We’re all criminals
Each and every one of us is a criminal. Whether we drank underage years ago or ran a stop sign on a deserted road or failed to report our chauffeur for speeding and regardless of whether or not we got caught, none of us is innocent.
Our criminal justice system likewise is criminal. The system may be staffed with officials schooled in law, but the most fearsome punishment is decided in prison by some of our more violent criminals.
We casually accept the assault and rape of imprisoned criminals as if it were simply justice served, but assault and rape are cruel and unusual punishments, if the words of our Constitution are to have any meaning. To condone assault and rape in prison is to condone assault and rape.
If our criminal justice system were to be honest with us, the threat of assault and rape would be written right into each grand pronouncement of sentence rendered within the walls of our sacred halls of justice, but it isn’t honest, and neither are we, because we’ll never admit to ourselves that we’re each of us at the very least a criminal.
Stevie Homer
Uniontown