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Modern Leper Colonies
People infected with the bacteria mycobacterium leprae were once so feared they were banished from society. Lepers were quarantined — and essentially imprisoned — for the public good. We’ve thankfully since discovered that leprosy is both treatable and not highly contagious, so the practice of exiling the diseased is no longer practiced, though the last leper colonies in the United States (Kalaupapa in Hawaii and Carville outside of New Orleans) were only shut down within the last 20 years. We no longer give non-penal life sentences to people considered too dangerous to exist in society, except when we do.
Unsympathetic cases make the best tests of our principles. There exists today a new kind of leper, a category of persons considered too dangerous to be free in society and given life sentences in exile. The inhumane treatment once suffered by lepers is now being thrust upon this class of people. The least sympathetic of all who are treated more like animals than humans are, of course, violent sex offenders.
The Supreme Court this term had an opportunity to clarify the constitutionality of imprisoning sex offenders indefinitely and answered affirmatively to Reason.com’s question, Will SCOTUS Let Fear of Sex Offenders Trump Justice? By denying certiorari in Karsjens v. Piper, the court lets stand the Minnesota program which “has detained sex offenders released from prison in a ‘therapeutic program’ conveniently located on the grounds of a maximum-security prison in Moose Lake. The ‘patients’ are kept in locked cells, transported outside the facility in handcuffs and leg irons, and subjected to a regimen that looks, sounds and smells just like that of the prison it is adjacent to.” [quote source]
As the Reason and Cato amicus brief puts it, “It is functionally impossible to distinguish between Minnesota’s civil commitment for sex offenders and imprisonment.” In the 24 years of its operation the program has only successfully treated and released one individual. The program offers no hope of a return to society. The trial court held that the plaintiffs had a “fundamental right to liberty.” The Eighth Circuit disagreed with this position, and now the Supreme Court has confirmed that no such right exists, at least not for those who are the modern equivalent of lepers.
Beyond the incarceration there is also the material treatment of these sex offenders being called into question. A recent case filed by sex offenders secluded on McNeil Island in Washington State contends that the drinking water provided to them by the facility is not safe. Cases filed by the incarcerated are often taken with a grain of salt, but this one is likely worth watching. As a society we’ve deemed that even the worst among us retain some degree of humanity and should be treated humanely, even if just barely so. Contaminated drinking water likely fails that standard.
I’m not arguing here that these are not monsters. I’m not even sure where I stand on indefinite civil commitment because the data on recidivism are dicey at best. But I am saying that if we are to do these things as a society we better be damn sure we’re right about it. Angels still don’t govern men, and I fear this is a situation which demonstrates it.
Published in General
This is part of what is not well known or understood. We need better science and a more robust system if we’re to take their liberty away forever.
Part of the problem is that so many of them seem so normal. They can, as I said, be charming and intelligent enough to be very effectively manipulatiive. They have been manipulating the reactions of other to them for their entire lives, and they have no conscience. Those of us with normal psyches have a very difficult time understanding people who function so differently from us. It is almost as though they were aliens, another species. The difference is that to a large extent they do understand us, and they see our compassion as a weakness to exploit, not as kindness towards them. Spend a few weeks in a juvenile detention facility and you will understand what I mean. I spent a year teaching in one.
Indeed. I am merely stating my willingness to carry out a sentence of death upon such a horrendous criminal. People often say that death penalty advocates are unwilling to pull the trigger themselves, but that is not the case for me.
@eugenekriegsmann
I’ve read that you can treat children with callous personality disorder, but you have to perform heroic measures. You basically need to work around their lack of a conscience – most of them know hurting people is bad in an academic sense and that doing that kind of thing will send them to jail, but there is no intuitive sense of it. Basically, they often want to be human as opposed to monsters, at least if you catch them young. The therapy denies them any satisfaction from evil behavior, and doesn’t punish, since it does not work – even corporal punishment is not a deterrent. Instead, it uses rewards for good behavior.
I have often thought about this. Justice being what it is, people are wrongly imprisoned. That said, there are people who are guilty and admit it. These people are a high risk for re-offense, some even beg to be kept behind bars because they know that they will do it again.
