That punishment seems so cruel and unusual
13 Responses to “That punishment seems so cruel and unusual”
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April 24th, 2012 at 10:58 am
By itself, yes; stealing a dollar’s worth of soda shouldn’t be anything more than a citation, or maybe a misdemeanor at worst.
But since this choirboy has a long rap sheet of theft convictions it triggers the habitual offender statute. I am having a hard time generating any sympathy for him.
April 24th, 2012 at 12:07 pm
He stole soda because the employee made of a point of saying the cup was only for water, which pissed him off, so he wanted to stick it to the Man. When they didn’t care, he was loud and abusive. McDonalds made sure to mention the theft of soda in the police call, because the 99% would go crazy if McDonalds called the cops just because some nutter was being loud and abusive and crazy.
Police won’t come and arrest somebody for smoking at McDonald’s; they won’t come for theft of soda. They will come (eventually) for public disturbance.
A guy who steals soda – nobody cares. A guy looking to get arrested should be arrested before he escalates.
April 24th, 2012 at 1:00 pm
I agree with Captain Holly. He obviously didn’t learn the first, second, or third time. Maybe of the penalty is ratcheted up a bit, he will eventually learn.
A search at the county clerk’s website shows that he has 28 misdemeanor and 11 felonies dating back to 1987. He is not a choir boy.
http://www.collierclerk.com/RecordsSearch/CourtRecords
April 24th, 2012 at 1:02 pm
Right, so it was a $1 worth of soda, but when do we start to draw the line?
He stole something…period. He has a history of stealing…period. He is a thief…period. I’m guessing his goal was a trip to jail for 3 hot meals and a bed.
April 24th, 2012 at 1:19 pm
Abating a public nuisance. I’m as suckass a liberal as you can find but this guy going away for a while is just fine with me.
April 24th, 2012 at 2:29 pm
Not just a thief, as Bill says, but they even (according to the link) asked him to just pay for the soda before calling the police, which is good form.
I’m not sure the law that makes habitual misdemeanor theft into a felony is necessarily correct, but I’m also not sure it’s wrong – plainly misdemeanor convictions weren’t deterring him.
April 24th, 2012 at 3:04 pm
A bum finally ran out of hit points with the local judges. Looks like we have here a failure to communicate.
If you keep stealing crap and making a pest of yourself, the law will find a way to put your ass in a cell.
Big deal.
April 24th, 2012 at 3:56 pm
He stole the dollar worth of soda, but the manager told him to leave. That’s trespassing. Then the manager asked him again to leave, at which point the guy got loud and cussed him out. There’s disturbing the peace. Plus, nothing would’ve happened if he hadn’t had a lengthy record of petty theft. At what point does a train of petty theft become a felony? The 7th time? The 12th?
April 24th, 2012 at 4:40 pm
Bill wins it.
I see this a lot. The guy was probably having to work hard and getting nowhere. Shit gets tough so go commit a petty crime and get back to the joint. It also wouldn’t surprise me if the guy had some sort of “status” in the joint and couldn’t wait to get back to it as opposed to living in a world where everyone could give two shits about him.
April 24th, 2012 at 7:25 pm
“But since this choirboy has a long rap sheet of theft convictions it triggers the habitual offender statute. I am having a hard time generating any sympathy for him.”
I agree Captain! He had his chance(s).
April 24th, 2012 at 9:28 pm
When you buy a soft drink, at a fast food joint, you are not buying the drink. You are buying the container the drink comes in. And, think about it, everything else. From the napkins, to the wrappers on the straws. When you buy water…..
April 24th, 2012 at 11:43 pm
In itself its over-kill; I think we have far too many felonies generally.
I follow the logic of it in that we’ve pretty well criminalized any response by civil society or private citizens. 100 or possibly even 50 years ago the crew might have just laid hands on him and carried him out bodily. Now they’d be the ones facing felony charges for trying. So practically, you need a uniformed official with police powers to deal with even minor irritants. And the uniformed officials need felony charges for the justice system to take note and actually halt the trespass the only way left, by locking people up; otherwise they’re toothless themselves and the criminals know it.
I’m not saying the old way was perfect either, but its important to recognize the change we’ve made. Its counter-intuitive, but shifting power from civil society to the police has a tendency to empower criminals over law-abiding citizens, as the law-abiding citizens have more to lose by entering the justice system.
April 25th, 2012 at 11:52 pm
He’s not being charged with a felony for stealing $1 worth of soda. He’s being charged with a felony for being a career criminal who stole $1 worth of soda.