Best and worst crimes for employment?

[Eddie Teach]

I'm working on her side, so not really evil. Pro bono I might add, though hardly by choice.  The major partner I do work for is helping her out as a freebee to the airline she works for, a major client. He's "volunteered" me.

He's a mover and shaker, it's a joy to see him at work even when I'm the butt (sort of). Two days ago, he invites me out for lunch and flatters me totally - asks me my opinion on how to change the department, on what is wrong with our corporate culture, saying he thinks I have a rare talent and I'm underused. The next day, he gives me this pro bono file to do for him. Message is clear - he'll protect me in the department, and I will do the stuff he hasn't time for.  He pleases his major client for the price of some words and lunch. Not that I think he's insencere - he does use me on some very major files.

He has a very rare gift, of manipulating others to do things his way and putting them in his debt by doing it, without angering them by the manipulation. He does this by being totally open and honest in a way.

It's a gift I've seen him use in negotiations with others time and time again. He's not the most intellectual guy in the firm, but he gets stuff done more than anyone I've ever known. Clients who pay his fees are getting their money's worth. I sincerely hope to learn even a little from him - not about the law, which I can learn on my own, but how to get stuff done. I hope it isn't simply an inborn talent.

Malthus and boss?

[dps]

Today in Pressing Charges: A mentally retarded 62 y.o woman attempts to steal $4.39 of pork rinds from Food Lion, Inc. The rinds are recovered.  The police are called, a citation is issued, counsel is appointed, and a court date is set.

What do you think the optimal resolution would have been?

Take back the rinds, eject her from the store.  A formal ban would be appropriate for someone with capacity to understand it, otherwise put her on the unofficial "kick out of store" list.

The amount of money the taxpayers of N.C. are going to pay isn't negligible.  State-paid cops cite her, a state-paid bailiff gives her the affidavit of indigency form, a state-paid PD is appointed, spends time talking to her caretakers, then negotiates with the state-paid ADA in the state-funded courtroom in front of the state-paid judge, with the ultimate resolution being a dismissal one way or another.

Here's the $4.39 question - does she have a record of similar offences?

To me, the question is did the management of  the store know that she was mentally retarded to such a degree that should couldn't be tried?  If they knew, then simply taking back the pork rinds and kicding her out would have been the best play (assuming that she didn't get violent or anything of that nature, which it would appear she didn't).  If they didn't know, they did the right thing in calling the police IMO.

[crazy canuck]

Seem a good time for policy to exercise a little discretion....

[Barrister]

To me, the question is did the management of  the store know that she was mentally retarded to such a degree that should couldn't be tried?  If they knew, then simply taking back the pork rinds and kicding her out would have been the best play (assuming that she didn't get violent or anything of that nature, which it would appear she didn't).  If they didn't know, they did the right thing in calling the police IMO.

I don't know about law in your jurisdiction.

Here, 'mental retardation' will rarely qualify you as NCRMD (not criminally responsible by reason of mental defect).  Hell my 2 year old has okay notions of ownership.  I've worked with some pretty profoundly afflicted people, and they know you can't take items from a store without paying for them.

Putting this on the store is bullshit.  Of course they should call the cops.  You're dealing with a LPO earning close to minimum wage.  They are not going to be making a whole lot of nuanced decisions based on public policy.

Once the cops are called... Well this gets back to my original question.  Mental issues, first time offender... why the hell does the system care?  Should be withdrawn, no problem.

But someone with mental issues who repeatedly shoplifts?  Then there's a place for the ciminal justice system.  That doesn't mean jail, necessarily.  But something needs to be done.

[Martinus]

Today in Pressing Charges: A mentally retarded 62 y.o woman attempts to steal $4.39 of pork rinds from Food Lion, Inc. The rinds are recovered.  The police are called, a citation is issued, counsel is appointed, and a court date is set.

What do you think the optimal resolution would have been?

Take back the rinds, eject her from the store.  A formal ban would be appropriate for someone with capacity to understand it, otherwise put her on the unofficial "kick out of store" list.

The amount of money the taxpayers of N.C. are going to pay isn't negligible.  State-paid cops cite her, a state-paid bailiff gives her the affidavit of indigency form, a state-paid PD is appointed, spends time talking to her caretakers, then negotiates with the state-paid ADA in the state-funded courtroom in front of the state-paid judge, with the ultimate resolution being a dismissal one way or another.

Here's the $4.39 question - does she have a record of similar offences?

To me, the question is did the management of  the store know that she was mentally retarded to such a degree that should couldn't be tried?  If they knew, then simply taking back the pork rinds and kicding her out would have been the best play (assuming that she didn't get violent or anything of that nature, which it would appear she didn't).  If they didn't know, they did the right thing in calling the police IMO.

