of the new laws. Scratch him off the list.
Please, list the civil liberties, which you lost because of this database.
The cases like this all they can expose. A caught-up spy or, indeed, a terrorist is too valuable for their capture to be publicized. But, clearly, you would not give the government any benefit of the doubt so go ahead and enumerate the lost civil liberties. Thanks.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
I don't think there's even been a serious claim that our justice system is about rehabilitation and not punishment. Rehabilitation is kind of a minor sub goal, but not the serious focus.
Privacy.
A huge government database full of your SSN and other personally identifying information (Lexis-Nexis, anyone?), including relative's names, former names, former SSNs, birthday's you've listed, jobs you've worked at, places you bank with... list goes on and on.
I don't know about you, but having all of that information readily available and consolidated in one place seems like a dangerous thing to me, and would violate my privacy.
Good work DHS, I feel so much safer now.
Wow, that query certainly took a long time.
Hey, that's a good one. Maybe I can get rid of my crappy credit rating by convincing the credit companies that the information they've stored about me violates my privacy.
Thanks! You're a genius!
interesting thinking to claim that murder is somehow forgivable.
Excuse me while I play devil's advocate here - am I to understand that your point of view is that life imprisonment should mean life?
Because if not, then the idea that society should never forgive a murderer to my mind implies that anyone who is let out of prison after serving such a term should never be able to find work, should be denied even the most basic of social housing or benefits and should essentially have no choice but to wind up living as a tramp, wandering the streets, drinking methylated spirits and shouting at people who aren't there.
Prisons don't rehabilitate, they destroy people (with effect proportional to time spent in prison and inverse proportional to age of a prisoner). But they are an necessary tools needed to control a society as big as a country.
My observation is that the US justice system is set up around the concept of revenge. Your comment is the first I have ever seen that it is about rehabilitation. And I spent a year in California. I guess I was wrong.
I know!
And yeah, it isn't illegal. But how far can the consolidation of databases be pushed until it really is an issue? I mean, a Lexis-Nexus search on the law enforcement branch brings up way more than enough information about me to steal my identity. How long until that information begins to trickle down into the hands of someone who would care? How open can the information get? It begins to raise a lot of questions.
Prison is supposed to be used as a reformation tool. She escaped and has lived a criminal free (ie: reformed) life ever since. So what is the good of locking her up right now going to do? Reform her some more? Murder might not be forgivable (unless you have the money and power) but locking her up won't bring the dead guy back. It will only cause more strife in this world, since her husband will lose his wife, her children will lose their mother, and her grandchildren won't know their grandmother, and she's gonna die in prison. What a solution!
Don't trust a bull's horn, a doberman's tooth, a runaway horse or me.
They show also be looking for Raoul.
Murder is OK in some circumstances, and this woman's situation is one of them.
Blar.
What I suspect actually happened is that Linda Darby needed to provide her SSN on some application for something recently and since identity theft has become a major problem over the last decade the agency that took her application found that the SSN belonged to multiple people and forwarded the information to the FBI for possible criminal investigation. This would automatically make Linda Darby a suspect for a crime which would justify the DHS trying to figure out who actually belonged to the SSN in question and who didn't, eventually giving DHS a justification for attempting to make a connection between Linda Darby and Linda McElroy. But the article doesn't go into this sort of detail and probably should.
Well, the main points of the article is that her conduct in the last 35 years suggests that she is not guilty of the crime and has been a good person since she has escaped. I don't quite buy this - there is too much of the "she goes to church and pays her rent on time and must be a good person" type of logic. However, the victim's family's opinion is completely irrelevant to either of these points, weak as they may be. I do agree that a judgment about whether she is innocent should needs to based primarily upon the details of the evidence and the trial. Again, for this determination the victims families feelings and opinions are completely and absolutely irrelevant. If we find that she did do the deed, then yes, the victim's family's opinion should be considered, along with her moral conduct and danger to society when deciding whether she should go back to jail. But even in this case, I believe that the larger interests of society in the administration of justice should be accorded greater weight than either of those considerations.
