Tag Archives: #Crime&Punishment

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‘Decarceration’ is deadly to black Americans The problem is not mass incarceration; the problem is that not enough people are incarcerated, for not a long enough time.

It was two months ago that Congress, which is normally hands off but does have jurisdiction over the District of Columbia, rejected the city’s attempt to overhaul its criminal law, an attempt which would have reduced or eliminated mandatory minimums.

Crime has increased in our nation’s capital, increased dramatically this year. The chart at the right is from the city’s Metropolitan Police Department, and was current as of 12:00 AM EDT on Friday, May 5th. You’d think that the residents of the District would want safer streets, but the far-left leadership apparently do not.

Well, the city’s retiring police chief has spoken out:

In D.C., many killers were previously jailed. We deserve better.

by Colbert I King, Washington Post Columnist | Friday, May 5, 2023 | 3:24 PM EDT

The average person arrested for homicide has been arrested 11 times previously, said D.C. Police Chief Robert J. Contee III during a March news conference on D.C. crime with Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D). Contee’s widely publicized statement drew a comment from Rep. Earl L. “Buddy” Carter (R-Ga.), an outspoken opponent of the D.C. Council criminal code reform bill that Congress recently rejected. Carter said the chief’s statement “means that before someone commits the horrible act of ending an innocent life, they’ve already left — at least — 11 other victims in their wake.”

D.C. police spokesman Dustin Sternbeck told me this week that Contee’s statement was based on data in the department’s records management system. Asked for clarification on the meaning of the number, Sternbeck said, “The 11 prior arrests include various crimes, and not just homicide offenses.” Contee, who is retiring in June, added another dimension to the arrest data. He said during the news conference that “the average homicide victim … also has been arrested 10 or 11 times prior to them being a homicide victim.”

Is anyone really surprised by that? While the numbers may vary from city-to-city — and many of my reports deal with Philadelphia — the trend is the same, bad guys killing other bad guys.

A December 2021 analysis of shootings and homicides in the District, conducted by the National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform, sheds some light on both the scope of gun violence and Contee’s observations regarding D.C. arrest histories.

The NICJR report aggregates what is anecdotally known or suspected. It found that across homicides and shootings, victims and suspects are demographically similar — about 96 percent of those in both categories in homicides and nonfatal shootings were Black, while about 65 percent were between the ages of 18 and 34. Roughly 90 percent were male.

In addition, and to underscore Contee’s statements, approximately 86 percent of homicide victims and suspects were previously known to the criminal justice system. About 46 percent had been incarcerated, according to the report.

So, if both killers and victims are very likely to have been, to use the euphemism, “previously known to the criminal justice system,” wouldn’t one very powerful way to reduce homicides be to prosecute them seriously, and incarcerate them to the maximum allowed under the law, because criminals, and apparently their victims as well, aren’t out on the streets and able to kill or be killed.

If you decide to do a Google search for mass incarceration, you’ll get “About 24,400,000 results”, and at least the first one shown are all lathered up about the horrors of mass incarceration. The Sentencing Project tell us:

Fifty years ago, the United States embarked on a path of mass incarceration that has led to a staggering increase in the prison population. Today, almost 2 million individuals – disproportionately Black Americans – are incarcerated in our nation’s prisons and jails. The prison population has grown 500% since 1973, the year America began to sharply increase its prison population.

But when the statistics given above noted that 96% of the murders and shootings in Washington, DC, had both perpetrator and victim being black, in a city where only 43% of the population are black, the notion that incarcerated prisoners are “disproportionately black Americans” seems kind of silly; incarceration depends on who actually commits crimes, not on their percentage of the population.

Nor is Washington somehow different. While few police departments report racial breakdowns on a daily basis, the St Louis Metropolitan Police Department does, and in a city in which 44.8% of the population are black, 87.8% of murder victims so far this year have been black, and 35 out of 38 identified suspects, 92.1%, were also black.

Yet the ‘decarceration‘ movement is all about the fact that so many black Americans are in jail, ‘disproportionately’ to their percentage of the population, but seemingly far less disproportionately to the who are committing crimes.

