Kuwait has a form of slavery, but then so does the US. A 2013 New York Times book review gives details:
In “Kids for Cash,” the investigative reporter William Ecenbarger tells the story behind a corruption scandal so brazen and cruel it defies imagination. Between 2003 and 2008, two Pennsylvania judges accepted millions of dollars in kickbacks from a private juvenile detention facility in exchange for sending children — girls and boys, some as young as 11 — to jail.
It is a harrowing tale, lucidly told by a journalist with a good eye for detail. The children’s stories continue to unsettle long after the book ends: the 13-year-old incarcerated forthrowing a piece of steak at his mother’s boyfriend; the 15-year-old for throwing a sandal at her mother; the 11-year-old for calling the police after his mother locked him out of the house; the 14-year-old for writing a satirical Myspace profile. Another 14-year-old, an A student, was sentenced for writing “Vote for Michael Jackson” on a few stop signs; she had a seizure while in detention, banging her head so hard she cracked her dental braces.
Mark Ciavarella is the judge who sent away all those children — and several thousand others — in cahoots with Judge Michael Conahan.
Two judges took money to trash the lives of children. Two judges made themselves rich by taking bribes to send children to prison for minor misbeahvior, or nothing at all.
After the briefest of hearings — the average length was four minutes — kids were dispatched to detention centers in which the judges had a financial interest. If parents were unable to pay the costs of detention, their children were sometimes held longer. One teenager’s Social Security survivor’s check, from his father’s death, was garnished to pay the costs.
What happened in Luzerne County, formerly known for coal and now for organized crime and public corruption (in certain districts, teachers have to pay for teaching jobs), was not a case of rogue judges acting alone. In a “festival of injustice,” prosecutors, public defenders, teachers and court employees saw it all and did nothing. At Ciavarella’s direction, juvenile probation officers talked kids out of exercising their right to counsel.
The judges stink, but so does the “criminal justice system” that makes such abuse available.
There is some vindication: Ciavarella and Conahan are serving lengthy prison terms, and the children’s records have been expunged. But there is no happy ending. Many children were traumatized by being shackled and summarily shipped off to jail only to be shunned by friends when they were released. Seven years after his incarceration, the young man accused of steak-throwing (he denied the charge) still has “a lost look about him,” Ecenbarger writes, “as though he has been permanently startled.”
Kuwait, the US – there’s not all that much to choose between us.
H/t Decker
Judges, even judges, with years of jurisprudence and ethics and…justice…Yes, well, hanging is too good for them and all that. How can you repair a life so wantonly ruined? How is it even possible for naughty children or silly children to be not only abandoned by their world but destroyed by their world? Well, unfortunately, we see it all the time, in one form or another, and it always seems to have the same motive underlying it: my advantage trumps yours.
The article fails to adequately underline the fact this occurred in the context of for-profit prisons and jails.
Just as motels need guests, private prisons need inmates. Is it any wonder the rates of incarceration are so high in the U.S. as compared to other countries where private, for-profit prisons don’t exist?
NO difference? In the US we are ashamed and shocked. In Kuwait they are proud.
Ciavarella is serving a 28 year sentence in a Federal prison. He will be eligible for parole in 2026, when he’ll be 85.
Oh, not everyone is ashamed of and shocked by the underlying arrangement – the routine sentencing of juvenile offenders to prison. I was barely aware of it myself (I’m ashamed to say) until that interview on Fresh Air a couple of weeks ago.
Are the children concerned suing the judges, legal systems and custodial institutions responsible for these injustices? Are the USA taking steps to male sure it can’t happen elsewhere?
I watched this unfold as it was happening, though I have no personal connection into the scandal. One young man committed suicide after being sent to juvenile prison for having a small marijuana pipe in his pocket at age 17. His first offence – he was sentenced to 4 months in a boot-camp-style prison and 30 days in youth jail. Because of this conviction, he lost the scholarship to college that he’d been promised as a wrestling star athlete. This chain of events sent his life spiraling out of control; he shot himself through the heart at age 23.
There is a video here of his mom confronting that piece of shit judge – you need to hear it:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/rot-hell-heartbroken-mom-son-committed-suicide-confronts-crooked-judge-video-article-1.137452
From the “Kids for Cash scandal” Wikipedia page:
Yeah, I think that goes without saying O_O
I hope they sue the pants off those private prison companies and seize ALL their ill-gotten gains and more.
Wait, you even have to pay for your own incarceration as if you booked a holiday?
How does incarcerating an 11 yo agree with the universal declaration of human rights?
Since when has the USA ever given a shit about the Universal Declaration of Human rights??
I believe that even suggesting that the US might be bound by it makes you a terrorist. Enjoy the No Fly List.
sc_77_etc.
There’s almost no point suing the judges or the criminal justice system when the current Supreme Court will simply find a reason to summarily reject it.
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Don’t worry, I decided a long time ago that a country that would treat me like a criminal instead of a visitor does not want my tourist money.
Blanche Quizno @7:
Oh, don’t be silly. The companies will fight any such suits for years and years, draining their assets if need be. And then in the end, even if judgments bankrupt the companies they’ll have already paid out their profits to their stockholders, themselves usually a handful of executives and boardmembers. Protecting profits from potential liability is the primary purpose for incorporation in the first place.
Suing the states is another matter, but they can claim sovereign immunity.
Years ago I read an article by Fred J Cook in ‘The Nation’ entitled ‘The Corrupt Society’ about this sort of thing.
So what’s new?
Certainly is a blight on the hopes and aspirations of the Pilgrim Fathers, the Founding Fathers, and the rest.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_J._Cook