I agree that the article was one-sided and manipulative. But telling the family's feelings would have been doubly manipulative and wouldn't tell the other side of the story which is not the impact on the victims but the evidence for her guilt. What was missing were the facts of the case and whether the judgment was fair in light of what we know now. I believe if she is guilty of the crime (and we don't know how "horrible" the crime was either), she should go back to prison. Whether she is a church going grandma or a skid row crack whore, or whether the family forgives her or wants her to fry in the electric chair, should be of minor import. Justice, as much as tabloid journalism would have us believe otherwise, is not all about the perpetrator, nor is it all about victim, but about fairness.
I do believe, in the US at least, you can waive your right to trial by jury, and just have a judge rule on the case (I'm not sure if the prosecution can demand a trial by jury however. IANAL). Doesn't happen much though, because defense lawyers have a much harder time swaying a judge with bullshit than they do a jury.
but that takes some really... interesting thinking to claim that murder is somehow forgivable.
Yes, Jesus was an interesting person.
There are two arguments for prisons: punitive and preventative.
Regarding the second, preventative, it is fairly clear that locking this woman away would not prevent any further crimes - she has not done anything in criminal (apparently) in over 30 years. There would be societal benefit to putting her away.
Further, if she IS innocent and wrongly charged (as she claims), then there's no reason to put her away at all. If she is guilty, she has proven that it was a mistake that she will not repeat, so no one is in danger because of her being free.
Regarding the first, purely punitive, then you are right, but I would argue that punitive prisons are a backwards notion that does not serve society in any way - this is essentially societal revenge, which does not sound like a reasonable way for society to exist. There is such a thing as forgive and forget - but ONLY if it is clear that the person will not do it again. People make mistakes, people can get crazy, and people can be wrongly tried. If it's clear that the person is no longer a threat to society, then (this is not a rhetorical question) what is the point of locking them up? Who does it benefit?
Considering she hasn't killed anyone in the time she's been out, I think they should consider the possibility that she is not a danger to society and change the conviction to manslaughter with credit for time served.
Good job. We caught her. Now let it drop.
Why isn't it called murder when the president slaughters people? Every single president we've had has killed at least 1 person. Yet they roam free and give speeches and get applause.
That's a hell of a double standard there.
You're nothing; like me.
maybe whacking an evil abusive husband is ok? I don't have a problem with that....
"A man is not innocent simply because he has never had the chance to steal." And, if I may point out a fundamental hypocrisy, you're also externalizing our domestic problems. The story here was about Homeland Security. Personally, I'm more concerned that our federal government has created a database to guard against foreign threats and is now using it to enforce domestic laws. If you want to blame that on the Mexicans, feel free, but refrain from criticizing those whom "refuse to fix the corruption and anarchy that's causing [the problem]."
Yes but don't you see the problem, "It was a crime she didn't commit!"
Duh!
No sig for you!!
wasn't supposed to be into domestic law enforcement.
that WAS the line we were given, pre-patriot act.
Right, because murderers are known to constantly plead 'guilty', and in no way, shape, or form try to deny it in the slightest.
If she was framed and actually is innocent, that sucks and all. Unfortunately, the judicial system is all that we've got, and if that system thought she wasn't framed, there's not much that can be done. Perhaps after this many years, I could see them reaching a middle-ground of sorts, in that there be a second hearing. With new technologies and techniques... if she is still found to be guilty, back in the slammer. If she DOES turn out to be innocent, then the system can pay her whatever they pay for someone unjustly imprisoned for several years.
It'd be win-win. On one side... murderer goes back to jail. On the other side, if she's innocent, she gets compensation. The system can't afford to start making exceptions when a guilty person escapes prison and they just decide... eh... let 'em go. When you get to that point, you might as well just do away with the entire judicial system. Either everyone who escapes prison is thrown back in when caught, or you'll have a MASSIVE grey-zone of people pleading that they should be 'left free' after they escape.
And there WOULD be a ton more escape attempts if it became known that the system will just let people stay free.
Planet Zebeth - Metroid with a twist
Justice without compassion is worse than no justice at all.
I'm sure this woman has spent the last 35 years looking over her shoulder looking to see if they were coming to get her. Now they're coming and they're going to wreck her family.