Simply put, the decarceration movement is all about getting more black Americans murdered! Oh, the #woke and #BlackLivesMatter activists might not realize it — or admit it if they do — but that’s what the statistics show.

The problem is not mass incarceration; the problem is that not enough people are incarcerated, for not a long enough time.
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Also posted on American Free News Network. Check out American Free News Network for more well written and well reasoned conservative commentary.

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More than a slap on the wrist, but not much more, for killing someone

We have twice previously reported on Eyvette Hunter, 52, a registered nurse accused of murdering 97-year-old James Morris. Well, she’s now pleaded guilty, but she’s not going to spend the rest of her miserable life behind bars.

Lexington nurse pleads guilty after death of a 97-year-old patient

by Taylor Six | Thursday, April 13, 2023 | 9:36 AM EDT | Updated: 408 PM EDT

Eyvette Hunter, photo by Fayette County Detention Center, and is a public record.

A Lexington nurse who was charged with killing a patient has pleaded guilty to manslaughter after she was initially charged with murder.

Eyvette Hunter, 52, pleaded guilty Wednesday after participating in court-ordered mediation. She was accused of killing 97-year-old patient James Morris, who police said died as a result of Hunter’s intentional medical maltreatment. Morris died May 5 after Hunter’s actions a few days prior.

Hunter faces five years in prison for the amended charge of manslaughter, according to court documents. She was originally expected to stand trial June 12. Her sentencing is scheduled at 9 a.m. June 8 with Fayette Circuit Judge Thomas Travis.

Hunter’s attorney, Daniel Whitley, said her case was troubling on multiple levels and said she was used as a “scapegoat” for negligence of the hospitals.

“What I have learned about the criminal justice system, prosecutors can make anyone a murderer,” Whitley said. “When you are facing 20 (years) to life in prison, you sometimes have no other choice but to resolve your case and take a lesser charge even though you are innocent.”

Read more here.

Naturally her attorney is going to claim that Miss Hunter is just an innocent victim in all of this, but he believed that his case was winnable, believed that the commonwealth didn’t have the evidence to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, wouldn’t he have advised his client to go to trial instead?

But my question is: why was Miss Hunter allowed to plead down to KRS §507.040(1)(c) second degree manslaughter, a Class C felony, and apparently, allow the minimum sentence? Under KRS §532.060, the penalty for a Class C felony is “not less than five (5) years nor more than ten (10) years” in prison.

Let’s be clear about this: she killed someone! And she’s getting off with, if more than a slap on the wrist, not a lot more considering her crime.

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Don’t waste time and money trying for a death sentence which will never be carried out

Sergeant Mark Fusetti is a retired Philadelphia Police officer, who last served on the Warrant Squad, and one of my electronic friends. His major concern right now — other than helping his friend Sam Oropeza gat on the ballot for a Philadelphia City Council At Large seat — is crime in the City of Brotherly Love. The fatal shooting of Temple Police Officer Christopher Fitzgerald, allegedly by a privileged punk kid from Bucks County, has Sgt Fusetti, and many of the other law-and-order conservatives in and around Philly rightly concerned.

There are a lot of responses to Sgt Fusetti’s tweet, and almost all of them call for the death penalty in this case. Continue reading →

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The utter bovine feces of ‘restorative justice’ How does 'restorative justice' repair the harm done when the victim is stone cold graveyard dead?

In Robert Stacy McCain’s “Everything Is White Supremacy: Inside America’s New Maoist ‘Struggle Sessions’“, I noted a smaller part of something he quoted:

In their “transformative-justice” workshop, my students learned to name “harms.” This language, and the framework it expresses, come out of the prison-abolition movement. Instead of matching crimes with punishments, abolitionists encourage us to think about harms and how they can be made right, often through inviting a broader community to discern the impact of harms, the reasons they came about, and paths forward. In the language of the anti-racism workshop, a harm becomes anything that makes you feel not quite right.