What do we do with these people?
There’s a fine line between constitutional freedom and practicality. In this particular case, couldn’t the sexual aggression be defined as pathological and mentally ill? If so, couldn’t these people simply be committed? There is no normal right to due process. The person can be judged a threat to themselves, others, or gravely disabled and committed without permission.
Perhaps this is the angle that needs to be taken.
This is what is happening, but they are essentially being committed to prison, not to mental health facilities with enhanced security. They serve a life sentence without being given one as punishment for their crimes but rather for crimes they may (or may not) commit in the future.
If someone is a potentially violent offender, the differences are minimal. There’s only greater access to drugs.
On the one hand, it’s problematic.
On the other, I’m not entirely sure I disagree. Prisons and high security mental health lockdowns are very similar, partly because their populations are very similar.
The differences are probably just semantics, but they matter when depriving another human being (and they’re still human, even if just barely) of physical liberty.
Well, that and the simple fact that air is a mixture and not a compound and is therefore made up of discrete molecules of differing gasses. There is no molecule of “air”.
I think it mostly is semantics. It is the approach and how one gets into this position that matters. The question, then, being a matter of due process. DO the right of mind require more of a challenge to deprive them of liberty? Do those who are not in their right mind require less?
It’s an odd statement to make and to think about. It almost reduces the mentally ill to wards of the state or somehow less deserving of free will. It is a very difficult call to make. I’m not sure which way to go, but I know where we are going now doesn’t work.
Criminal law has constitutional checks on depriving one of liberty, civil law not so much. That’s really where my problem is with this. We’re balancing liberty and security without the normal, robust checks on the state.
Sure.
But they aren’t criminals. That’s where it gets weird. I can’t tell you how many patients we have to let go who are not in their right mind, but because they can answer the right questions, they can leave medical care.
Where’s the balance?
It’s out of whack. We can’t release dangerous people, but we can’t keep locked up those who are no longer a danger just because they once were. The system in Minnesota in question seems to err too much against liberty.
If necessary change the law to make it so.
I’m sorry. My pity meter is not functioning. It doesn’t seem to register any pity at all after reading this tale of woe.
I think a better idea is to save a lot of money and use a modestly long piece of rope and any sort of stout overhead support that can be found in the woods, at the library, in any factory, or any other building or non-building. It’s cheap, it’s easy, it’s almost free.
The beauty of my proposal is that no one has to worry about water quality for these perverts anymore.
One does not get cured of being a child molestor, except by the modestly long rope method. I’m unconcerned with any other affect, such as rehabilitation. I’m always more concerned with punishment than with deterrence.
Yes, that’s the problem with “treatment”– unlike a statutory sentence, it may never end. I think it’s a due process violation.
(interesting that courts have in the past denied compulsive offenders permission to undergo castration–now, though, I guess all they’d have to do is say they’re transgender, a la Bradley Unmannng.)
@thekingprawn , you about “violent” sex offenders. There are many, many people out there who are branded sex offenders who are guilty of no more than what later is determined to be any unwelcome contact–and not with a child, but also with another adult. They have to register as a sex offender, possibly for the rest of their lives, and wherever they go their new neighbors will receive a letter informing them of the individual’s proximity. A photo of them on a stark black background, label led SEX OFFENDER, pops up when anyone googles them. Often they can’t even find a place to live; in a residential area, when you can’t reside anywhere near a school, church, plsyground, etc., you may end up sleeping under a bridge. They can’t work at any job which might entail contact with minors( again, even if the offense did not involve a child). If they get parole to avoid prison, they may be prohibited from any of the venues citizens normally frequent for fun and relaxation. A miserable half-existence.
I notice and am not surprised by the punitive, vindictive tone of many comments here. But
heed me!
This could be YOU, reader, or one of your children: overestimate the friendliness of a stranger in a bar. Take a prescription drug for depression, smoking cessation, etc., and experience a dramatic, one-time disinhibition.
