How bad could jail be?

[SmileyRose]

I'm on jury duty this week. I've been in the "pool" about every 18 months for the 25 years I've lived here. Never before selected.

Until today.

It's an old man - he took a waterblaster into a bank and handed the teller a stick up note. He put the watergun on the counter and sat down and waited for police. He apologized to everyone for causing a fuss, the security guard went and got him a chair while they waited.

His wife died 2 years ago. He has no kids. He has cancer. The medical bills are piling up and he can't take care of himself anymore. He can't afford to hire someone, can't afford assisted living, can't even really afford the medicare premiums - leave a fair portion of the bills for him to pay.

He said he spent weeks thinking about suicide. But decided 3 squares, a roof and medical care in jail was preferable. The only reason it was a jury trial is because a previous judge ruled with the man's attorney that he's not competent plead guilty or make decisions about how his legal team should proceed. So some court somewhere decided he would get a jury trial. They could not stop him from standing up and insisting he have a chance to take the stand.

It was obvious his mind is just fine. Loneliness and poverty are not equal to insanity. The last thing he said before he went back to his seat is "I'm dying, how bad could jail be?"

We found him guilty. The judge gave him the max - 5 years. It's long enough to make sure he's taken care of until he dies. I cried in my car for a full 10 minutes before I could even think about driving home.


I don't even know if I have enough of me to care about one more person. My life is overloaded beyond even what I could imagine right now. But somehow I'm going to visit that man as often as I can.

[Skittles]

1. *sniff*

:cry:

[flvegan]

2. He wasn't competent to plead, but he was competent to stand trial?

Richest country (allegedly) in the world, and we can't take care of our poor, our senior citizens, our veterans.

The shame.

[Richard Steele]

4. Shame is the word for it. nm

[SmileyRose]

10. I up in the middle of the night

trying to figure out if I was crying for him or for me.

I felt embarrassed for my community, my state, my country - myself.
And also thought - there but for the grace of god go I.

Anyone who spends a lifetime working to put wealth in some stockholder's pocket deserves better.

[Fire1]

52. I've got to bookmark this piece. Tears came to my eyes and

I'm not sure if it's because of the callousness of this country or him. I think it's both.:cry:

[seemunkee]

94. ..

It was once said that the moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped.
- Hubert H. Humphrey

If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.
- John F. Kennedy, inaugural address, January 20, 1961

[Tangerine LaBamba]

3. Bless you .........

This happened in our America.

You should write this up - just as it is - and send it to President Obama.

And to your local newspaper.

And to your Senators and Congressman.

And to Howard Dean.

And to Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow.

Bless your heart. I have tears in my eyes, but at least he'll be taken care of. If you can get his address, find out if he'd like to have mail. I'd certainly write to him. I'm sure others here at DU would, too.

In our America.

K&R.............................

[OffWithTheirHeads]

5. Ive been in jail. I've been broke and alone.

I'll take jail. What a fucked up society we live in where jail is preferable to the street.

[Downwinder]

79. Jail is better than a nursing home.

At least you come up for parole, it's not an indefinite life sentence.

[Selatius]

6. This country sucks for the poor. This nation has never really looked out for its weak and helpless.

This nation crushes poor people. It says that you should pull yourself up by the bootstraps, but the rules put in place are opposed to that. It's as if the system was erected to keep people poor once they are pushed into poverty.

[DUlover2909]

58. The system seems to assume that everyone is middle class.

Everyone graduated from high school, had parents that set aside money to help with a down payment on a house, has a car, a job, and great health. When I was down on my luck I would get quizzical looks from people because I didn't just have an extra couple of thousand dollars lying around to do this or that or solve some dilemma.

[Mind_your_head]

7. You're a good woman Rose.....

caught up in a terrible time....like many of us.

-----

Not meant for you, SmileyRose, but for other "watchers"....

How 'bad' can it be, when socialized prison is a better offering than THE BEST HEALTHCARE SYSTEM "IN THE WORLD" wHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE...................................

[knowbody0]

8. is there anyway we could make his life inside better?

like get him some warm longjohns, money for the commisary?

[SmileyRose]

12. I will let you all know.

it just happened today. It will take at least a few days to find out where they are going to send him initially.

[cabluedem]

14. He will be going to state prison, which will be better then a county jail. nt

[Art_from_Ark]

22. In Arkansas, at least, the state pens are for the hard-core offenders

The county jails are for the people who commit misdemeanors and minor felonies. I would think that the state pen would be far worse, at least in Arkansas.