There’s a serial rapist loose in Philadelphia, with four reported sexual assaults near the Broad Street SEPTA line, and, with rape being a crime often not reported, I have to wonder what the perp’s real number of assaults is.

So, I have to ask: how can the “harm” this rapist has done to at least four women in the City of Brotherly Love “be made right”? How can the “harm” done to the 46 people murdered so far this year in Philly “be made right”? Yeah, I can think of one way, involving a rope and an oak tree, but the prison abolitionists would not support that alternative, would they? Continue reading →

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Did treating Edwin Vargas leniently do him any favors? There are four people now stone-cold graveyard dead thanks (allegedly) to his lenient treatment

We first reported on Edwin Vargas on January 25th, but missed this story in The Philadelphia Inquirer:

North Philadelphia man charged with four homicides, terrorizing a woman, police say

Edwin Vargas, 24, has been charged with multiple shootings, including a high-profile triple homicide in Mayfair earlier this month.

by Ellie Rushing | Wednesday, January 25, 2023

A North Philadelphia man has been charged with committing a spate of shootings this month that left four people dead and a young woman terrorized, law enforcement officials said Wednesday. . . . .

Officials said the shootings were connected and domestic in nature, and stemmed from Vargas’ obsession with a young woman he had been stalking and terrorizing over the course of multiple days.

Court records show that these incidents were not the first time Vargas had shot at someone, and that he’s spent the entirety of his adult life — and at least a portion of his childhood — in and out of jail.

That’s the part you already knew. But further down was this:

Records show Vargas entered the justice system as a teen, when in 2013, at just 15 years old, he was arrested for a drug crime.

In 2016, just a few months after turning 18, he was convicted of illegally possessing a gun with an obliterated serial number. He was sentenced to up to 23 months in jail, plus five years’ probation.

Then, in January 2020, Vargas was charged with aggravated assault and illegal gun possession, after video showed he shot at someone multiple times in Kensington, according to court records. No one was injured.

He was convicted in that shooting and sentenced to up to 23 months in jail, plus three years’ probation, with required mental health supervision.

Vargas was released in August 2022, under the condition that he participate in a reentry program requiring weekly meetings with a caseworker while incarcerated, and for a few months after his release.

Ellie Rushing’s article missed one important point, which we mentioned in our previous article: in July of 2022, Mr Vargas pleaded guilty to illegal possession of a telecom device by an inmate. Under Pennsylvania Title 18 §5123(c)(2), illegal possession of a telecom device by an inmate is a first degree misdemeanor. Under Title 30 §923(a)(7), the sentence for a first degree misdemeanor is “a fine of not less than $1,500 nor more than $10,000, or imprisonment not exceeding five years, or both.”

In other words, Mr Vargas did not need to be released in August of 2022, but could have been kept locked up until 2027. We understand: many district attorneys believe in ‘second chances’ for criminals, hoping that they’ve learned their lesson and will attempt to become productive members of society. But just how many ‘second chances’ should someone who has been in the criminal justice system since he was 15, and “spent the entirety of his adult life . . . in and out of jail” receive? Could no one see that Mr Vargas was a bad dude?

Let’s tell the truth here: all of that lenient treatment didn’t do Mr Vargas any favor. Instead of being in prison now, with a reasonable hope of being released no later than 2027, and probably earlier, Mr Vargas is back in jail, and he will, if convicted, (probably) spend the rest of his miserable life in prison. Four people who would otherwise (probably) still be alive are now pushing up daisies, another seriously wounded, and others terrorized from being shot at even if they weren’t struck.

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Lexington’s first homicide of 2023

Rigoberto Vasquez-Barradas, photo by Fayette County Detention Center, and is a public record.

Meet Rigoberto Vasquez-Barradas. Mr Vasquez-Barradas has, allegedly, been a very bad boy:

Lexington man accused of repeatedly kicking pregnant woman, leading to fetal homicide

by Christopher Leach | Tuesday, January 24, 2023 | 8:10 AM EST

A Lexington man facing a fetal homicide charge allegedly kicked a pregnant woman in the stomach three times during a physical argument, according to court documents.

