The Half Message

By Joanne Greenberg

Care2 News Network

Many people who have been through strongly negative experiences will declare afterwards, that their sufferings gave meaning and richness to their lives. I’ve never heard these emotions expressed by people who have been in prison. Incarceration is an experience its designers made for the purpose of changing lives. Each country’s prison system mirrors its society’s values. We prize liberty – liberty is denied. We prize individuality – prisoners are given numbers for their names, dressed alike and regimented. What stops the prison experience from bringing meaning and thus growth to the experience is the huge inconsistency of the system, which was once planned to be strict but fair, and has ended up being capricious and undependable hour to hour. What is OK on Monday is forbidden on Tuesday. Where there is randomness, meaning shrinks and dies and so does learning. Lab animals are driven mad by random rewards and punishments; people fare hardly better.

Pg2a.org

I could imagine Deaf people doing well in a structured, consistent and fair situation. They follow a lifetime of watching the body language of the Hearing, which may be inconsistent with what the hearing person is saying. Unfortunately, the randomness of prison life has militated against guards or prisoners expressing outward emotion at all. Deaf people can read displeasure, fear or rage by closely watching the pupillary reaction of a subject, with this beyond conscious control. Staring however, which is what such monitoring takes, is liable to land the starer in the infirmary, or worse. In addition, body language can tell what – anger, fear, etc. but not why. The half-message  is often worse than none.

Joanne Greenberg was born in 1932, in Brooklyn, NY. She was educated at American University and received and honorary Doctorate from Gallaudet University – the world’s only college for the Deaf. She has written 2 books on the subject and has spent decades working with state mental hospitals for appropriate care for the mentally ill Deaf.

Related articles

• Deaf – Blind Inmates: Are They Being Served Appropriately in Jail? (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Assumptions and Misconceptions (starsandrainbows.wordpress.com)
• Read: “Deaf people’s linguistic culture is being allowed to disintegrate” in the Guardian (limpingchicken.com)
• Deaf and deaf (brokenrulesmagazine.com)
• Marsha Graham’s Presentation at the Symposium (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Mental Illness and my Faith (believersbrain.com)
• Deaf Awareness Culture Week (library.sbcc.edu)
• Gallaudet University’s Harkin Computer Lab Gets SMARTdesks Computer Classroom Design Makeover: Conference Tables, Motorized iMac Tables, Flip Top Tables and Laptop Tables (virtual-strategy.com)
• Mentally ill should be in hospitals, not jails (newsherald.com)
• Barnes & Thornburg Exhibits Gallaudet University Student Art in D.C. Office (legaltimes.typepad.com)

Deaf – Blind Inmates: Are They Being Served Appropriately in Jail?

By Jean F. Andrews

http://www.behearddc.org/

According to a recent newsletter by HEARD, as of March 31, 2013, there are 407 deaf and deaf-blind prisoners in 38 states, Washington, D.C. and in the Federal Bureau of Prisoners. Within these numbers, we do not know exactly how many are deaf-blind or deaf and visually-impaired inmates there are in prison.

Interpreting and Working with the Deaf-Blind

Deaf-blind and deaf-visually impaired inmates are most vulnerable to human rights abuses and often do not receive adequate accommodations in jails and prison. Take for example, the case of Ms. Jones, an African-American deaf-visually impaired woman who has been incarcerated numerous times, mostly for misdemeanors. Ms. Jones is profoundly deaf , has limited vision in both eyes, uses American Sign Language (ASL) as her primary language, and reads at the second grade level. To effectively use a sign language interpreter, the interpreter must sign very close to Ms. Jones’ face. She can use a videophone but she must be situated very close to the screen to see the signs of the other person.

Carolina Photojournalism

At each of her arrests, Ms. Jones was not provided with an interpreter. In her last arrest, she was charged with possessing drugs but none were ever recovered and she did not have an interpreter during the arrest to tell her side of the story. While in jail, she was not provided an interpreter during the booking or during the medical intake. She was not able to explain that she was diabetic and took insulin, and spent three days in jail without her insulin. While in jail she was given a copy of the inmate handbook and a number of forms to sign but she could not read them given her low reading level of second grade. No interpreter was provided to translate these documents. Consequently, she did not learn about the rules she was required to follow while in jail but instead had to depend on another inmate who had rudimentary fingerspelling skills. Upon release, she frequently violated her probation because she did not understand the fees and regulations she had to follow. Because she did not understand the rules of her probation, she violated them and was subsequently jailed.

How Stuff Works

Ms. Jones’ story points to the inequities of the criminal justice system particularly for those inmates who have more than one disability. Ms. Jones’ deafness, visual impairment, and diabetic condition combine to make special accommodations necessary in order for her to have her rights as designated by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

Policy  in jails and prisoners need to reflect awareness of these unique needs of deaf, deaf-blind, and deaf and medically fragile inmates,  and include training for jail officials in order to ensure deaf blind inmates are given their Constitutional Rights.

Jean F. Andrews is a Reading Specialist and Professor of Deaf Studies/Deaf Education at Lamar University.

Related articles

• Nation’s oldest deaf/blind woman dies (nzherald.co.nz)
• H.E.A.R.D. Sends Letter to Editors of Major Fla. Papers (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Travel Resources for the Deaf (handstalktoo.wordpress.com)
• Deaf and blind students display artwork at Tohono Chul (azstarnet.com)
• Ni Gallant: How much can people learn about being deaf from an ‘In their shoes’ day? (limpingchicken.com)
• Allow Me To Introduce Myself (cycling4deafblind.wordpress.com)
• “Bad Things”: Child Abuse and the Nineteenth-Century Spanish National School for the Deaf and Blind (haileyfox.wordpress.com)
• Read: “Deaf people’s linguistic culture is being allowed to disintegrate” in the Guardian (limpingchicken.com)
• Astronomical Statistics (eyecanthearu.com)

Better

By BitcoDavid

IMDB

In a scene from Chris Walas‘s the Fly II, the lead character, Martin and his girlfriend are hiding out in a motel. He’s mutating into a giant fly – twitching, peeling and losing his teeth and hair. Beth, his girlfriend, tells him they need to get to a doctor. She say’s “you’re getting worse.” He replies, “No. I’m getting better.”

Faster, smarter, stronger – better. It’s been my goal my whole life.

The Baby Boom represents the largest population expansion in this country’s history, and the majority of Americans, right now, can classify themselves as Boomers. That means that the majority of you – my readers – are a stone’s throw, a New York minute, a heartbeat away from the starin’ window. Get it? We’re all careening – pedal to the metal and no brakes – to a future of drooling in our oatmeal and wearing Depends.

But it doesn’t have to be thus. Jack LaLanne lived well into his 90s, and was active, alert and… well… alive right to the end. Exercise and diet can do wonders to stave off the tragedy of aging. But it’s only half the story. The one muscle that needs the most exercise and tends to get the least, is the muscle that’s located between our ears. That squishy gray glob of electrochemical energy we call our brain.