No sig today...
While I agree with you that the AVERAGE person will murder while in a rage, there are plenty of ppl who have absolutely no respect for life. They will lie, cheat, steal, and Murder. It will occur over and over. Somebody who kills in cold blood, that is plans it out, or simply runs out and kills a stranger, should be locked up for life. But somebody who blows up and kills a mean spouse is not likely to do it again.
Personally, I would like to see the rates changed for white collar crimes. Something like murder, or doing crack, then jail sentances will not deter them. But most white collar crime (theft of the job; bribery of politicians; tax evasion; etc) would stop if everybody KNEW that they might get a 30 year sentence.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
+1 insightful ... if I had the mod points.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Murder is not OK. But people do get imprisoned for crimes they did not commit, which is not OK either. So how sure are you that she's really guilty?
1) She's managed to stay fairly clean for 35 years, unless further digging shows she has actually committed more crimes during that period.
1.1) In absence of evidence of her committing crimes, I doubt she has killed anyone (else?) in the 35 years, so she's not really a danger to anyone, even IF she really did kill her husband.
2) Putting her in jail isn't going to bring back the dead.
Possible benefits of jailing her:
a) It might discourage people from killing someone, then somehow escaping and not kill or commit any further crimes for as long as they live in hope that they get an amnesty. And then relatives of the murdered try to find and kill the murderer and do the same thing... Repeat, rinse etc. Then law and order start to break down. Might be a bit of stretch, depending on how well the cops etc work in practice.
b) Benefits the relatives and friends of the murdered person, in terms of satisfying their desire for vengeance and justice.
So maybe let her do an appeal based on new "evidence": "I couldn't have killed him, since I'm 'provably' not a murdering sort of person".
If the old evidence/records are still around, and it still seems like she did it, then back to prison it is, unless you'd like more potential for mercy: maybe she gets to go free if _all_ the close relatives, and maybe "known best friend(s)" of the murdered decide she should go free by a secret and anonymous ballot. The system could premptively get their votes (before sentencing) in case they die early or something... And allow them to change it years later in case of such an appeal.
Guess I better find all those unpaid parking tickets, eh?
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
Every woman who kills her boyfriend/husband says it was because he was abusive.
"Rather then attempt to clear her name shed escaped from jail and started a new life - a felony in itself."
this might (or not) have to do with the diminished access to appeals that have been relatively recent policies in federal facilities and most states.
it can't be denied that a lot of self-represented claims have no apparent merit, but it is still the only right way to get out of jail, and <blink>some </blink> of the appellants' claims are inevitably true, they shouldn't be denied access to due process.
since she hasn't killed anyone else.
Completely batshit irrelevant: she did the crime but did not serve the time. Why don't you give me your address so I can come visit your house with a baseball bat and break your kneecaps. Then I'll promise to never do it again, and don't. So no harm no foul right?
First of all, the GGP post mentioned lost civil liberties — in plural. You listed only one candidate. Bad.
And your candidate does not qualify — even if this is a privacy loss to begin with (nobody is peering into your window), you had it only because of the past logistical challenges in accumulating and storing all this information. The difficulties, which Lexis-Nexis was successfully overcoming, BTW — for many years.
You did not lose it today. You lost it, when income tax was established — and with it the need to keep track of people's income. Bank accounts must have an SSN associated with the holder (unless not a US-citizen) — and report it to the government... Most of the government's information about you comes from those sources (unless you were ever subject to a law-enforcement investigation). It used to be harder for the government agents to access/use that information, and now it is easier. But it was always legal. And when it was not — such as sharing information between CIA and FBI — it contributed to substantial unpleasantries, which lead people to think, the privacy gain was not worse the loss of life.
The fate of a grandmother is always emotionally appealing — most people have a soft spot for the elderly. But the fact remains — the database helped catch a convicted murderer...
I too hate to present IDs when traveling by train or air, but I know better, than to blame the current government.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
The goal of prison is rehabilitation. I hear that all the time. Are you claiming that the actual reason we use prison is punishment?
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
...And I would have gotten away with it if it wasn't for you meddling dataminers.