The collateral civil consequences are immense, far reaching, oppressive. The Supreme Court of my state, at last, finally ruled that new draconian registration requirements imposed on people who have already been tried and / or sentenced do violate the constitutional prohibition against ex post facto laws. Progress.
I believe that we must demonstrate compassion and kindness and justice – for the victims.
I believe in the rule of law: Law to promote the general welfare, law to protect the innocent, law to punish (not rehabilitate) the bad guy.
I believe in the swift execution of justice. (Not 30 years on death row, even if that means some mistakes are made.)
I believe the punishment should fit the crime. Certain violent crimes, including sexual, warrant execution and if pain is involved, well, they won’t suffer any longer than their victims.
Is this Christian? Is this biblical? I believe so.
(emphasis mine)
I’m not sure on what basis you say that. Why do you think this is punishment for hypothetical future crimes, versus simply protecting society from their demonstrated proclivity toward violence?
Washington state’s law on involuntary civil commitment applies to a small number of offenders who are found to be “sexually violent predators.” This is separate from criminal prosecution and whatever sentence for a conviction may be. The law has been upheld by the state supreme court and U.S. Supreme Court (case on Kansas’ similar program), and affords full hearings before a judge, due process and publicly funded attorneys and experts who vigorously contest whether the person fits the statutory definition of a “sexually violent predator.”
A person:
Offenders adjudicated as meeting these criteria, as determined by a trial judge on a more probable than not basis, are held indefinitely and receive treatment (although some refuse to participate in treatment — their own lookout) until their mental condition improves such that they may be released into society.
As such, it is not a widely cast net. It is to protect society where the rights of innocent people can be shown to be seriously at risk and the probabilities outweigh the individual’s liberty interest.
I should add that the individual can call for a review of status at any time; the state constitutionally must review the individual’s case annually, whether they still meet all the criteria or can be released. It is not an automatic forever sentence of confinement.
This thoughtful and informative comment has been on my mind ever since I read it last night. Thank you for writing it out.
It is scary to contemplate actual sociopathic and psychopathic children. I’ve been following this story off and on about kids who are disturbed in this extreme way since I read the story years ago about the two sociopathic teenagers from Vermont who cold-bloodedly killed two professors at Dartmouth.
At any rate, if anyone is interested in the latest treatments for this disorder, I found this excellent article in the Atlantic Monthly.
You put the Wikipedia link in for the Atlantic Monthly article.
Thank you. I’ve fixed it. :)
You have a Pik Quik? There were a dozen Pik Quiks in northwestern CT when I was a kid. I worked at one for two years. They went under around 1980. Where is this store?
Washington State’s law is an example of it being done correctly. The Minnesota system, on the other hand, does not have (or does not actively use) the annual evaluations or status reviews. At the trial the plaintiffs testified that the only way out of the place was to die. The one person released from the program only got out because his original conviction was as a minor and a court mandated his release, not because the program determined he had an improved mental condition.
The problem with Washington’s program is the potential inhumane treatment of not providing safe water. Even the worst offenders are entitled to that, especially if they are only civilly committed rather than incarcerated.
That article was fascinating. Thank you for sharing it. Now I’m left to wonder if sexual predation falls into the camp of psychopathy. There’s a lot we don’t know. My greatest fear in this is hopelessness, for the perpetrators and for society.
One problem is that we have left the system of common law behind in preference for legislatively defined minimum and maximums. Judges should be free to determine sentences using legislatively defined criminal penalties as guidelines, checked only by appeal to a higher court. If a jury finds someone guilty and a judge determines that someone is so likely a danger to society that they should never be returned to it, then the judge should be able to give a life sentence even if the normal legislatively defined penalty is much shorter.
The idea that a government can imprison someone indefinitely for crimes they haven’t committed yet is the very definition of tyranny. Even psychiatric institutionalization should maintain procedures of due process, including periodic reviews with access to an independent advocate if not legal counsel.
Which is why a jury should order them hanged instead. The government acting sua sponte is frightening, but it would be better if they were put out of our misery.
I don’t really trust the government enough for this.
I generally trust juries and appeals courts. Generally. There are exceptions.