LaLanne also loved dogs, and his white Shepherd was a regular feature on his TV program. Image: Skeptical Eye

Research has shown that the best way to fend off brain disease is to keep learning new things. By opening new pathways in the brain, we create channels that can be used to bypass those sections that are destroyed by aging and other destructive illness. Further research proves that the best thing one can learn – to stimulate new brain cell activation – is language. In fact, language is the basis of all learning. One can’t study law, for example, without first learning the language of that science. Technology is the same way. Before one can understand what a transistor does, one must learn the language of electronics. Math is a language. Science, physics, history – even art. All are really languages that we must learn and translate into our own inner monologues in order to understand.

Many of my friends in the Deaf and HoH communities, tell me that hearing people don’t want to be bothered to learn Sign. I really don’t understand why this is. I love learning – and somewhere in my 30s I discovered that I’m actually quite good at it. Learning that is. Perhaps if my school years hadn’t been as abysmal as they were, I would have made that discovery a decade or so earlier. I’ve set out to learn ASL, and I’m loving it. I love it almost as much as I love boxing – another science, another language – one must learn. You don’t just climb into the ring and fight. It takes years to build a fighter.

Woody Allen’s second favorite organ. Image: Williamette

So if a friend walked up to you and said she wanted to teach you Italian, why on earth would you refuse her? Look at it like this. Any opportunity to learn anything might just give you another month, another year – perhaps – of independent, lucid… well… life.

So give some thought to learning ASL. Not only would you be adding to the overall size and strength of your brain, but you might just be able to develop some friendships in a world that you never even knew existed.

And a decade from now, instead of getting worse – you could be getting better.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• ASL Meetup 2 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Top 5 Ways to Not Be a Dummy (ucaftercruz.com)
• Learning ASL (mortizsulloway.wordpress.com)
• Most Influential Blogger Award (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Practicing ASL (American Sign Language) Online (allsignlanguage.blogspot.com)
• Post Birthday Digest Post (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• April at DeafInPrison.com (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Them Hearies; Who Can Figure ‘Em? (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Team Blood (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• March at DeafInPrison.com (deafinprison.wordpress.com)

Them Hearies; Who Can Figure ‘Em?

By BitcoDavid

Oregon Lions Sight and Hearing Foundation

Marsha Graham raised an interesting point, this morning. In a post on her site, she asked why Hearies often leave the TV blaring in the background, while attempting an important business call. I responded as best I could with a comment. The above links will take you to her original post, and my comment. I suggest you check them both out. The whole exchange got me thinking about communication in general, and some of the more glaring social differences between the hearing and the HoH and Deaf communities.

For example, we don’t consider it rude to talk over one another. At a group get together, say a party, we will commonly carry on conversations while others are talking around us. Our brains have learned to filter out the extraneous noise of other people talking. But I’m beginning to realize that for some HoH, that is very difficult and uncomfortable. We also carry on multiple conversations, simply interrupting one another to say hi to a passerby or when speaking in a group. Signing requires the two individuals to be more or less locked in to one another. You need to be looking at one another, and maintaining that level of concentration.

TechFond

Computers are well aware that simply because I say something, you may not have heard it – or may not have understood my meaning. When you log on to a Web site, the machines engage in a process called handshaking. A computer would never be so ignorant or arrogant as to simply assume the other computer understood the information exactly as it was being sent. I find the Deaf to be much similar in their communications. One needs to establish a visual contact, and then proceed with the conversation – and both can tell when either is not being understood.

We Hearies on the other hand, commonly will speak to the crowd, or toss a sentence fragment over our shoulders, and expect the intended listener to hear and understand. We speak to the backs of each other’s heads. Our world would probably function much more smoothly, if we also did handshaking. “This is what I just said, did you understand?” “Yes, I understood. Go on”

But what I’m finding most interesting is that much of what we do, we are unaware of doing. I hadn’t thought about the TV thing, until Marsha brought it up, but I do it all the

123-RF

time. I also talk to myself when working. I never realized it until last night. One has to remember to take one’s hat off when signing, because many signs involve touching parts of your head or face. One has to be careful not to cut between two signers. We’ve learned to stop when we see someone taking a picture, so as not to ruin the shot, but we often will walk between two people signing.

At one point, I worked with a sightless individual. He was one of the soundmen at Woodstock. A very capable engineer, and a very dear friend. He was so capable, in fact, that I would often forget that he was born blind. He could see with his hands, almost as well as any sighted person can see with their eyes. In one exchange, I asked him to hand me a certain tool, explaining that it was in the blue toolbox. He simply said, “blue? Moron?” We take so much for granted.

 

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• April at DeafInPrison.com (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Live Coverage of Bridgewater Event (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• ASL Meetup 2 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Marsha Graham Part 2 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Most Influential Blogger Award (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Marsha Graham’s Presentation Part 1 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• March at DeafInPrison.com (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• From USABoxing – Casting Call (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)

April at DeafInPrison.com

By BitcoDavid

View this document on Scribd

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

• From USABoxing – Casting Call (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• Moorbey Puts Us Up for Dragon’s Loyalty Award (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Amnesty International Petition for Angola 3 Member (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Team Blood (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• March at DeafInPrison.com (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Unique Opportunity From Lipreading Mom (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Marsha Graham’s Presentation Part 1 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Here’s the Conclusion of The Brookline PD’s Presentation (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• First Video Installment – Brookline PD (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Marsha Graham Part 2 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)

Embed: DOJ’s 71ppg PDF on Serial Murder

By BitcoDavid

 

Several years ago, I did a paper on the differences between the 3 major types of mass murderers. Serial Killers, Spree Killers and Thrill Killers. The terms are not interchangeable – the three types have succinctly different motivations, methodologies and pathologies. Research for that piece came from the DSM-IV, and from the DOJ. Recently, I found this PDF document on the Web. It’s a long read, but is the bleeding edge of law enforcement research into the phenomenon.

View this document on Scribd

It is worth noting that none of the terms apply to politically or religiously motivated killers, although in some cases, both the Serials and the Spree types have reported religion as a motive. Generally speaking, that is viewed as a common symptom of these illnesses, but the feeling is that a pathological murderer would kill regardless of religion.

Both this report and the information in the DSM – my previous paper, for that matter, as well – did not therefore, deal with the issue of terrorism. So, although the outcomes may be the same, there is a significant difference between – for example – Harris and Klebold, and the Tsarnaev brothers.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• The Sensationalism and Glamorisation of Murderers and Serial Killers (lbriant.wordpress.com)
• Warning Signs for Parents: The Profile of a Shooter (everydayfamily.com)
• Serial killers (crimefighterz.wordpress.com)
• Amnesty International Petition for Angola 3 Member (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• NJ ‘Angel Of Death’ Gives First Interview To ’60 Minutes’ (newyork.cbslocal.com)
• March at DeafInPrison.com (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Here’s the Conclusion of The Brookline PD’s Presentation (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• First Video Installment – Brookline PD (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Marsha Graham Part 2 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Team Blood (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)

So Long CISPA!!!

