[ethics, crimjust] Outside the System

[siderea]

Someone (maybe on metafilter? I've lost the source) pointed me at this article: Let's Make A Deal. It explains: Imagine you’re browsing at Bloomingdale’s when a security guard taps you on the shoulder and accuses you of shoplifting. He takes you to a private room, sits you down, and runs your name through a database to see if you have any

Comments

[heron61]

I see two ways this is terrible. The first has nothing to do with this program being terrible, but with the fact that the criminal justice system is often drastically unequal, but that really says nothing about this program, beyond it giving some people an out.

Where this program could be terrible is if it is used as extortion - if people who appear vulnerable because of their race, background, or other qualities are targeted, some of them will pay up even if they are innocent, even if they only reason they were accused was in the hopes of forcing them to pay for this program.

Also, if 90% of people pay, then the number of court cases will be low enough that it might take many years for the fact that some stores are using this program as a money-making scheme by harassing innocent people to come to light. I have no idea if this is happening, but if there is any financial connection between the stores (or their employees) and the company running the program, then I can pretty much guarantee that this program is being used that way by at least some people. In fact, an under the table "bounty" for security guards for every person they get to take this program seems likely.

[alexx_kay]

Agreed. And the second issue is only problematic *because of* the first. The standard societal "due process" forms an upper limit on the corruption possible in the privatized version. For minorities, that upper limit is distressingly high.

[siderea]

Hmm, see my comment below:
http://siderea.livejournal.com/1199297.html?thread=8897217#t8897217

[siderea]

if people who appear vulnerable because of their race, background, or other qualities are targeted, some of them will pay up even if they are innocent, even if they only reason they were accused was in the hopes of forcing them to pay for this program.

This is an excellent point. Hmm, a related point is that the threat of extortion could also be used to discourage "undesirables" from patronizing one's store. Actually falsely accusing every black customer to cross your threshold of shoplifting doesn't work so well if the cops have to be called every single time. But if you can reliably assume that black patrons won't insist on their innocence, and will pay the extortion, then you can use the accusation of shoplifting in conjunction with this scheme to drive black customers away.

[siderea]

The first has nothing to do with this program being terrible, but with the fact that the criminal justice system is often drastically unequal

It's terribleness resides not just in that it's unequal. I'm thinking of a white male patient of mine who accepted a plea bargain. The crime he was accused of had a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years. He plead out and did 3 months and is now doing N years of probation, and has a felony conviction for the rest of his life. To hear him tell it, he maybe could have beat it; he argued that he hadn't done what he was accused of doing. But he was unwilling to dice with his life like that.

Even if everyone enjoyed the privilege of a college-educated, employed, middle-class white man when dealing with the criminal justice system, the stakes involved are often terrifying. Just the threat of having a criminal record is terrible, especially if one works in a job for which such a record is a disqualification.

(I just heard the statistic that 1 in 7 people in the US now work in the health care sector, and its only growing. You know that the vast majority of health care jobs don't allow employees with any sort of criminal record? Even the janitors and receptionists.)

[alexx_kay]

Of course, if it weren't for mandatory minimum sentences, the threat side of the bargain wouldn't be as big. And clearly they (in some sense) aren't *really* mandatory, as a plea bargain circumvents them.