No, of course the Lexington Herald-Leader did not publish Mr Vasquez-Barradas’ mugshot! I had to look that one up myself.

Rigoberto Vasquez-Barradas, 24, is charged with first-degree fetal homicide, first-degree strangulation and second-degree assault — domestic violence, Lexington police previously said in a news release. Police said they were called to a local hospital that was treating a domestic violence victim Friday morning.

Court documents say Vasquez-Barradas and a woman who was 18 weeks pregnant got into an altercation that turned physical on Thursday. Vasquez-Barradas shoved the woman to the ground four times and kicked her in the stomach three times, court documents say.

Vasquez-Barradas also strangled the woman while she was on the ground, according to court documents.

While speaking with investigators, Vasquez-Barradas admitted to shoving the woman but denied kicking her in the stomach, according to court documents.

There’s a little more at the original.

As of this writing, the murder of the unborn child is not listed in the Lexington Police Department’s 2023 homicide investigations report, but that page is not updated daily. I do wonder, however, if the powers that be will include the murder of an unborn child on that list.

Mr Vasquez-Barradas has been charged with:

  • KRS §508.020: Assault, second degree- domestic violence. Assault in the second degree is a Class C felony.
  • KRS §508.170: Strangulation, first degree. Strangulation in the first degree is a Class C felony.
  • KRS §507A.020: Fetal homicide, first degree. Fetal homicide in the first degree is a capital offense.

Under KRS §532.060(2)(c), the sentence for a Class C felony is imprisonment for “not less than five (5) years nor more than ten (10) years”. The penalty for a capital offense under KRS §532.030 is:

  • death; or
  • imprisonment for life without benefit of probation or parole; or
  • imprisonment for life without benefit of probation or parole until he has served a minimum of twenty-five (25) years of his sentence; or
  • imprisonment life; or
  • imprisonment for not less than twenty (20) years nor more than fifty (50) years.

Under that fourth possibility, imprisonment for life, a prisoner first becomes eligible for parole after serving a minimum of 20 years in prison.

Me? I’m hoping that Mr Vasquez-Barradas is not allowed some lenient plea bargain arrangement and, if he is guilty, sentenced to life without parole.

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Hold them accountable For all practical purposes, lenient prosecutors, judges and parole boards have been accomplices in the crimes of those not treated seriously

Five people were killed and another 18 wounded, some critically, allegedly by Anderson Lee Aldrich. As Robert Stacy McCain reported, Mr Aldrich, in June of 2021:

was in an armed standoff with police at his mother’s home in Colorado Springs. He was charged with multiple felonies, but for reasons as yet unknown, the charges were dropped and records in the case were sealed. Seventeen months later, Aldrich was wearing body armor when he stormed into a local gay bar with a rifle and a pistol, shooting multiple people, five of whom died in the shooting rampage before bar patrons — one of them a former Army officer — tackled and disarmed him.

You can read the rest at Mr McCain’s site, but it has to be asked: why was Mr Aldrich out on the streets? Why was he able to buy a rifle? Why were the charges dropped and records sealed. But, most importantly, who took the decisions which left a crazy person out on the streets, able to (allegedly) commit the crimes with which he has been charged?

The New York Post reported that:

A Connecticut felon with a lengthy rap sheet fatally stabbed his 11-month-old daughter and dismembered her — then got into an argument with her mom and fled, police said.

Police are on the hunt for Christopher Francisquini, 31, who is accused of murdering Camilla Francisquini on Friday morning at their Millville Avenue home in Naugatuck, the Hartford Courant reported.

After allegedly committing what Police Chief Colin McAllister described Monday as a “horrific and gruesome” crime, Francisquini got into a fight with Camilla’s mom, who was unaware the girl was already dead.

During the argument, Francisquini allegedly destroyed the mother’s cellphone, removed a GPS tracking device from his ankle and fled in a 2006 gray Chevy Impala.