By BitcoDavid

Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out! Ziff Davis among others, is reporting that the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or CISPA is dead in the Senate. Apparently, the bill contained insufficient privacy protections. This site, joined 900 others in a protest of the bill this past week.

Not only has the Senate refused to take up the controversial bill, but the White House has stated that President Obama would exercise his veto option if CISPA ever made it to his desk.

Rotary Action

To those of you ruled by fear, let me set you straight. Martial Law won’t protect you. Brigades of black helicopters and uparmored Humvees won’t protect you. A militarized police force – armed with machine guns and chemical crowd control agents won’t protect you, and above all, private corporations most certainly won’t protect you. All you’re doing is giving away the store, to thugs who are all too glad to take it off your hands.

And what’s true in the streets is equally true in Cyberspace.

Hacker Journals News

Sure, bad things happen. And all too often, they happen to good people, but the odds are really stacked against you ever losing your bank account to some subterranean Hacker, bent on stealing your hard earned identity. The built in protections are really quite good, and those who seek to defeat those protections will always do so, no matter how much you legislate away our liberties.

Bills are drafted by lobbyists. Any time a law is proposed, you need to ask yourself who lobbied for it. At the end of the trail, you will almost always find some corporate interest, seeking to protect profits. CISPA is no different. You know who wants CISPA? Sony Music, ASCAP, AOL, Time Warner, Verizon and Comcast. The very same people who turned my Internet into a shopping mall.

Wikipedia

In 1980, I began my transition from the world of analog tech to the world of digital tech. I built a switching matrix keyboard for a company that sought to automate the chore of taxi-cab dispatching. Back in those days, the big deal processor was the Z-80, and the Internet was called the BBS – or Bulletin Board System. It was all geeks and physicists, who would cradle their telephone receivers in slow, clumsy analog modems and link up their Ataris and Apple IIs.

But for all the effort – an evening spent trying to download a single Kb of data was not uncommon – the entire system was free. By which I mean socially and intellectually free, not economically free. We had to pay huge long distance phone rates. But the information – the data – was free. The Internet as I know it may already be dead – turned into a massive Google-driven superstore – but I like to believe that it lives here. In the Blogosphere. Here in the last bastion of free citizen journalism – the last fortress of self published writers and radical speakers.

So, I say this. So long CISPA. Better luck next time, Sony. And the rest of you? Blog. Blog hard, blog often and say what’s on your mind.

Long live a free and vibrant Internet.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

 

Related articles

• CISPA, SOPA, and the Next Acronym (librarianshipwreck.wordpress.com)
• Cispa (parserjets.wordpress.com)
• Blackout to Protest Cispa for Next 24 Hours (cadesertvoice.com)
• Petition: Stop CISPA – Protect Internet Privacy (dprogram.net)
• CISPA Protest Carried Out by Annonymous (thehollywoodgossip.com)
• It’s privacy versus cybersecurity as CISPA bill arrives in Senate (networkworld.com)
• The Theft of Dignity by Pastor Mark Ehrlichmann (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Amnesty International Petition for Angola 3 Member (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Team Blood (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• Marsha Graham’s Presentation Part 1 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)

An Unpopular Point of View

By BitcoDavid

Yesterday’s Post

Yesterday, DeafInPrison.com was one of over 900 sites that went dark in protest of the proposed Internet snooping law known as CISPA. This law would allow government agencies to track your browsing habits, download and read your e-mails, and peek at your social network profiles. Furthermore, it would not only mandate that your ISP willing turn over this information, but would disallow you – the citizen – from suing your ISP, or the “government agencies” in question. It’s all part of the War on Terror®. Everybody knows that the Brown Evil are all a bunch of computer geniuses who are using Twitter to erode your family values.

CBS News

Had I not reblogged (in the old method) Moorbey’z image of the Guy Fawkes mask from V for Vendetta - now synonymous with the activist group, Anonymous, I would have written about the Siege of Boston, like every other journalist, media outlet, blog site and news source in the world. But what I would have written would probably read a bit different from what you’re seeing everywhere else.

Jerusalem Post

The day after the blackout, I got into a long FaceBook thread with my RL-BFF. (For those of you who actually have lives, RL-BFF means my best friend in real life.) I had mentioned that it disturbed me greatly, to see uparmored Humvees and black clad mercs, running around my city with G.I. ordinance. My friend said they did a great job, and that he didn’t mind the stormtrooper presence, as long as they caught the bad-guys.

Fast Eddie – the Dead.net

The thread ended however, on an ironic note. See, both my friend and I used to have long hair, and were active participants in the drug culture and youth movements of the late ’60s/early ’70s. We both remembered when we were considered the enemy.

And it is from there, from that point of view, that this post is written. I won’t defend the Tsarnaev brothers – if in fact, they are indeed guilty. What they did was horrible, and the surviving brother certainly deserves everything the justice system can throw at him. My point is simply this. An invasion – albeit benign – is still an invasion. In my mind, there is little difference between militarized Staties, armed with automatic rifles and crowd control chemical agents, and an invasion force from a hostile nation. Call me a Pinko if you must, but I can only see commonality between SWAT teams on Boylston St., and SS divisions marching through Poland.

TokyoRemix.com

And when we let fear move us to hand the keys over to these militarized forces, what’s to stop them from simply taking the store? In Akira Kurosawa‘s classic film, 7 Samurai , the warriors were hired to protect the village from bandits – which they did. Problem was, nobody was there to protect the village from the warriors. So what if the cops weren’t great? What if somebody said, “I’m sorry officer, but I have to see a warrant?” Martial Law really sucks. Oh, and let me point out, a study revealed that over 5000 people were wrongly convicted in 2012. Yet, in just under 250 years, we’ve only had 2 terrorist attacks on our own soil. So let’s run the math. According to WolframAlpha, your chances of getting wrongly convicted are 625 thousand times better than your chances of getting blown up by terrorists.

