Dumb And Dumber
From Yahoo news:
FORT WORTH, Texas - Fed up with deadly drive-by shootings, incessant drug dealing and graffiti, cities nationwide are trying a different tactic to combat gangs: They’re suing them.
Fort Worth and San Francisco are among the latest to file lawsuits against gang members, asking courts for injunctions barring them from hanging out together on street corners, in cars or anywhere else in certain areas.
The injunctions are aimed at disrupting gang activity before it can escalate. They also give police legal reasons to stop and question gang members, who often are found with drugs or weapons, authorities said. In some cases, they don’t allow gang members to even talk to people passing in cars or to carry spray paint.
“It is another tool,” said Kevin Rousseau, a Tarrant County assistant prosecutor in Fort Worth, which recently filed its first civil injunction against a gang. “This is more of a proactive approach.”
More of a proactive approach. Let’s tackle the logic behind this one. Criminals don’t respect the law or the criminal courts, so we’ll sue them, because everybody respects the civil courts!
Get back to us in about a year and tell us how this more proactive approach worked.
But somehow, it gets — yes — even stupider:
But critics say such lawsuits go too far, limiting otherwise lawful activities and unfairly targeting minority youth.
“If you’re barring people from talking in the streets, it’s difficult to tell if they’re gang members or if they’re people discussing issues,” said Peter Bibring, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. “And it’s all the more troubling because it doesn’t seem to be effective.”
If the proactive approach logic was lacking, the ACLU logic is downright impenetrable. Suing criminals “targets minority youth” because . . . ? And I’m assuming here the ACLU does not mean “minority youth who are criminals and belong in prison.”
They’re trying to outstupid each other.
Darren:
You’re just a killjoy. At least they’re trying something, right? Isn’t that what counts?
July 31, 2007, 5:46 pmdragonlady474:
I guess the thugs will have to take off those big ol’ signs they wear identifying themselves as gang members.
August 1, 2007, 12:12 amskh.pcola:
“Discussing issues.” That’s the best euphemism that I’ve heard for “loitering and causing trouble” that I’ve ever heard. Some leftards will jump through flaming hoops to justify their multi-culti biases…to the detriment of civilized society.
August 1, 2007, 12:39 amJeffrey Quick:
It’s wonderful! After we add all the stupidity of civil law (weeping victims, ambulance-chasing lawyers) to the stupidity of criminal law (plea bargains, felony murder charges), there won’t be any law left. So we can reset and start over!
August 1, 2007, 4:07 pmJohn the Marine:
You know I always thought the gov. had the market cornered on stupid. Well I was wrong, the ACLU is definitely more stupid. The sad part is that both entities have immense power over all of us.
August 1, 2007, 4:10 pmTheCalvinator:
What’s stupid about plea bargaining in criminal cases? If the State had to put every Defendant to trial for every charged offense, we would still be trying cases from 1950. Just to give you a specific example, the Hot Check Division of the Dallas County (Texas) DA’s Office has disposed of 56 Felony cases this year. There’s no way we could have had full trials on all of those. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Despite the fact that 56 dispositions in 7 months is a relatively quick pace, it’s still not quick enough. The Division currently has 400 open Felony cases with 166 of those being cases in which the Defendant has been apprehended and/or is on Bond and making Court appearances. On top of that, the Division filed 67 Grand Jury Referrals in the month of July.
Unless you are ready to at least quadruple (and that’s probably WAY too conservative an estimate) the number of Prosecutors and Judges we currently have in this country, Plea Bargaining is vital to the sustainability of our Criminal Justice system.
August 2, 2007, 7:50 amJohn the Marine:
The utility of plea bargaining is not the problem, nor is it one of the reasons I feel our legal system and organizations like the ACLU have taken a sharp turn down the stupid path. In short my complaint is that which I feel the above post is making. That fool hardy notions like filing civil suits against gangs is dumb enough and opposing such an endeavor on the grounds that gang members might just be poor minority kids discussing “issues” is over the top stupid. It seems to me that the whole legal world has been turned upside down when it comes to; common sense, Justice and the public good. The above is just one many demonstrations of this trend.
August 2, 2007, 9:41 am