[Ex Lurker]

100. it depends

county lockups often have some fairly hardcore inmates doing their time there, for whatever reason, and then there are the ones awaiting trial. The state prisons are no picnic, but they have more resources and there's usually some semblance of order about who gets thrown in with whom. Not always the case in local jails.

[Alcibiades]

47. Really?

That's odd, in and of itself. Bank robbery is usually a federal rap,especially if it looks as if there is going to be an expensive trial (or, in this case, expensive medical care). Though most folks regard federal crimes as somehow worse, the federal prison system is a much, much better place to be than most state systems, especially if you're someone at a low custody level who has no behavior management issues.

[SmileyRose]

84. No this was federal - but the feds have been buying space outside the federal system.

It's my understanding he will probably be sent to a "lockdown" hospital (that's what the bailiff called it) but God only know where in the country that will be.

[emilyg]

9. When you vist him

give him a big hug. If he'd like mail - I'll write.

[ThomCat]

25. I would like to write to him too if we could get an address for him.

:(

I hope he goes to a minimum security prison. I hope he doesn't go to anyplace too mean or too harsh.

What a horrible situation to be in, to have to contemplate this at the end of his life. :(

Please, if you know how we can get an address for him, please PM me.

[struggle4progress]

11. Some homeless people pull this trick regularly. Cold? Hungry? On the street? Get busted

for shoplifting. At least it's three hots and a cot

[aquart]

23. "Trick"?

Yeah. Real tricky to be that desperate.

[struggle4progress]

28. Semantic quibbles are pointless. The homeless population in my town is a diverse crowd:

some are in dire straits through circumstances entirely beyond their control; some are quite crazy, but you wouldn't know it without really getting to know them, because in other ways they are quite sane; some are very intelligent but have somehow lost their bearings; others function at a borderline level, and communicating with them can be a real challenge; drugs account for some problems; bad relationships account for other problems; sometimes people acquire a habit of playing bullshit games and can't quite figure out how to stop; other people have been so badly abused at certain points in their lives that they have no hope; sometimes the abused recover -- and immediately select a new abuser for their lives

I'm sorry you didn't like the word trick, but perhaps you would have found any of the synonyms -- ploy or gambit or play or move or tactic or any of a thousand other words -- equally offensive. Life on the street poses countless problematic situations, and there is a large collection of survival strategies that people use -- and some people repeatedly use I'm going to jail as the escape. The reasons for this may differ from person-to-person: sometimes there may be real desperation, as you indicate; sometimes, the individual seems to have adopted an institutionalized mind-set and acts as if comfortable only in institutional settings; sometimes, it's hard to understand what is going on. Everybody's different

[aquart]

31. No, I did not like "trick." The "semantic" tone was condescending.

As was the explanation of how the homeless around you are so uniquely different from the homeless everywhere else.

[struggle4progress]

35. ??? I described some people I've met and spoken with repeatedly. Have a nice day.

[wolfgangmo]

68. imply vs. infer

I know you inferred but I am not sure he implied.

[Downwinder]

81. Sounds like a good many of who you describe need medical help. n/t

[ThomCat]

26. Yeah, it's a great "trick."

Get a permanent criminal record in exchange for warmth and bad food. :eyes:

I've been homeless. I didn't have to go that far, thankfully.

You know, for someone who's username implies that you think you're a progressive, your posts Often show a surprising lack of empathy. I hope it's just poor choices of words in your post. I hope you really have more empathy than it seems. :(

[struggle4progress]

30. It's a rabbit you can pull from a hat to keep from being cold and hungry. I don't believe

there could be any excuse for society to regard jail as a substitute for adequate social services -- though your reaction might suggest you think I'm saying that. Nor do I mean to suggest it is the standard response, to be expected from some stereotypical class "homeless people" -- though, again, your reaction might suggest you think I'm saying that

"I didn't know what to do next so now I'm in jail" does seem to occur regularly enough that professionals see it repeatedly. Different people reach that point for different reasons. Sometimes the problem is that a person released from a long period of custodial care hasn't been adequately prepared for non-institutionalized life. Sometimes it's a person with treatable psychiatric problems who can't afford medication. The story in the OP probably isn't unique either: there are probably a number of people who find themselves in a similar position but end up on the street first -- of course, this speaks to the need for universal health care

The point of my post is that there may be more people in comparable situations. And I don't believe that my merely expressing empathy on an anonymous bulletin board would actually do that man a damn bit of good: something else is needed

[Downwinder]

82. In a lot of Repug areas, Jail is a prerequisite for Social Services. n/t

[MercutioATC]

36. I've worked in law enforcement. People do exactly that.

Where I worked (Ohio) they'd do something that would get them locked up in the county jail for 3-6 months...over the winter.