And I’m still gonna need someone to explain this:

While everybody is quaking in fear over the Tsarnaev brothers, and all the other terrorists plotting to blow us up, we’ve all forgotten our fear of 1984. Personally, I  would much rather die in a terrorist bombing, than live under the yoke of dictatorship.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• | The Boston Blowback! (truthaholics.wordpress.com)
• The Orwellian Paradigm: Killing you, for your own safety (sott.net)
• Something’s Rotten in Boston: Who’s Investigating the FBI Investigators? (conservativeread.com)
• Boston & Civil Liberties (bereansatthegate.wordpress.com)
• ISPs urged to stand up against Big Brother-style ‘snooping bill’ (techradar.com)
• Interview with Moorbey (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Militarized Cops and Drug War Victims (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Moorbey Puts Us Up for Dragon’s Loyalty Award (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• The Theft of Dignity by Pastor Mark Ehrlichmann (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Team Blood (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)

Texting, Chat Rooms and the Deaf Sex Offender

By Jean F. Andrews

Growth of Texting – Steve Anderson

Even though many deaf adults read below the third grade level, there are cases where they regularly use texting and enter chat rooms to engage in conversations with people they have not met. There have been cases where deaf adults have engaged in conversations with hearing minors for purposes of sexual encounters.

Some deaf adults are often not aware of the legal consequences of soliciting sex from minors. Some deaf adults have been victims of sting operations. These situations pose challenges for the courts because on one hand these deaf adults may be linguistically incompetent to answer questions from the arresting officer or detective, to understand the Miranda Warning, as to work effectively with an attorney and to stand trial.

Freelance Lady: Sexting Etiquette

When charged with the sex offense they may not understand the consequences of pleading guilty and having to register as a sex offender. They do not understand the repercussions being a registered sex offender has on their living arrangements and job prospects. To complicate matters, there are psycho-social as well as linguistic factors that must be considered if they are to receive a fair hearing or trial. Most attorneys and judges are not familiar with these complex factors. Instead, they often assume if the deaf person can use a texting device and can enter a chat room, then they are literate in the English language.

Klean Treatment Center

Texting and chat room conversations do not require high levels of literacy and this type of discourse is radically different than the discourse in the jail, prison and courtroom. The picture gets even more complex if the deaf person is sent to a treatment program. There are few facilities in the country that specialize in the deaf sexual offender. Most facilities are designed for the hearing offender with staff that have no knowledge of deaf culture, ways of visual teaching and learning, and do not provide accessible information through a qualified interpreter.

UKnowKids.com

At issue here, is not whether the deaf person is guilty or not of the offense. The critical issue is that a deaf offender must be provided the same access to communication and information as the hearing offender from arrest, to incarceration, to trial, to probation and parole. English is typically not the most effective mode of communication for the deaf offender even though they use texting devices and enter chat rooms regularly for social reasons, both legally and illegally.

Jean F. Andrews is a Reading Specialist and Professor of Deaf Studies/Deaf Education at Lamar University.

Related articles

• Federal judges finds unconstitutional broad state law limiting sex offender internet activity (sentencing.typepad.com)
• Too many sex offenders (mostboringradical.wordpress.com)
• Governor signs bill tightening sex-offender registry (elpasotimes.typepad.com)
• “On Emotion, Juvenile Sex Offenders, and Mandatory Registration” (sentencing.typepad.com)
• Luveni: Register sex offenders (fijitimes.com)
• Locating Broome County’s sex offenders (wbng.com)
• Clarksville Police are looking for Violent Sex Offender Darnell Comauex (clarksvilleonline.com)
• Police Hunt Dangerous On-the-run Sex Offender (belfastdaily.co.uk)
• Team Blood (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• The Theft of Dignity by Pastor Mark Ehrlichmann (deafinprison.wordpress.com)

Terrorism in Boston

By BitcoDavid

The Atlantic – In Focus

Woburn, MA may be the modern Northeastern equivalent of Andy Griffith‘s Mayberry, but it’s only 12 miles northwest of Boston. Boston, where I lived for 18 of my 38 years in New England. In all that time, I’ve seen far too much violence, crime, death, disease and destructive behavior, but I don’t recall ever seeing any real acts of terrorism.

Let me be clear. Terrorism is defined as The calculated use of violence (or threat of violence) against civilians in order to attain goals that are political, religious or ideological in nature. We tend to throw that term around nowadays, with the same nonchalance that we have for phrases like schizophrenic and Holocaust. Just because my wife gets a little pissy now and again, doesn’t make her schizophrenic – and not every act of senseless murder can be compared to the unmitigated and industrialized evil that was the Third Reich.

The Atlantic – In Focus

So, what I’m trying to say is that until we catch the perpetrators of yesterday’s tragic bombing of the Boston Marathon, and discover what motivated them to commit such an atrocity, we have no business labeling it as terrorism. Tragedy? Sure. Horror? Of course. We can call it a crime, a senseless act of violence, a day of mourning – but until we’re sure, we can’t call it terrorism.

America – I’m begging you. Don’t let this send you spinning into craziness like September 11th did. Don’t go off on a vendetta of war, murder and wrongful prosecution. Don’t further stuff our over-sated jails and prisons with anonymous boogeymen. Don’t attack any sovereign nations, and above all let’s don’t declare a War on anything.

Legendary Dallas Arbiter Fuzz-Face. Build a Fuzzbox Part 1

Back then, I was teaching analog electronics at a small college in Brookline. Our meetings were about how to reach problem students, how to best convey information, how to inspire interest, best practices in teaching and making lessons accessible to people with disabilities. After 9/11, the meetings became about security, how to catch cheating and plagiarizing students and what to do in emergencies. We were bade to stop being teachers and become cops. I actually got in trouble with my Department Chair, for turning in a lost backpack, rather than calling the police. The backpack could have contained a bomb.

Boston Herald

My students built projects of their own choosing, for their final exams. Things like small preamps, fuzz-boxes, wah-wah pedals and guitar tuners. These projects would take several weeks, and the students would commonly bring them home to work on them at their leisure. I had so many students complain that transit authorities would confiscate these projects, that I had to make the rule that nobody could take their projects home. I guess to a cop, an unfinished fuzz-box looks enough like a bomb to warrant confiscation. I get the need to protect – to prevent – but at what point do we cede all that makes us Americans, for a fleeting sense of security?

As a Bostonian and a distance runner, I mourn for the victims of yesterday’s tragedy. And I, like everyone else in this state – and this nation – want to see justice done. But I’m begging you. Let’s do that justice fairly, calmly and with no eye to revenge. Let’s let cooler heads prevail.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• The message sent by America’s invisible victims | Glenn Greenwald (guardian.co.uk)
• TERROR THREAT: Centerville Man Charged (whotv.com)
• Studying The “Wicked Field” Of Terrorism: Starting With Basics – Analysis (eurasiareview.com)
• URGENT – obama statement boston (wyff4.com)
• Obama Calls Bombings ‘Act of Terror’ (kcrg.com)
• Five questions about terrorism in the wake of the Boston Marathon explosions (pennlive.com)
• Tragedy in Boston (jk1211.wordpress.com)
• S.A. expert on terrorism: Boston bombings work of Islamic extremists (kens5.com)
• Terrorism on Obama’s Watch (conservativebyte.com)
• Bloody Boston (canadafreepress.com)

No Symposium Coverage Complete w/o the Tech

By BitcoDavid

One of the terp team at work. Photo: BitcoDavid

True. There were 2 ASL interpreters, and what I noticed there, was that not only did they take turns interpreting for the individual speakers, but they did this cool tandem thing for audience questions. An audience member would sign her question, and Terp 1 would say it in English, then Terp 2 would sign the speaker’s answer back to the questioner.