The standard in the U.S. is "quilt beyond a reasonable doubt."
The jury has to make a decision based on the evidence before the court. Not what the lab technician of 2007 can retrieve from a sample stored in 1985.
Man bites dog is news. Dog bites man is not.
How many prisoners serving time for rape or murder will ever see their convictions overturned on new DNA evidence? How many are praying right now that testing won't link them to other crimes?
O.J. won because a critical witness and piece of evidence [the glove] was successfully impeached. There are lessons here for the prosecutor.
Leather shrinks. The witness caught in a string of lies irrelevant to the case losesa all credibility. You can't blame the jury.
The goal of prison is rehabilitation. I hear that all the time. Are you claiming that the actual reason we use prison is punishment?
It's both, you incompetent twat. Where is that address? I'd like to see if your views on punishment stay the same when you're rolling around on the ground screaming in pain.
35 years? And I thought *I* wrote bad SQL... Check your query plan for table scans!
The standard in the U.S. is "quilt beyond a reasonable doubt."
Yeah, no fancy blankets for you if you have any doubts.
Obviously "Oz" is fiction, but I think there's a pretty good point you are making: that "3 in 100,000" was the average for all prisons, juvenile facilities and all -- but the hardest prisons may have significantly higher rates (I'm thinking federal, maximum security, and such). Have no data points on this, though.
>Why isn't it called murder when the president slaughters people?
Because most rational and intelligent people understand the difference between killing and murder. Sorry you don't have the intellectual capacity to fit into the rational and intelligent category.
If I terminate your life while you are attempting to shoot children on a playground, that is killing in defense of others.
If I terminate your life because you are suffering horribly from terminal cancer, that is killing for mercy.
If I terminate your life after buying a big life insurance policy on you, that is murder.
Actually, she doesn't deserve to be in jail.
You may think I'm crazy for saying that, of course, but I'm not a fan of the retributive concept of "justice" that countries like the USA use. For me, prison has two functions, and none beyond these: 1) keep society safe from those criminals who're actually dangerous; 2) reeducate criminals for the purpose of enabling them to function as productive members of society again.
Now look at this case. 1) Is it necessary to put her in jail to keep society safe? No; she's been living for 35 years without doing anything, and possibly never was a threat at all, depending on whether she was indeed rightfully convicted or not (something I naturally can't comment on). 2) Is is necessary to reeducate her? No; she's already become a productive member of society again.
Therefore, putting her in jail is counterproductive and wrong - QED. Unless, of course, one believes in using prison to take revenge on people, but that's not something I do (although I do realise I'd probably be in the minority if I lived in the USA).
Unlawful search and seizure -- this is information they couldn't have aggregated and searched via normal means
Rights not expressly given to the federal government and state are reserved for the people -- things such as having databases that CONTINUALLY scan all of my information to try and link it up with new activity to find criminals, and continually check to make sure that I'm not stepping over the line. To me, that's being secure in one's own home and life, being secure in their freedom and liberty, knowing what evidence/techniques that law enforcement uses to put marks on my record, hell keeping a record of all my activities for review.
I doubt that many people would argue that McCarthyism infringed only on one or two civil liberties -- the people he targeted had many hard to define, nearly intangible civil liberties lost that they did not know they had lost until the accusations and trials started kicking up. This database seems to be on the road to the same thing -- a file on everyone, always present, always being monitored. You better not have done anything sordid, ever, Timmy otherwise your ours when we decide to make it so.
And didn't speak out, for I was not a felon.
One of the problems I have with so called homeland security laws is the application of extraordinary powers of investigation collecting evidence to prosecute pedestrian offenses. Forget the Fourth Amendment. They bug your computer because they claim you are contacting your terrorist conspirators and only discover your MP3 collection. Then they phone up their RIAA buddies.
Well according to the WhiteHouse http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/homeland/, the Dept of Homeland Security has terrorism as it's primary focus (at least that's how it's justified). However, their org chart http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/DHS_OrgChart.pdf shows they over arch quite a few agencies that don't really have anything to do with terrorism.