Any more than 6 months got sent to a real prison, so they'd always keep it under that. They got 3 meals a day and a warm bed when the weather got cold.

[wolfgangmo]

66. I used to be a corrections officer

We saw it every winter.

[catrose]

97. This is what I don't get

I hear how prisoners get medical care. My son has been in jail. When he had teeth problems, the dentist told him he could have a filling for $10 or have a tooth pulled for $10. Only 2 choices, except for doing without. When one contact lens tore, he squinted through one eye. When the other one tore, we couldn't get replacements because his prescription was over a year old (because he'd been in jail). The jail said they'd take him to an optometrist for $300, or he could by magnifying lens glasses from the commissary. His previous roommate found a pair of his old glasses under the bed and brought them; so instead of wearing a year-old prescription, he wore a four-year-old prescription. When the frames broke, he taped them together until a local priest took them to be welded back together.

He did seem to have access to pills for depression, but no doctor to supervise.

Is this the difference between jail and prison?

[toadzilla]

98. before I became unemployed, I payed $300 for a tooth filling, with dental insurance.

sounds like a sweet deal to me.

[catrose]

102. Except that he didn't need a filling

and the only other choice was to pull the tooth. The dentist recommended doing nothing in the hopes he could get out soon and have it seen to on the outside.

And he wasn't earning any money and had gone through his savings by then. So I paid for anything he needed.

[Freddie Stubbs]

62. Or they will feign illness to get a hospital stay

[kentuck]

13. What justice we have in this country...

The law is the law. It is all so black and white. There is no room for empathy or compassion. There is even no room for intent. There are no extenuating circumstances. There is no temporary insanity. The law is the law and has absolutely nothing to do with justice...

[Fumesucker]

32. That depend entirely on your social class and position..

If you are poor and powerless then the law is the law.

If you are are rich and/or powerful then apparently there is very little to no law.

Just think telco immunity, retroactively making something legal that was illegal, for the rich and powerful.

And then of course there is the whole torture issue.

[Patiod]

37. Or you could buy a judge for 3 million dollars

and have Justice Roberts, Thomas, Scolia and Alito defend your right to do so

[cboy4]

15. You're a good person.

How sad.

[SmileyRose]

17. OK that made me laugh against my will

I know what you meant - of course.

But please, don't be sad that I'm a good person. :) :)

(I do it all the time)

[cboy4]

19. Argh, another poor choice of wording by cboy

I'm glad you knew what I mean.

But I'm glad it made you smile, since you needed it. :)

[Dogmudgeon]

16. But for such people as you, SmileyRose, the world would not be worth saving

When in an insane place, the best that anyone can do is to be humane. To be human.

You did your best. The crazy won, but you and your peers were able to mitigate some of the pain. That alone is more than I've ever done in my life.

I know you are feeling tapped out right now. I can't really know exactly what you are feeling, but I do know the feeling of moral exhaustion. It will be replaced with something far better -- the kind of wisdom that the world is badly in need of.

You have broken some of the ice in the heart of the world. Even a little bit, every little bit helps.

Courage!

:No_emoticon_really_suffices:

--d!

[Mind_your_head]

18. You know, the other thing that strikes me.....

Is that WE ARE ALL DYING. From the moment that we take our very first breath, our inescapable destiny is in death.....However many grains of sand are in our 'personal hourglass' it just starts slipping away from the moment of our birth.

[SmileyRose]

20. In the 7th grade - in 1960 something or other - they taught me

we grow until we are early 20 - then we begin to die. Humans are supposed to have 40-50 years. Beyond that is thanks to medicine or mutant genetics.

[Mind_your_head]

24. Ah, that's prolly not a "good read" on things Rose....

We ALL have a few good years to make a "statement"/have an impact/influence, all the while trying to maintain balance & family/loyalty.

Sure, there are "nuts on line" who try to confuse and obscure. They are few, but very persistent and convincing to the GULLIBLE.