C.A.R.T. in action. Photo: BitcoDavid

C.A.R.T was also employed, and it’s the first time I have been privy to seeing C.A.R.T. in action. The operators – there were 2 of them, as well – would key in the spoken words, using a Steno machine. The output of the Steno was fed into the U.S.B. port on a laptop. The laptop drove a little DLP projector, onto a 60″ Da Lite screen. While what appeared to be the lead C.A.R.T. operator was keying in words, the backup operator would be using the Web on her own laptop, to look up words, spellings and other references.

My trusty little Sony Handicam, earning its daily bread. Photo: BitcoDavid

On top of all that, they had a PC at the podium, and were running constant PowerPoints from the overhead DLP, onto a separate screen behind the speaker.

My little guy needs some Abilify and a hit of Viagra after seeing this monster. Photo: BitcoDavid

I wanted you to see more C.A.R.T.

The backup operator. Photo:BitcoDavid

All things considered, I was impressed by the accuracy and speed of C.A.R.T. As you know, captioning is something that’s important to me. The manual method I use is absolutely accurate, assuming I can hear the dialog, but it’s very slow and labor intensive. The computerized method employed by YouTube among others is horribly inaccurate – relying, as it does, on speech to text conversion. I noticed that C.A.R.T. wasn’t 100% accurate, but all things being equal it was sufficient to the task, and with almost no noticeable delay.

Here’s the primary operator and her screen. At her lap level can be seen the Steno machine. Photo: BitcoDavid

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• Live Coverage of Bridgewater Event (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• March at DeafInPrison.com (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Marsha Graham’s Presentation at the Symposium (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Marsha Graham’s Presentation Part 1 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Symposium on the Deaf and the Justice System – Part 1 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• First Video Installment – Brookline PD (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• From USABoxing – Casting Call (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• Reminder: Symposium on Criminal Justice and the Deaf (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Here’s the Conclusion of The Brookline PD’s Presentation (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Marsha Graham Part 2 (deafinprison.wordpress.com)

Militarized Cops and Drug War Victims

By BitcoDavid

Cheryl Ann Stillwell. Image: the Grey Train

The Huffington Post recently featured a story by Radley Balko, author of Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America’s Police Forces. The article centers around the death of Cheryl Ann Stillwell, a middle-aged single woman, shot to death in a police raid gone awry.

According to Balko, Stillwell was a recluse, afraid of the drug activity she witnessed in her neighborhood. Stillwell did own a handgun, and she had installed surveillance video equipment in and around her home. But it wasn’t the undesirable element whom she needed to fear, it was a militarized SWAT team, enforcing a warrant with no name and no address – merely a description of her house as given by an unidentified informant, seeking to save his own skin.

Image: Narconon

This tragic tale is really a he said, she said of complex lies and deception. A story of police so bent on capturing drug dealers, that they will rely on coercion and hearsay. Stillwell, apparently was on a doctor’s prescription for Oxycontin, of which she gave 2 pills to a neighbor who claimed to be suffering from pain. Shortly afterward, the neighbor was arrested, and in order to cop a deal, turned in Stillwell.

Image: Southwest Oncology Group

At five-thirty in the morning, on December 22, 2005, SWAT team agents armed to the teeth, kicked in her front door. It was to be one of 3 raids, that day. In a haze of sleep, Stillwell went for her gun, but forensic evidence reveals she didn’t fire it. One of the officers claims to have seen her finger twitch on the trigger – in the darkened house. She died in a hail of gunfire.

And in Florida, to this day, all drug related search and arrest warrants are carried out by SWAT teams.

But Cheryl Ann Stillwell isn’t the only victim here. As America’s insatiable desire for narcotics increases, coupled with her insane need to criminalize drug use – as she seeks to lock up more and more of her citizens while further militarizing the police in the War on Drugs, we all become the victims. Cheryl Ann Stillwell never got her day in court. She never had her Miranda rights read her. At 5:30 in the morning, a small paramilitary force – a junta – busted into her home and killed her in her bed. And we are OK with that.

To learn more, go to Raid of the Day, or Drug Raid Gone Wrong. To pre-order Balko’s book, go to Amazon.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• Event: Webinar (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Amnesty International Petition for Angola 3 Member (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Team Blood (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• The Theft of Dignity by Pastor Mark Ehrlichmann (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Directions to Bridgewater (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Interview with Moorbey (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Cities continue to get ‘tanks’ they don’t need in nationwide police militarization trend (talesfromthelou.wordpress.com)
• Police militarization comes under nationwide investigation (usahitman.com)
• Police militarization comes under nationwide investigation (alethonews.wordpress.com)
• SWAT: Is America Coming Under Martial Law? (jonathanturley.org)

Book Review of Outcasts and Angels: The New Anthologogy of Deaf Characters in Literature by Edna Edith Sayers, Galluadet University Press (2012).

By Jean F. Andrews

CHOICE is a publication which reviews books for academic settings. This book appeared in the April 2013 issue of CHOICE.

Outcasts and angels: the new anthology of deaf characters in literature, ed. by Edna Edith Sayers. Gallaudet, 2012. 361p bibl afp ISBN 9781563685392 pbk, $35.00; ISBN 9781563685408 e-book, $35.00

 

Explaining Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects for deaf and hearing impaired children through an interpreter. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Fiction helps readers know and understand cultures other than their own in more empathetic and compassionate ways than informational nonfiction can’t accomplish. This anthology does just that. Edna Sayers (Professor of English at Gallaudet Univ.) gathered 32 short stories published from 1729 to 2009 that feature deaf characters. Through clever plotting and character creation, the authors of these stories reveal attitudes of hearing people toward sign language, the challenges and limitations of lip-reading, the difficulty of understanding deaf speech, and the infantilization of deaf people.

Edith Edna Sayers

Sayers notes that the only story in this anthology that advocates for signing is Joanne Greenberg‘s And Sarah Laughed. Sayers also offers writers a useful formula for what she calls a “nonexploitative treatment” of deaf characters in literature: there are at least two deaf characters in a story, these deaf characters converse with each other, and their topic of conversation is about something other than being deaf or the deaf community. This stimulating compilation of short stories with deaf characters will endear, enlighten, provoke, and amuse all readers. This book is highly recommended for undergraduates and graduate students; professionals; general readers.

Jean F. Andrews is a Reading Specialist and Professor of Deaf Studies/Deaf Education at Lamar University.