So murderers and rapists should just be able to go free if they can, and this is somehow a check against the injustice of the system as a whole? The very notion that the Mexican prison system's turning a blind eye to escapees as some kind of solution to overcrowding or a fundamentally flawed justice system is ludicrous. Though it's interesting to us living on this side of that border, I wouldn't want our system in the States to follow suit.
The woman in TFA was convicted of murder, and that's a serious offense. If she didn't want to spend her life paying for someone else's crime, she should've tried an appeal instead. That's why we have them.
It's true I tell you, feller at work's next door neighbour read it in the paper.
1/3 of jokes get modded OT. If you get the joke, mod 1 in 3 insightful/interesting/underrated to restore karma balance.
The lady was not searched (before being caught), and nothing was seized...
Yes, of course they could! By buying it from Lexis-Nexis, for example. Better yet — from the tax-records and bank-reports. I'm pretty certain, you would dismiss people opposed to income tax as "lunatics", but the problems you are so angry about started, when the tax was introduced (in 1913) — and with it the need to track everybody's income...
In general, it is not illegal to know (and record!) things about someone else. "Information wants to be free," — remember? Just ask a paparazzi...
But you mentioned civil liberties — in plural. Care to offer another candidate?
The rest of your response is political, rather than legal, so I'll ignore it.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Someone has to decide guilt or innocence. What do you propose?
Prison is also supposed to serve as a disincentive to others to commit the same crime. If I start seeing more and more people around me committing murder and getting away with it, I might start working on my own "little list"...
deus does not exist but if he does
That may be true, but why would Apple care about that? Apple exists to make money, not to hurt MS.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
"now catching little 'ol grandmas "
She is merely a murderer who got old. Her grandmotherliness is irrelevant.
I don't murder anyone, and I don't have a reason to care how much of my life the government knows about. If anything, what they find would constitute a recommendation for a job. Considering domestic criminals are a far greater threat to me than terrorists I favor data mining to catch them. Every interaction with other people where someone is identified is a chance to catch criminals.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Stealing music is worse than terrorism. If I recall correctly, the RIAA estimated damage to our economy runs around 100 trillion USD/year due to piracy.
Obama likes poor people so much, he wants to make more of them.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Last time i looked, in Indiana, yes there is additional punishment for escaping.
Oddly enough, this woman led a seemingly normal crime free life for 35 years. Perhaps she was innocent in the beginning like she claims, as its really hard for a criminal to go cold turkey.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
The story of Jean Valjean predates this story by centuries.
Because most rational and intelligent people understand the difference between killing and murder. Sorry you don't have the intellectual capacity to fit into the rational and intelligent category.
If I terminate your life while you are attempting to shoot children on a playground, that is killing in defense of others.
OK, but odds are if you were found by the police with a gun around a playground with that intent, you would probably end up in jail.
If I terminate your life because you are suffering horribly from terminal cancer, that is killing for mercy.
That is illegal in 48 or 49 states in the US.
If I terminate your life after buying a big life insurance policy on you, that is murder.
That is also a very small minority of murders.
Yes, there is a difference between killing and murder. Also, most presidents are at most guilty of conspiracy to commit murder or similar, not direct murder.
I'm a little strange in that I kinda think murder should be legal. There are too many people on the planet, so why is culling the herd a bad thing?
Bear with me. Most murders are dumb. Its usually one lowlife knocking off another. I say make it legal to knock off the surviving lowlife and get on with it.
Serial murders are very rare, and no law is going to stop a serial murderer. I say knock them off and get on with it.
Many other murders are within families. That one is more difficult, but again, no law is going to stop such a thing.
Keep in mind that all murders are not created equal as it stands. Murdering a policeman or an elected government official is a different crime than your standard killing and ditching of a prostitute. There is also manslaughter, where it was not the intent to kill someone, but it happens.
Personally, I would not feel any less safe if murder was not illegal. Would you? If so, maybe you should change your lifestyle.
"So basically you are saying murder is OK."
Of course murder is ok in fact it's institutionalised in the US, have you not heard of the death penalty?