------

Question to DU'ers in general:

Have you been "gullible" today? (i.e., easily cheated?)

[wolfgangmo]

70. Uhmmm.

I think you need to look at a better authority on human genetics than your 7th grade science teacher. Just sayin.

At age 21 we will have cycled through the last of our juvenile cells {given that the cells of the body replace themselves in total about every 7 years} but that doesn't mean that our genetics are locking into a 50 year life span. Those numbers are more likely a result of the lack of sanitation of a few hundred years ago.

In my family everyone has lived over a hundred on both sides of the family going back 5 generations.

[SmileyRose]

85. Sorry, yes that was tongue in cheek

meant as a comment on how inadequate most of our education is.

[bertman]

76. Smiley Rose, you're a good soul. Thank you for sharing this with us. I'd like to point out that

during the days when Alexander the Great was marching his armies all over the known world, many of the men who served with him were in their 60's. Alexanders' greatest cavalry general, Parmenius, was in his 70's. When you think about the fact that those men marched all over Europe, north Africa, the Middle East, Afghanistan, and into India, through deserts, mountains, and every other obstacle known to mankind, it's mind-boggling to think that many of these people survived and thrived into their sixties and seventies (the ones who weren't slain on the battle fields or who died of disease, of course).

There must be something about natural foods, strenuous exercise, and fresh air that's missing from our environment these days.

[DutchLiberal]

46. You maybe. I'm not planning on it. Just doesn't fit my schedule.

[roody]

21. capitalism.

[Digit]

27. You want to know what is crazy?

I can relate.

[JustinL]

29. heartbreaking

What a disgrace that this kind of desperation exists in a country as wealthy as ours.

[HughBeaumont]

33. Want a better life? COUGH up, suckers, or it's the Big House for YOU!

"How bad can jail be". Hmmmmm, well other than the occasional beating/stabbing/murder/uninvited rape, it's probably no different from working in cubes until they stick you in your grave. :sarcasm:

Duhmerica don't exactly have the greatest track record of taking care of ANYBODY, let alone the infirm elderly. Well, unless you're astoundingly wealthy; then Duh-merica is your oyster!

You probably did the right thing. That guy probably has tons of stories to tell those who are locked down. He may even inspire a few of them before he goes to a better place.

[reggie the dog]

34. what a shitty country

people have to go to jail to get health care. Why not give all people in the US the same care prisoners have?

[Patiod]

38. Your post supportss this ISN'T the greatest country in the world

My SO is a regular, liberal Democrat, the son of a union organizer.

We were watching TV and someone said that this is the "greatest country in the world" and I said "no it's not". My SO was APPALLED. Really, really upset. "Well, where else is better?"

And I said "how about any of the European countries that take better care of their citizens who are poor, old, sick, mentally ill, or otherwise not able to compete in the rat race? Until we do that, we can't claim to be a great country, much less a good one."

The Republicans get a lot of milage out of "I'm Christian" but it's impossible to look at their bible, look at Matthew 19 and 25, and think that you can be both a Republican and a Christian. They are absolutely mutually exclusive. Any person or peoples who don't take care of the poor, old, sick, mentally ill or otherwise not able to compete can't call themselves a great person or great nation or great political party or great anything.

Ugh.

[deaniac21]

39. Medicare would have paid for a nursing home.

[Lugnut]

44. The man didn't need a nursing home.

Medicare will only pay some nursing home costs if the recipient needs skilled nursing care or rehabilitation. This man doesn't appear to qualify.

[deaniac21]

101. He doesn't need someone to take care of him then.

[Lugnut]

104. He's ambulatory and he's ill.

The OP's post mentions assisted living which I'm assuming would be the appropriate situation for him. Medicare won't pay for assisted living care and unless he fits the Medicare criteria they will not pay for skilled nursing home care.

[deaniac21]

107. Whatever you say......Jail will do the trick.

[Vidar]

40. Well done. I detest this country.

[AwakeAtLast]

41. "Going In Style"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079219/

Sad that it is life imitating art. :(

[CrispyQ]

42. America is a harsh, judgmental country.

:hug:

[barbtries]

43. wow.

hardly know what to say. that poor man. that poor, poor man.

[DutchLiberal]

45. I would put him in a Dutch jail. I would never put him in an American jail.

5 years for this? We would give him 2 weeks and a fine. And I'm just fine with that. He didn't go through with it, he apologized, he's in bad health.