Related articles

• Two Quick Stories (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Your Money or Your Life (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Deaf Driving Illegal? (brokenrulesmagazine.com)
• Deaf News: Capturing Deaf culture in BSL – Deaf Heritage website launched today (limpingchicken.com)
• Deaf Mother Hears Sound for the First Time with Hearing Implant (laughingsquid.com)

Florida Justice and the Tragedy of the White House Boys

By BitcoDavid

The Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys opened on New Years Day, 1900, and remained open for 111 years. At one point it was the largest juvenile reform school in the U.S. Young men and boys were sent there from all over the state, for all kinds of things – some criminal, and some not. Orphans, runaways and truants were housed with – and treated the same as – hardened juvenile offenders.

View of the infamous White House. Photo: Wikipedia

It wasn’t long after her opening, that the school began developing a macabre and fearsome reputation. As early as 3 years in, reports surfaced that inmates were being held in leg irons. The school was 14 years old, when a fire caused the deaths of six students. Shortly after that, a 13 year-old inmate died after only 38 days in custody.

By the early ’60s, Florida officials were saying things like, “somebody should have blown the whistle a long time ago”. — Wikipedia

Students were discovered hogtied, and held in isolation for weeks – even months – at a time. Inmates were commonly starved, beaten, raped and denied medical attention. And these are children. Boys 10, 11 and 12 years old.

One of the school’s administrators – OJ Keller – with the tools of the trade. Photo: White House Boys

The most notorious and chilling place on the entire campus was a small building known only as the White House. Here students were taken to be beaten and otherwise tortured.  Many boys died there. This statement isn’t an exaggeration. Both the state and Federal governments have been investigating the school over the past several decades, and have not yet finished discovering all the bodies buried in secret graves all over the campus.

Apparently one of the rules during these beatings was that the inmate couldn’t cry out. If the student made any audible noise, the beating would start over again.

In one story, a boy’s jaw was broken before receiving his beating with the strap. After the beating he was taken to a hospital, for his broken jaw.

In another story, a boy was taken to the White House after telling the camp psychiatrist that he would not allow the man to rape him. The psychiatrist was present at the beating. Other boys have since accused this same psychiatrist of raping them.

A portable radar device used for finding the hidden graves at the Dozier site. Photo: White House Boys.

Survivors of the school – and in particular the White House – have formed an organization dedicated to bringing about awareness of what went on at Dozier over the past century. They are called the White House Boys. They have published their stories on a Web site, and it’s a read that will absolutely chill you to the bone.

This is an important story, and I could go into more detail, but at a certain point it begins to become not only egregiously gruesome, but a bit hard to believe. The massive amount of torture, rape, blackmail, homicide, abuse, deception and outright – perverse – criminality on the parts of all the adults charged with caring for these children – dozens of them in total – seems so horrific it borders on nightmare-like.

Grit your teeth, tense your stomach muscles and go to the White House Boys to learn more. You can also go to this Wiki page, or here from NPR. Mad Mike’s America – my mentor site, has also covered the White House Boys’ story.

Now here’s what I don’t get about this. I understand Parchman Farm. I don’t condone or defend it, but I understand it. You had a financial motivation, a racial motivation and a resentment motivation. So I get that. But here – here you have an organization that ran for over a hundred years. Different administrators, different government officials and different staff would have resulted in policy changes, one would imagine. I can understand one psychotic warden, and maybe 20 bad years under him. The fact that this level of abuse, neglect and outright criminal behavior went on for decade after decade… well, was it built on an Indian burial ground? I just can’t understand how a place that large, and that public, could have an embedded culture of torture and murder that would last for over a century.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• The Exhumation of Florida’s Children: Digging Up the Past at Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys (laurabwilliamsdesigns.wordpress.com)
• ‘A CONCENTRATION CAMP FOR LITTLE BOYS’: Dark Secrets Unearthed In KKK County (secretsofthefed.com)
• Florida attorney general seeks exhumation of unmarked graves at White House Boys school site (jacksonville.com)
• ‘A concentration camp for little boys’: Dark secrets unearthed in KKK county (thedailysheeple.com)
• Digging for answers (newsherald.com)

Be Afraid… Be Very Afraid

By BitcoDavid

‘E Pluribus Unum’, a white Vermont marble sculpture, 1982, President Thomas Jefferson Elementary School, Honolulu, Hawaii (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

They’re everywhere, lurking under every rock, skulking behind every dark corner. The evil doers. The criminals, bent on the senseless destruction of all you hold dear. They exist only to rape your daughters, steal your goods – oh, and hack into your identity.

Whether it’s crazed road ragers who will shoot you for cutting them off in traffic, teenaged gang initiates who kill at random, immigrants who dig through your trash looking for credit card numbers or techie geniuses who want to turn your computer into a zombie, you’re constantly being told to live in fear.

E pluribus unum should be rewritten as, be afraid and buy some crap. Build more prisons and cut the school budget. I’m scared, and only a kristallnacht  of prosecution will let me sleep at night.

But Black men with guns aren’t our only criminal problem these days. Hackers. Hackers are everywhere, using their 200 I.Q.s as weapons against us. All we want to do is go on FaceBook – but no. These Gen-Y cyber-terrorists are out to post kiddie porn all over our pages, and use our e-mail addresses to steal our jobs.

Phreaking equipment (Photo credit: pyoorkate)

Speaking as a member of the Hacker community, and as someone with – oh just a smidge – of technical skill, let me explain something to you. There’s Hackers, Crackers, Phreakers, Social Engineers and Script Kiddies. Hackers are people who want to know how things work. We’re equivalent to the Hotrodders of the 1950s. Steve Jobs was a Hacker. So was Bill Gates. Crackers on the other hand, are guys who actually try to break into computer networks – sometimes to do damage, but most often, simply to prove that they can. Phreakers are specific to telephone systems. There was a time when you could access any corporate or government network by simply punching in the right numbers on your phone. As systems grew more complex, Phreaking began to ebb in popularity. however, Phreakers still exist.  Social Engineers don’t use technology. They manipulate wet-ware (you) to get access to systems. A Social Engineer is the guy who calls you at work and says, “Hi, I’m over here in the advertising department, and I forgot Bob’s password. You wouldn’t know it, would you?”

how-to-catch-script-kiddies (Photo credit: liquidslave)

Finally, we have Script Kiddies. These are people who simply go to certain Web sites to download Trojans and other malware. They actually know less about computers than you do.

Anonymous (Photo credit: Schuilr)

So on one hand you have a group of people who work towards Internet freedom, citizen journalism, pseudo-Socialist information sharing and flash-mob protesting. And on the other you have the D.O.J. Now, I’m not saying that true cyber-crime doesn’t exist. Nor am I defending it, or trying to say that it doesn’t pose a threat.

