Perhaps nothing speaks better to our broken justice system than the fact that people–guilty and innocent alike–are held in jail for more than year beforetrial. Lise Olsen reports in the Houston Chronicle: Though the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to a speedy trial, at least 500 county inmates [out of 11,500] have been locked up for more than a year…
Crime Prevention Tip
Never leave your bike unlocked. The latest in bike-theft prevention. From Chetumal, Mexico.
Build a better photo lineup
The traditional “6-pack” is flawed because people will pick the person mostlike the suspect. Showing pictures one-by-one is supposed to change there. Here’s an AP story by Jeff Carlton about the Dallas P.D.
Ohhhh….
I couldn’t figure out this the whole let-the-terrorist-go thing the Brits did. I think the New York Times may cut to the chase: Colonel Qaddafi made his remarks as British and Scottish officials were doing their best to distance themselves from Mr. Megrahi’s release, which they insisted was decided without any pressure from London by Scotland’s justice secretary, and based…
Mexico Decriminalizes Drug Possession
The story in the New York Times. The law sets out maximum “personal use” amounts for drugs, also including LSD and methamphetamine. People detained with those quantities will no longer face criminal prosecution; the law goes into effect on Friday. Too bad this won’t stop the narco violence.
So, honey, how was your day at the office?
Check out this video. New Mexico is crazy, man (and I say that only because my wife is from there, ese)!
NYC Event, Tuesday August 25.
I’m speaking at my very own neighborhood book store this coming Tuesday, August 25, at 6:30pm. The new paperback edition of my book will be available (I still haven’t seen it). Seaburn Books. 33-18 Broadway, Astoria, Queens, New York. Hope to see you there (or anybody there, for that matter).
Blue-Light Cameras
I’m generally not a fan of flashing blue light police cameras. I think they’re a waste of money. So in the interest of fairness I should point out that one in Baltimore recently got a shooter convicted. Peter Hermann reports. Not surprisingly, the victim wouldn’t cooperate. In an unrelated case, Hermann talks about a brutal racist attack on a elderly…
Health Care or Prisons
Nicholas Kristof sounds offabout our absurd priorities that funds incarceration instead of school and health care. Did you know a black boy born today has a one-in-three chance of serving time in prison? That’s right, not arrested, but prison. It wasn’t that way a generation ago. It’s not crime. Crime hasn’t gone up (it’s gone down). It’s the war on…