[Alcibiades]

48. He's not going to jail, but prison

Jails are county facilities, with the majority of offenders being folks awaiting trial. Prisons are state and federal facilities that mainly house folks who have been convicted (though the federal system itself houses plenty of folks who are pre-trial, for sure, but folks held pretrial are usually more serious offenders).

[DutchLiberal]

49. But you know what I meant, right?

[Alcibiades]

99. The point is, prison treats folks better

than they are treated in "free society," at least when it comes to healthcare. Someone in my family works for the Federal prison system. This is not the first time this has happened.

I have no idea what Dutch prisons are like, but I'm sure that your healthcare system must be much better than the unbelievably shitty system we have.

[zalinda]

51. He WANTED to go to prison

He was dying of cancer and needed health care, and the only way to get it was to go to prison.

zalinda

[Grinchie]

50. Thanks Ronnie Reagan!

Reagan was the one that finally dismantled any sort of health care for people with neuroses, and he dumped them out onto the streets. As this safety net for society was dismantled, it became normal to see people with serious problems wandering the streets.

Fast forward 40 years and we now see an environment that is generating Neursis as a Mass Plague, and there is no system available to help treat it. We are an our own, and Jail is the answer for everything, especially since we can pump them full of Prozac, and the Prison Corporations can squeeze some profits out of the taxpayer.

The legal system is broken, mainly due to the fact that they are not accountable to the costs involved with incarceration. Nobody takes the time to look at alternatives "Because it's not my job". It's time we stopped being such specialists and started being human again.

As far as caring for other people, you start by caring for yourself. No matter how much you'd like to change someone, it is they who need to change. This individual has determined to "Go Home" or withdraw from society of his own free will. This is Societies problem, and Society is paying for it.

The time is coming when the majority of the people are going to question the validity of having three seperate types of Law in America. Criminal, Regulatory, Corporate, and Civil, each totally out of balance and inequitable.

The only real freedom in America is our freedom to make stupid decisions to get us forever mired in the tangled web of legal traps, monetary ponzi schemes, redistribution of our wealth and labor to the rich, and the consequences of poisoning ourselves until we fall ill and die.

You should probably invest more time in being prepared for the day when this whacked out system crumbles under it's own weight.

[motely36]

53. The other day my brother told me that when he retires, he will commit a felony

He's 40. He doesn't believe he will be able to retire otherwise.

[Name removed]

54. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Raster]

56. 'scuse me? This late Boomer (1956) has *NEVER* voted for a rethuglican.

[sasquatch]

57. But the rest of your peers did

[Raster]

59. Bullshit. Plenty didn't.

[VOX]

67. Horse-flop! Do your homework: Gallup: "Democrats Do Best Among Generation Y and Baby Boomers"

http://www.gallup.com/poll/118285/democrats-best-among-generation-baby-boomers.aspx

Democrats Do Best Among Generation Y and Baby Boomers
Republicans do better among Generation X
by Frank Newport
PRINCETON, NJ -- Although Democrats currently enjoy a party identification advantage over Republicans among Americans at every age between 18 to 85, the Democrats' greatest advantages come among those in their 20s and baby boomers in their late 40s and 50s. Republicans, on the other hand, come closest to parity with Democrats among Generation Xers in their late 30s and early 40s and among seniors in their late 60s.

[VOX]

64. Boomers took bullets at Kent State; withstood untold cop beatings; were drafted into Vietnam combat.

And they did this for **you**, all in hopes that a better world might be forged through hard effort.

Yes, some Boomers did sell out, and I damn them all to hell. The Boomers I know are currently tied into jobs like "poverty" law, ER docs, college profs, crap-paying non-profit jobs, etc. -- work that can give some shape, or make some difference against the sad-reality of a continuing reactionary nightmare.

Do NOT make Boomers your target. If you do, you are not only very misguided, but you're judging by the group, a maneuver which is completely at odds with liberal and progressive points of view.

[tucsonlib]

75. Thanks, Vox

I hate the term "Boomer". I'll take "Hippie" any day. Or even "Left-wing extremist". I don't know how many of us "sold out", but I do know this: We marched for civil rights. And we made a difference! We were first to oppose the Vietnam War. And we ended it!
We fought for women's rights and gay rights. We fought for clean air, water and energy.
Today, there are those who would dismiss my generation as a bunch of spoiled, greedy, un-American druggies. Why? Because we dared to question authority. Because we dared to expose our leaders for the hypocrites they were.
Sure, sometimes we were loud, obnoxious and self-righteous. But in the end, history has exonerated us. Why? Because


We Were Right!!


