Just Deserts

Jelly-filled guerdons with a dredge of solatium.

There will never be a perfect slice of restitution.

Drawing upon the criminal justice system as a half-baked sample, murder, while a certifiably grave offence, is multifaceted. Punishment should be delivered on a case-by-case basis.

The accused who kills according to self-defence or by accident naturally should be assessed differently than the one who had no justifiable reason or to settle on the grounds of vigilantism.

The most pertinent message to glean is illuminating the perpetual cycle of corruption in prison systems not exclusive to America.

It is unconscionable that a system intended to rehabilitate and reintegrate enforces the opposite of a cruel jest wherein those released are welcomed to the beginning of a sinister cycle that results in the prison becoming their permanent residence without the precedence of a life sentence.

Making it difficult to nigh impossible for convicts to get hired and/or acquire housing. It’s to send a clear message that if you make one mistake, commit one crime, regardless of how petty, your “comeuppance” lasts a lifetime.

The system is a paradox designed to increase recidivism.

Vagrancy and psychosis are the only other options.

Not necessarily in that order.

Steady conviction is that the death sentence should only be delivered unto those who, after a certain period of thorough observation, if evincing chronic behaviour of a hostile nature (e.g., initiating fights, smuggling drugs or contraband, attempted homicide of other inmates, and other acts of harassment), if showing little to no signs of behavioural correction/improvement, effectively deeming the inmate unfit to be molded back into society, demonstrating as an evident, unrelenting threat, only then should execution be considered.

Inb4 “no redemption arc” analogy.

Notwithstanding that SHU only exacerbates the issue when abused, which it often is. Isolation deals further damage, possibly irreparable, which is counterproductive towards the motive of rehabilitation.

Even worse when dealt as penalty to 187s.

Abuse may stem partially from the twisted idea of administration believing that inmates can be reshaped into a persona of their choosing. A form of unethical experimentation in the vein of trepanation/lobotomy.

Perhaps, what also occurs in the psych ward.

All the while, the excessive duration of stay they impose on what should be no more than a week in sequestration is ultimately birthing a near total loss in ability to function. If not being a stimulant for existing thoughts of ill will.

Prisoners are wrongfully treated as inhuman because it is easy for administration to merge all crimes into a single checkbox.

What’s valuable to them is numbers.

Statistics.

Illusions of efficient law enforcement, “protecting the land and its people”.

Nothing more than a quota to fill.

During investigation, the flashlight barely skims across the purview of backstories. Only focusing on just enough convincing ‘evidence’ to close a case. The only compelling stories are ones where the defendant is declared guilty.

Innocence seldom yields a merry crowd.

Humans are driven by strong emotion. They crave for something to fight for, to spur them to action, to give them purpose, only when it doesn’t affect them personally, and who better but the legal system, id est police, politicians, and their indoctrinated citizens to offer irresistible samples of untruths.

To perform on a stage where those lies become so hypnotic in presentation that everyone improvises to the point of forgetting that the revelation of truth was supposed to be the final act.

They forget that those gyves, that cell and the guilt inside, were just props for an actor.