I noted that the nation’s second oldest daily newspaper, the New York Post, founded in 1801 by Alexander Hamilton, cited the nation’s oldest surviving newspaper, the Hartford Courant. Inasmuch as I frequently cite The Philadelphia Inquirer, our nation’s third oldest continuously published daily newspaper, that part interested me. But I digress.

Further down:

Francisquini has been convicted of assault and drug charges — and also has various pending assault and theft-related cases.

He got out of prison in June and is on special parole until 2032, WFSB reported. He managed to remove his tracking device before going on the lam, police said.

The same questions which I asked concerning Mr Aldrich apply to Mr Francisquini: why was he granted a “special parole,” and why, iif his pending charges of assault and theft occurred after he was paroled, was he not taken back into custody? He was wearing an ankle monitor, so the police knew where he was! And again, most importantly, who took the decisions which left this guy out on the streets?

Now we have a “disgruntled employee” of a Walmart in Chesapeake, Virginia, who murdered six other people before killing himself. The identity of the shooter and whatever interactions he may or may not have had with law enforcement have not yet been released. But when that information is made public, will we be asking the same questions?

On saving this story during the process of writing it, the system notified me that this will be, when published, my 32nd article entitled Hold Them Accountable. From Latif Williams, who (allegedly) killed Temple University student Samuel Collington but was out on the streets because District Attorney Larry Krasner and his office didn’t already have him locked up, to Cody Arnett, now sentenced to life in prison for raping a Georgetown College student, after having been paroled early despite having five prior violent felony convictions, to Benjamin Robert Williams, not charged despite being arrested as being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm, and with a twenty-year criminal history now charged with the murder of his girlfriend, to Brandon Dockery, sentenced in 2012 to 45 years in prison for arson but free in 2021 to go out and (allegedly) kill someone, to Nikolas Cruz, given every break possible by the Broward County Sheriff’s Department and the school district, thus free to buy a gun, and then murdered 17 people and wounded 17 other, to Hassan Elliot, given a lenient plea bargain arrangement by Mr Krasner’s office, released even earlier than that, violated parole more than once, but still not locked up, who then murdered a Philadelphia Police Officer.

So, what would happen if we started holding judges and prosecutors and parole boards accountable for the crimes committed by criminals they sentenced too lightly, prosecuted too leniently, or released too early? A Georgetown College Coed would not have been raped had the Kentucky State Parole Board not released Mr Arnett early; Police Corporal James O’Connor IV would still be alive, if the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office had had Mr Elliot locked up again on his parole violations, and Mr Collington would still be alive today.

Can you give me one good reason why Mr Krasner should not be standing trial, right along with Mr Elliot for the killing of Corporal O’Connor? Is there any reason that the members of the Kentucky State Parole Board shouldn’t be serving the same life sentence as Mr Arnett?

If we held these people accountable for the crimes committed by thugs who they could have had behind bars, we’d quickly find that prosecutors would seek maximum sentences, judges would sentence criminals to the maximum terms allowed under the law, and parole boards wouldn’t turn anyone loose before he had served his full term in prison. We would also have far lower crime rates, far fewer people murdered, far fewer women raped.

Our state legislatures are elected by the people, and do the people’s will. When they pass strict laws, when they set serious maximum sentences, they are responding to what the public and society need, and then we have lenient prosecutors and judges and parole boards undermining all of that. We need to start holding those people accountable for the damage to which their decisions have led!

Perhaps these people really do mean well, but meaning well is not enough; for all practical purposes they have been accomplices in the criminal acts committed by those already in custody, who were not fully punished for the crimes for which they had been previously arrested, and were let go early.

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If “Black Lives Matter,” why do black killers of white victims get more severe sentences than black killers of black victims even in very liberal cities?

Josephus Davis, photo via WPVI-TV, Click to enlarge.

“It’s a shame that another Black male, young male, is losing his life to the system,” Josephus Davis said. “It’s another white judge, white family, white DA, and another Black male.”