:hippie:

[grantcart]

55. tks for the story look forward to the updates

[Matariki]

60. Please, please, please

send this to your Senators, and Congress person. Send it to the Whitehouse.

Only the dead hearted could read that and not be moved to sympathy. It speaks volumes about the Healthcare issue.

[JuniperLea]

61. All that empathy and $3.55 will get you a cup of coffee...

:hug:

I'm sure this happens a lot these days. I was thinking about it just the other day... so many homeless, nothing to be done, may as well commit a crime and get in out of the heat/rain/snow, and have three meals a day. Even prison food must be better than what you find in the dumpster.

:cry:

It's really mean to put people in this position. Saint Ronald Reagan started this bullshit... and he's honored all the time. Bogus bullshit.

Not that this man did it on purpose, for this reason... but the guy was sure pushed into doing something he clearly didn't have in him to do.

[keepCAblue]

73. And it is going to get worse -- in California -- very soon...

Ronnie Jr., a.k.a., Ahnold Scharzenegger, has proposed state budget cuts that affect, nearly exclusively, the poor, the elderly and the disabled. Der Fuhrer's cuts include:

_ Eliminating Temporary Assistance for Needy Families
_ Ending Healthy Families, California's version of the federal government's State Children's Health Insurance Program
_ Eliminating home care for 404,000 elderly and disabled residents, maintaining care for only 60,000 of the most frail under the In-Home Supportive Services program
_ Reducing child welfare services
_ Reducing the contribution to the AIDS Drug Assistance Program, which provides treatment and prevention for those with HIV/AIDS
_ Phasing out college-fee assistance

I can't stress enough that these budget cuts will directly lead to the deaths of hundreds, perhaps more. In particular, many people with AIDS will no longer be able to afford their anti-viral drugs which typically costs as much as $17,000 a year. Add to that the rising number of PWA who have lost their jobs due to our nation's failed economy -- people who now will no longer have insurance to cover the cost of their medications. The outlook is bleak and Ahnold simply doesn't give a damn. "Let them eat cake..."

[JuniperLea]

74. Yep... the AIDS patients in particular...

Along with others who have serious medical issues that need constant attention, they have all had their heads placed on the chopping block. Ahnold is as clueless as they come.

If the medical and food services are cut, people will die this summer. And those who are frail and survived the summer, will die this winter.

[truedelphi]

63. Bwhew. Tears on my cheeks.

Bless you for promising to visit him.

Maybe we can write him?

What a screwy screwy nation this one is.

I contrast your post with the one I just finished reading - Paulson got himself a 200 million dollar tax forbearance through how and when he decided to work for the government.

Those who have the bucks see that every aspect of their lives is protected. While the rest of us try to ignroe nightmares of a future digging through the dumpsters.

[keepCAblue]

65. His only *crime* is the bad luck of living in a country...

...that prizes greed, corportism and political corruption over human suffering. Were he a citizen of Canada, the U.K., France or another *socialist* country, he'd be getting the medical treatment he needs -- without having to go to jail. This man's sad case so pointedly illustrates that, in America, it has become a crime to poor, ill and uninsured.

[Swamp Rat]

69. jfc!

:cry:

[Duer 157099]

71. He's not alone. That is my "plan B" also n/t

[Hippo_Tron]

72. I wonder if there are some good statistics on this type of incident

If it happens frequently then it would be good ammunition to support health care reform. Housing people in a prison because they can't afford health care or other necessities is an inefficient allocation of society's resources.

[handmade34]

77. from personal experience,

I can tell you it happens. Don't know the statistics but I worked as a correctional officer for a couple of years (in northern state- cold winters) and just about October time the gym got loaded with beds to house all the extra inmates that would be coming in. Everybody knew why. Prisons have become the "poor house" of the 20th-21st. People that make the rules know and our ammunition for health care reform is merely to get the masses on board and shake up the people who make the rules.