You can download a free and very effective anti-virus program here, and none of the above will be able to do anything to hurt you.

But like everything else where the Justice system is concerned, one needs to read between the lines and develop a sense of nuance. God forbid we end up with a War on Hacking similar to our failed and insane War on Drugs.

Personally, I’m far more afraid of Bank of America, than I am of some kid who knows a little perl.

To learn more, go to this article from the NYT, or here on Twitter.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• What is computer hacking? Introduction to Hacking (sruthintk.wordpress.com)
• I is HaXoR (thegreycorner.com)
• US spy agency seeks high school hackers (wcpo.com)
• An Introduction to Ethical Hacking (venusvimal.blogspot.com)
• Before Steve Jobs And Steve Wozniak Invented Apple, They Hacked Phones (slate.com)
• We are all afraid. (pollyflintsadventures.wordpress.com)
• Amnesty International Petition for Angola 3 Member (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• The Theft of Dignity by Pastor Mark Ehrlichmann (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• It Keeps You Young (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• Unique Opportunity From Lipreading Mom (deafinprison.wordpress.com)

Former Prosecutor Unloads on NYT

By BitcoDavid

Tumblr.com

Paul Butler is a former Federal prosecutor who (guilty of Driving While Black) learned firsthand what our punishment-crazed culture is all about. He now writes about Justice System reform, and is best known for his excellent book, Let’s Get Free – A Hip-Hop Theory of Justice. He did a beautiful op-ed piece in the Times, about the Gideon v. Wainwright case, which we discussed in You Have the Right to an Attorney… FAIL!

Two things should be clearly understood at the outset of this post. 1) The supreme court believed so strongly that all defendants deserved legal council, that they voted unanimously in the ruling. 2) Butler was a Federal Prosecutor when he found himself up against the lynch-mob mentality that is modern prosecution. If he had his rights trampled on, what chance do you or I have?

Mr Butler:

FIFTY years after the Supreme Court, in Gideon v. Wainwright, guaranteed legal representation to poor people charged with serious crimes, low-income criminal defendants, particularly black ones, are significantly worse off.

Don’t blame public defenders, who are usually overwhelmed. The problem lies with power-drunk prosecutors — I know, because I used to be one — and “tough on crime” lawmakers, who have enacted some of the world’s harshest sentencing laws. They mean well, but have created a system that makes a mockery of “equal justice under the law.” A black man without a high school diploma is more likely to be in prison than to have a job. — NYT (Emphasis, mine.)

Circle Players

In Harper Lee‘s timeless classic, To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch is asked to defend Tom Robinson, a Black man accused of raping a White, teen-aged girl – in the deep South. Finch faces huge opposition from the townspeople, but gives Robinson the best defense available – struggling between his belief in right and wrong, and his devotion to community. But the poor in America today, don’t get Atticus Finch. They get an overworked, underfunded Public Defender who merely makes a vain attempt at plea-bargaining the case down. And that’s if they’re lucky. Budget cuts and tough on crime elected officials are making it more difficult for the poor to get any representation at all.

More from Butler’s piece:

A poor person has a much greater chance of being incarcerated now than when Gideon was decided, 50 years ago today. This is not because of increased criminality — violent crime has plunged from its peak in the early 1990s — but because of prosecutorial policies that essentially target the poor and relegate their lawyers to negotiating guilty pleas, rather than mounting a defense.

After Gideon, things got better for poor defendants in the short term. Thousands who had not had lawyers at trial were released from jail. Many states and localities created public defenders’ offices. But political and legal developments soon eroded those achievements.

The so-called war on crime greatly expanded criminal liability. A prosecutor can almost always find some charge: there are over 4,000 crimes on the federal books alone. Recreational drug use is one of the more popular activities in America, but racial minorities suffer the brunt of drug-related convictions. –NYT

You can read the rest of this brilliant assessment of our current state of Justice for the poor, here.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• Gideon at 50: A stolen promise and the search for a soul (apublicdefender.com)
• Panama City case changed legal history 50 years ago // DOCUMENTS, VIDEO (newsherald.com)
• Serious problems persist in indigent legal defense (miamiherald.com)
• The Silence of Gideon (simplejustice.us)
• Judges Opt for “Drug Courts” in Non-violent Cases (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• How Americans Lost the Right to Counsel, 50 Years After ‘Gideon’ – Andrew Cohen – The Atlantic (theatlantic.com)
• Amnesty International Petition for Angola 3 Member (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Follow Up Letter in NYT About “Drug Courts” (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• The Theft of Dignity by Pastor Mark Ehrlichmann (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• It Keeps You Young (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)

The Injustice of Permanent Punishment

By BitcoDavid

Logo of the Food Stamp program (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In 1996 – under Clinton, by the way – the U.S. decreed that people convicted of drug related criminal offenses would never be eligible for Food Stamps or other government assistance. Up until 2011, almost a full quarter of states disenfranchised their ex-felon population, even after those individuals had served their sentences and paroles. Still, those rights are not restored automatically. The ex-convict, having expressed a desire to vote, must complete a process to have his suffrage rights restored. Virgina and Florida are still obtrusively intransigent. barring for life, anyone convicted of a felony, from voting.

The Washington D.C. office of the American Bar Association. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Many industries also ban ex-felons from working in them. For example, the American Bar Association will not allow ex-felons who successfully complete law school, from ever practicing law. That applies to civil law as well as felony law, so an ex-felon can not only never become a defense attorney, she can never practice any form of law. She can’t even be a clerk in an existing firm. Or, after serving a decade in prison, helping out in the infirmary, Prisoner number 01716S decides she wants to go to medical school. Well, she’s welcome to take all the classes she wants – but she’ll never be a doctor.

University of Tennessee

Now, let’s get back to the idea that incarceration serves as a societal disincentive against commission of criminal acts. Prisons were created in America, so the law biding could tell the non-law biding, if you do this, you’ll go to prison. Proponents of the death penalty – wrongly – rely on the deterrent argument. Theoretically, A person would think twice before committing an act so heinous as to result in execution. This being the case, since most felons go through life, blissfully unaware that they will never again be allowed to vote or get on the dole, I fail to see how disenfranchisement can serve as a deterrent.

Blue Ridge Community College

Whether the purpose of prison is to deter, to punish or to rehabilitate, one overarching fact remains. The very definition of justice states that once an individual has paid his debt to society, the punishment stops. Once the time is served – the time is served. The guy’s square with the house again. He or she should be allowed to pick up the pieces of their broken lives and start anew. This should apply to working – in any field, to voting – a Constitutional right – and to receiving government assistance. And especially so, to Food Stamps. Would you starve someone just for having made a mistake? Surely, that comes under the heading of cruel and unusual.

You can learn more about this issue by going to State Felon Voting Laws (ProCon.org), Felony Disenfranchisement (Wikipedia) and Unfair Punishments (New York Times).