‘You will die in prison’: Philadelphia man is sentenced to life in prison for murder of Brewerytown man walking his dog

Josephus Davis, 21, was convicted in the murder of Milan Loncar, who was fatally shot while walking his dog in Brewerytown last year.

by Ellie Rushing | Friday, August 26, 2022

After an emotional two-hour hearing that brought even a seasoned homicide prosecutor to tears, a Philadelphia man on Friday was ordered to spend the rest of his life in prison for fatally shooting a man as he walked his dog in Brewerytown last year.

Josephus Davis, 21, was convicted of second-degree murder, robbery, and related offenses in June for the killing of Milan Loncar, 25, a Wayne native and Temple University graduate. Loncar was walking his dog after work in January 2021 when Davis and another man held him at gunpoint in an attempted robbery. After rifling through his pockets, Davis shot Loncar in the chest, then ran away as Loncar lay bleeding on the street.

Think about that: after robbing Mr Loncar, when there was absolutely no need to do so, Mr Davis shot and killed his victim anyway, but, “It’s a shame that another black male, young male, is losing his life to the system.” Perhaps, just perhaps, it was Mr Davis who took the decision to spend the rest of his miserable life in jail, not that “white judge, white family, (and) white DA.”

During Friday’s sentencing hearing, Common Pleas Court Judge Barbara A. McDermott read segments of the approximately 25 letters submitted by family and friends detailing how Loncar’s death has affected their lives. All described him as caring and loving, “the best person [they’d] ever met.”

Jelena Loncar, 28, said she has not been able to work more than 20 hours per week since her brother’s death. She sold her house in Brewerytown after the shooting and, along with other family and friends, moved out of Philadelphia, the pain and fear of the ongoing violence crisis too much to bear.

Ellie Rushing, The Philadelphia Inquirer reporter, went through some time and effort to tell us how loved Mr Loncar was by his family and friends, but there’s a certain point which arose in my mind: yes, Mr Loncar may have been a wonderful guy, but does that mean his life was somehow worth more than the lives of many of the thugs who’ve also been killed in the City of Brotherly Love? We have previously noted how Fayette County Commonwealth’s Attorney Lou Anna Red Corn “mediated” crimes and allowed lenient plea deals and sentences for murderers — I suppose “manslaughterers” would be a more mocking term for their crimes now — and if that happened in the Bluegrass State rather than Philadelphia, the same things are happening all around the country in our cities. Of course, in those Lexington cases, the murdered manslaughtered men were black gang members as well, while Mr Loncar was white.

And even as Davis maintained his innocence, and his mother testified of his traumatic childhood filled with abuse and instability, Judge McDermott was firm in meting out his punishment.

“You will die in prison,” she said.

McDermott sentenced Davis to life in prison without the possibility of parole, the mandatory sentence in Pennsylvania for second-degree murder.

Jelena Loncar, left, with her brother Milan Loncar, in December 2020 outside of Tinsel bar in Center City.
Courtesy of Jelena Loncar, via The Philadelphia Inquirer. Click to enlarge.

Of course, Mr Davis chose to fight the charges in a jury trial, and was convicted. Had that not happened, District Attorney Larry Krasner would probably given him a nice, soft plea bargain. Ahhh, but then again, the very black Mr Davis killed a white victim, generating the kind of sympathy that the murder of Samuel Collington,  a Temple University student approaching graduation. Mr Collington was a white victim, allegedly murdered by a black juvenile in a botched robbery. Then the Inquirer published 14 photographs from a vigil for Mr Collington, along with another story about him. Five separate stories about the case of a murdered white guy.

The Inquirer even broke precedent when it came to Mr Collington’s murder by including the name of the juvenile suspect in the case, and delving into his previous record.

The Inquirer, a newspaper which publisher Elizabeth Hughes vowed to make “an antiracist news organization”? I see that the paper paid more attention to the accidental killing of Jason Kutt, a white teenager shot at Nockamixon State Park, an hour outside of the city. That’s five separate stories, a whole lot more than the two or three paragraphs most victims get.