Ever since Reagan dismantled the US public mental health care system, you need to lock up the mentally ill in prisons. If it was good for 18th century England, it is good for the US.

[Ideologue]

But just remember, the use of the state by corporations and rich people is exactly proportional to that of poor people.

Proportional to what?  Income or lives?

I'm having some difficulty parsing what you mean by "proportional... to lives."

[OttoVonBismarck]

Marti, not sure how you blame mental health on Reagan. That shit started in the 70s as part of a liberal movement in America aimed to restore the "rights" of the mentally ill. Psychiatric hospitals were dramatically de-emphasized because they were seen as "institutionalizing" sick people, and now are mostly only used to house the most extreme cases and the criminally insane. Because the States have basically stopped building new psych hospitals most of them are 50% or more filled with criminal court patients who they have to house, making beds for those who haven't already committed crimes nearly impossible to get.

The liberals who hated psychiatric institutions insisted group homes were the way to go, and yeah for many mental patients a group home is a much better place than a psychiatric hospital. Unfortunately the group home system isn't set up to keep people there who do not want to be there, and group homes have rules. Many people with serious mental illness have serious problems with those rules (no alcohol, no drug use etc), so they refuse to stay in the group home and refuse treatment. Basically achieving what the liberals of the 1970s wanted--mentally ill people having the "freedom" to decide to devolve into untreated and unmedicated insanity.

That's fine for the mostly harmless schizophrenics or manic-depressives who can eke out a minimal existence in society unmedicated, but for the rare person who is deeply mentally disturbed this liberalization of mental health made it a lot harder to get those people committed. Before the 70s, a psychiatrist could basically have anyone committed at least for awhile. This was seen as being too much power, so now they have to explicitly believe someone is an imminent danger to themselves or others to get them committed. Even that decision has to immediately be reviewed by a mental health commissioner and a judicial authority in many jurisdictions. In the 70s a guy like James Holmes would've been taken to the hospital after his first therapy session, but Reagan isn't to blame for why he wasn't.

[The Brain]

Needs moar dino.

[garbon]

I don't see an issue with that. Psychiatrists really can't be trusted to have much if any power.

[CountDeMoney]

Marti, not sure how you blame mental health on Reagan. That shit started in the 70s as part of a liberal movement in America aimed to restore the "rights" of the mentally ill.

It actually goes farther back than that, to Kennedy and the various deinstitutionalization bills his administration passed.

And while I thoroughly enjoy the Hansyesque hyperbole, the heightened awareness of the 70s wasn't so much for the "rights" of the mentally ill as continuing to address the "wrongs" of dysfunctional long-term institutionalization that was really ramped up by Kennedy and Johnson; so you should be satisfied enough with bashing them over that.

[Capetan Mihali]

It really goes back to the development of Thorazine and the other first-generation anti-psychotics in the mid-50s, which allowed schizophrenia to be controlled with a medication regime.

[Admiral Yi]

But just remember, the use of the state by corporations and rich people is exactly proportional to that of poor people.

Proportional to what?  Income or lives?

I'm having some difficulty parsing what you mean by "proportional... to lives."

Your statement can be interpreted in one of two ways.  Adding in the obvious irony, it could be interpreted to mean that rich people consume more government services on a per capita basis than a poor person.  Or it could be interpreted to mean that a rich person consumes government services disproportionately for every dollar of his income and/or wealth. 

I think most people would agree more or less with the first interpretation (although counterarguments could be made about per capita consumption of law enforcement and justice).  But taking that as given doesn't advance the progressivity argument, which is what you're aiming at.  If you're going to argue progressivity on a consumption of public services argument, you need to demonstrate that each dollar the rich man earns consumes more public services than a dollar a poor man earns.

Actually we've had this discussion before; you tried to do something with shipping or ports IIRC.  I have no burning desire to go through it all again but I can't let you just throw out your statement as if it's axiomatic.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Part of the nice thing about the old mental health regime is if a psychiatrist just thought you were "too weird" you would get locked up. That would probably have taken care of dudes like Jared Loughner and James Holmes.

It'd have the downside of also resulting in people like Lettow and Raz being locked up as well...oh wait...what was the downside again?

[Razgovory]

Part of the nice thing about the old mental health regime is if a psychiatrist just thought you were "too weird" you would get locked up. That would probably have taken care of dudes like Jared Loughner and James Holmes.

It'd have the downside of also resulting in people like Lettow and Raz being locked up as well...oh wait...what was the downside again?

It was also a good way of getting rid of drunks.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Indigent drunks you mean. Wealthy drunks don't pass out on the street wearing rags. On the rarer occasion a member of polite society got too drunk in public the authorities were primarily concerned with getting them home safely so they could sleep it off. Chronic drunks on the street were a good target for institutionalization sure.