From Wikipedia:

"A poorhouse or workhouse is a government-run facility for the support and housing of dependent or needy persons, typically run by a local government entity such as a county or municipality.
In early Victorian times..., poverty was seen as a dishonourable state caused by a lack of the moral virtue of industriousness... The term is commonly applied to such a facility that houses the destitute elderly; institutions of this nature were widespread in the United States prior to the adoption of the Social Security program in the 1930s. Facilities housing indigents who are not elderly are typically referred to as homeless shelters, or simply "shelters," in current usage.

Often the poorhouse was situated on the grounds of a poor farm on which able-bodied residents were required to work; such farms were common in the United States in the 19th and early 20th centuries; it could even be part of the same economic complex as a prison farm and other penal or charitable public institutions.

[handmade34]

78. your story is sad

we will write if you get the man's name and address. No one should be so alone. "loneliness and poverty are not equal to insanity"

Depends on the facility: I have seen a few individuals do ok in jail and my time there showed me that some fine people end up imprisoned, including one old man I knew that acclimated himself to his small cell. Overall though I would like to think we could make better lives for people outside the prison system.

[merh]

80. I hope that you send a letter about this man and your experience

to your congress persons, to Obama, to everyone on the congressional committee considering the issue and to Kennedy and Dean.

Heck send it to Rachel Maddow and Olbermann.

I've met and tied to help those who decided 3 hots and a cot was better than the options available in the free world. Some had health issues and some just had issues that made it easier to commit the crime than continue in the free world.

Thank you for sharing and for caring. I hope you do get to visit this man, to let him know that he is not alone.

:hug:

[SkyIsGrey]

83. Welcome to the Greatest Country on the planet....

I really should put that in quotations.

I wonder if there has been anything similar happening is those "socialist" country's that have universal/single payer health care?

As a response suggesting to send this to Obama and Senators and the like; I would also suggest sending this to the foreign press, like the ones in those socialist country's, like Le Monde, The Guardian, Asahi Shimbun and others, to hopefully put some more outside pressure on as we could use it.

A quote, with events like this bring to mind, that I think is direct, or at least as I have been told.

"How there could be so much poverty in the midst of such wealth."

Chief Sitting Bull.

[Gman2]

86. We are down to "The adventures of Ivan Illich

He too stole a loaf of bread to be jailed. They would not jail him. Drats.

[Kablooie]

87. The only way to get medical care and meals for some. Amereka is the best country in the world.

[defendandprotect]

88. Welcome to America...Superpowerdom . . .Poverty is a crime, Homeless is a crime --

Health care is a right, not a privilege --

Food, Shelter, Clothing, Healthcare -- as confirmed by the United Nations

[handmade34]

95. I was told by a judge in a court of law

3 years ago that my health insurance(for myself and children) was not a necessary expenditure - that was my moment of epiphany, the moment it truly sunk in that we are a sad society

[defendandprotect]

106. And the Bushes have had 12 years of appointing judges while they blocked

most of Clinton's appointments.

[HughMoran]

89. That was an interesting and touching story

Thanks for sharing that, I enjoyed it. :)

[JerseygirlCT]

90. Oh that's the most awful, sad

story. What an indictment of our society, huh? I cannot even imagine what he's going through. Bless you for going to visit him.

[Greyhound]

91. Thanks for your empathy and this story. It's pretty common and becoming moreso.

This guys did it right; Bank robbery is a federal offense, so he goes to federal facility, and if he has no prior record he'll probably be in a minimum security facility, which has better living conditions than what most poor "free" people can get, especially in high-cost states like CA.

Keep us all informed and keep your ears open for new legislation to prevent such "abuse" in the future as things keep deteriorating.

Why do those that can change things feel no shame?

[Number23]

92. Heartbreaking. Tragic. Sickening.

Thank you for posting this.

Sometimes, you think that the lack of humanity in the world could not possibly get worse, and then you see something like this.

[G_j]

93. maybe you would also consider writing more

about this tragedy. It is a devastating story that needs to be heard.

[Alameda]

96. Jail is sometimes really BAD, I hope he gets some

compassionate jailers.

[MrMickeysMom]

103. Please send this to everybody you know in the media...

This is so awful that it should be shouted from the mountain tops. My God, how bad could JAIL be? Indeed.

How desperate has LIFE become? Full employment for some, 3 square meals and shelter for yet another one.

You have a good soul, SmileyRose.

[Joe the Liberal]

105. America is one of the only 1st world industrialized countries where this is possible.....

We may have been the greatest nation on the face of the earth at one time during our history but those days are long over.