Let me be clear here: I absolutely support the sentence Mr Davis received, and it’s a good thing that state law sets life in prison without the possibility of parole as being mandatory for second-degree murder; no judge should have any leeway in that. What I oppose is the lenient plea bargain deals which let murders off with manslaughter convictions, meaning that they can see a time at which they will be released, and, all too frequently, are eligible for early parole. Murders should not get out of prison until the day that their victims come back to life!

It seems that this was not Mr Davis first brush with the law:

Prosecutors, though, said the evidence was clear: As Loncar walked his dog, Roo, near 31st and Jefferson Street that January evening — two blocks from his residence, and a half-block from Davis’ — Davis and an accomplice attacked him.

So, both murderer and his victim were neighbors, living in an integrated area. Zillow shows me an area of mixed housing, some older and in not the greatest repair, while other residences have been fixed up and selling well into the $300,000 range.

Later that night, Davis was stopped by police in Kensington after officers recognized the car he was in as having been reported stolen in a carjacking the day before. Davis and a few other men hopped out and ran, Assistant District Attorney Joanne Pescatore said.

When police caught and questioned Davis, he wore a distinctive belt and shoes — evidence prosecutors used to match him to surveillance video of Loncar’s murder. Police later tested Davis’ clothes for ballistics evidence and found a small amount of gunshot residue on one of his jackets. The accomplice has not been identified.

Davis, one of 14 children, spent most of his life in the system, family testified. His mother said he was taken from her, along with his siblings, when he was 8, and forced to live with his father, who struggled with addiction and homelessness. Davis was arrested for the first time at 14 for assault, and bounced between numerous behavioral health facilities through his childhood. When he was 12 years old, his mother said, Davis witnessed a facility staffer fatally beat another child.

“You all think he is a monster,” she said. “But the streets turned him that way.”

Well, perhaps his mother being such a rotten parent that the Commonwealth took her children away from her might have had something to do with it, and not just “the streets.”

Davis’ crimes continued into adulthood. He was arrested four times for robbery and aggravated assault, the judge said. He was on probation for robbery at the time of the murder, and was awaiting trial on charges of carjacking and assaulting a jail guard. He had been released from jail two weeks before killing Loncar.

Mr Davis has two brothers also locked up, so it’s a criminal family, which makes me wonder: was he treated leniently by the District Attorney in a manner which allowed him out of jail two weeks before he killed Mr Loncar? Could Mr Davis have been behind bars on January 13, 2021, the day he robbed and killed Mr Loncar? If he could have been behind bars on that date, did the legal system, did the District Attorney, do him any favors by letting him out early? The 21-year-old Mr Davis might have been looking at several more years behind bars, but at least be able to see, into the future, when he would get out. But because he was out, and able to kill someone, he will only be freed when he has been freed from this mortal life.

I can have some sympathy for Mr Davis, in that he grew up without much of a chance. Saying that he was “forced to live with his father” is the same thing as saying that his father did not live with his mother. Somehow, some way, Western culture has decided that the primary organizational structure of every human society of which we have any knowledge, for as far back into history as we can determine social structure, normal, heterosexual marriage, with both fathers and mothers living together and rearing their children together, is just so much junk, and can be blithely discarded, leaving people like Mr Davis’ mother alone to bring up 14 kids. We have allowed our own selfishness to ruin things for everyone.

But having some sympathy for Mr Davis does not mean that I think his crimes should be excused or minimized: he killed another man, and were he somehow freed, he’d wind up killing someone else. I can hope that he finds God in prison, and that his life after this one will be better.

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Biden Administration stupidity on the death penalty

Regular readers of The First Street Journal, both of them, know that I am opposed to capital punishment. It isn’t because I am Catholic, although being Catholic informs my decision taking, but the belief that once we have a prisoner in a position where he can be executed without his consent, he is, by definition helpless, and it is not necessary to kill someone you hold helpless.

There has been a lot of talk recently about President Joe Biden, who purports to be Catholic, and the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops discussing whether he should be denied the Eucharist due to his support of abortion. He is, however, very much in line with the Church in his opposition to capital punishment, but there are obvious questions raised by this story from The Washington Post:

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