Sounds to me this woman whacked her hubby, he may or may not have deserved it. Either way she escaped 35yrs ago and has proven she can refrain from whacking a different hubby long enough to produce grandkids. The authorities had long ago stopped searching for a dangerous felon, they caught her by 'accident' with a system H.G.Wells might have imagined. Giving this woman anything more than a slap on the wrist is not justice it's instiuional revenge, OTHOH 'the law is an ass' and since the US is so fond of the death penalty it would seem revenge is also OK.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
... this massive database that spies deeply into our lives...
Yes, deeply intrusive data like our social security numbers and dates of birth. My God can you imagine any legitimate reason why the government should have such sensitive data?
Seriously, why is this such a huge deal. The woman was a fugitive, the government was looking for her, and they found her. I don't care if it's the DHS, FBI, or freakin' local sheriff. She was CONVICTED of murder. People are clearly ignoring the "until proven guilty" part of that famous phrase.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Think of all of the NEW business, all in the name of catching them terrorists!
New 'customers' (AKA inmates) all lined up for the privatized jail system.
Each of those people who unknowingly aided and abetted a convicted and escaped felon for 35 years?
And those lawyers fee$ and all that wonderful free Federal grant money for wall-to-wall jail$.
Maybe, after all these years, her case will get a proper review?
RR
A U.S. article about it is here. ahref=http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/22/us/22lam.htmlrel=url2html-29406http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/22/us/22lam.html>
If I terminate your life after buying a big life insurance policy on you, that is murder.
So what is it called if I kill 10,000 people I don't even know to get at one that I hate? How about if I hire others to do the killing? How about if I didn't really know that one person either but needed someone to blame?
In other words, given that we have no evidence that Iraq was any sort of threat at all, it becomes murder rather than self defense. Just like if you shoot someone breaaking into your house only to realise later that he was your neighbor and was actually entering his own home. You won't get away with a simple "ooops!".
The act of catching a murderer for a crime committed many years ago and putting them in prison is not an act of revenge. It's an act of punishment designed in such a way as not to have a statute of limitations; that in turn is meant to make it a very powerful deterrent against murder. People everywhere tend to agree that murder is a very bad thing and should be punished very harshly as a warning to others.
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3) Deterrence.
I don't understand how it is that we get a story like this, set in Middle America ... reported by an English newspaper. Isn't there something just a little suspicious there? Or is it just too small a story for the USA papers to bother with? Or is Dept. of Homeland Security controlling the US press ... back in a minute, there's a knock at the doo .......
Don't blame me, it's usually 2 in the morning when I post
I apologize in advance for being somewhat of an apologist for the previous poster, as you make some good arguments.
While it can be said fairly that he had used the word liberties when he only had the singular liberty in mind, that doesn't mean that the statement is not true.
Loss of privacy is usually the first step towards the loss of essential liberty. Which is the progressive loss of all liberties. Hence, the statement stands as written.
The explanation:
Privacy ensures that the state doesn't take too much power, because as privacy moves closer to zero and a government's information on its citizens increases towards infinite any reason to bring anyone in on charges can be trumped up. Basically, the less privacy there is, the more likely you are guilty of something, anything, even trivial stuff. At that point, all that has to happen for an incarceration is for a person to say the wrong thing to the wrong person, or be in the wrong place in the wrong time. That equates to loss of freedom of speech and the loss of the ability to move about freely. And that's just two examples.
cat sig >
No, actually, that's not true. Charging you is not enough to bring you in. The government also has to persuade a jury of your peers, and it is not easy. For example, the government knows a lot about the mafia bosses, but locking them up (for very real crimes) continues to be very difficult.
Now, when those thugs do go to prison, quite often it is not for extortions and murders, but for "benign" things like tax evasion.
Which brings me back to what I used to rebut that single argument regarding the loss of the liberty of privacy, which we supposedly lost in exchange for the database in subject... The privacy (from the government) was lost shortly after 1913, when the Constitutional Amendment allowing Congress too levy income taxes was passed, and — naturally — the need to track everybody's income along with it.
We did not lose our privacy to Bush — it happened a long time ago. If Bush's DHS manages to use this information to catch up on some "cold" cases, that's the crappy nickel lining to the dark cloud, that our ancestors invited upon their heads in order to be able to finance America's participation in World War I.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.