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• New York Times editorial laments increases in “Disenfranchised Felons” (sentencing.typepad.com)
• Cammett on Felony Disenfranchisement and the Criminalization of Debt (lawprofessors.typepad.com)
• Voting connects inmates to society (bangordailynews.com)
• You Have the Right to an Attorney… FAIL! (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• “What’s In a Name? A Lot, When the Name is ‘Felon’” (sentencing.typepad.com)
• March 10th Digest Post – NYT (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Colorado to Big Pharma: Got Any Pentothal? (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Just Born! Welcome to BitcoDavid’s BoxingBlog (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• Amnesty International Petition for Angola 3 Member (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Wasted Lives – Our Children Die in Adult Jails (deafinprison.wordpress.com)

You Have the Right to an Attorney… FAIL!

By BitcoDavid

Constitutional Amendments 101 (Photo credit: Village Square)

Back in 1963, the SCOTUS ruled that you have a right to an attorney regardless of your ability to pay for one. The ruling was unanimous – one of the few unanimous rulings in the history of the Court. That’s how important the Justices viewed this particular Constitutional right. A half a century later, judges, lawyers, advocates and poverty level inmates all agree, that right is seldom secured.

Any courtroom activity other than a felony is exempt from the ruling, so poor people often go into court for Civil proceedings, such as lawsuits, evictions, family and custody disputes, and small claims cases, without the protection of legal counsel. The results can be disastrous. Cases exist, of abusive parents being granted custody, the elderly being evicted from rent-controlled apartments and individuals being dragged into court by large corporations for billing disputes.

hi, you are my public defender for a shoplifting case (Photo credit: ellesmelle)

During the recent bank foreclosure debacle, many families lost their homes when they shouldn’t have, due to the fact that they couldn’t afford representation. Your bank is attempting a fraudulent and illegal foreclosure, and they get away with it because they have huge legal staffs, but you’re eating cat food and can’t afford a lawyer.

The government created and funds an organization, the Legal Services Corporation.

They exist to provide legal services to people below the poverty line, in civil litigation. According to them, some 60 million Americans qualify for their services, but 80% of them never actually make use of the service. American trial judges were surveyed, and they – overwhelmingly – stated that they are seeing more and more cases of individuals acting as their own attorneys. These people are shooting themselves in the foot when it comes to courtroom procedures. They don’t understand how to present evidence, how to interview witnesses or how to submit documents. The machine rolls over them like an army tank, and they don’t have a clue as to what to do about it.

Percent and number below the poverty threshold for the United States (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Even in felony cases, the poor can suffer from a lack of representation. For example, a court appointed attorney – public defender – isn’t assigned until your case actually goes to trial. You don’t get even that paltry defense during the arraignment. Bail gets set, and you don’t have anybody to step up and ask the court to waive bail. You go to jail where you sit and wait – sometimes months – for a trial.

In this age of wrongful convictions, hyper-punishment, the school to prison pipeline and the creation of huge and powerless criminal class, it is essential that we do all we can to insure that everyone receives all the Constitutional protections due them, regardless of race, creed or net worth.

To learn more, check out these 2 links from the New York Times.

Right to Lawyer Can Be Empty Promise for Poor, and Needed in New York: Better Legal Defense for the Poor

 

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• Right to Lawyer Can Be Empty Promise for Poor (readersupportednews.org)
• March 13th Digest Post (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Follow Up Letter in NYT About “Drug Courts” (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Gideon v. Wainwright and the Right to Counsel in Immigration Removal Cases: An Immigration Gideon? (lawprofessors.typepad.com)
• How You Lost Your Right to Free Legal Counsel (newser.com)
• Canibal Cop Case Closing (Sorry) (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Just Born! Welcome to BitcoDavid’s BoxingBlog (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)
• February at DeafInPrison.com (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• The Theft of Dignity by Pastor Mark Ehrlichmann (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Law Enforcement Incentivized to Lie in Drug War (deafinprison.wordpress.com)

When Will They Ever Learn…

By Jean F. Andrews

As The Crackerhead Crumbles

In their popular 1960’s folk song, Peter, Paul and Mary sing the ballad, “Where Have All the Flowers Gone.” In the ballad, is the echoing refrain, “When Will They Ever Learn,” that points a firm finger at a society engaged in the Viet Nam War, wondering sadly, Where have all the flowers, soldiers and graveyards gone?  This sweet refrain, can also be applied to the many police departments across the country in Florida, Texas, North Carolina and Colorado who repeatedly refuse to give deaf suspects and inmates sign language interpreters during questioning as well as during important events during the arrest and jail intake, processing, orientation and during needed educational and rehabilitation services. Consequently, across the country, police departments have repeated lost legal cases and have had to pay hefty settlements costing the tax payers hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Mary Travers’ obituary page. Examiner.com

There is an easy solution.

Simply make it the police department policy to do the following as recommended by the Department of Justice.

A police officer, upon discovering an individual is deaf, by law, must offer the individual an opportunity to request a sign language interpreter. One way the officer may do so is by providing the deaf individual with a visual representation (illustrated below) allowing the deaf individual to make a choice. It depicts the ADA recognized symbol for sign language and includes two hands signing “yes” and “no”. The deaf individual can select “yes” or “no” by pointing to, circling, or signing the choice.

Deaf individuals too would be wise to copy this visual and keep in their wallet in the event they are stopped by a policeman.

 

 

Jean F. Andrews is a Reading Specialist and Professor of Deaf Studies/Deaf Education at Lamar University.

Related articles

• English: A Major Obstacle For the Deaf Suspect and Deaf Inmate (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Deaf Suspect Gets Settlement (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Englewood settles with deaf suspect who didn’t get interpreter (denverpost.com)
• Sign Language Interpreters (signsoflifeasl.wordpress.com)
• Booking, Medical/Psychological intake, and Classification: Why a Live Interpreter is Critical (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• ADA ignored by Denver Law Enforcement (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Bics & Calp (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• How do you Treat Deaf People with Psychological Disorders? (handstalktoo.wordpress.com)
• Feds Probe Denver for Violating Deaf Prisoner Rights (coloradoindependent.com)
• Just Born! Welcome to BitcoDavid’s BoxingBlog (bitcodavidsboxingblog.com)

CCA and Others Use Politics as Strategy

By BitcoDavid

In January of last year, the Sentencing Project released a 25 page report entitled, Too Good to be True – Private Prisons in America, by Cody Mason.

RortyBomb

In the first decade of this century, the number of state inmates in private prisons increased by 80%, but the number of Federal inmates, saw gains in the area of almost 10 times that amount. The overwhelming majority of those are in for drug related and other non-violent offenses, and evidence exists that these increases are along ethnic lines.

Consider:

• A staff psychiatrist employed by CCA in Florida was caught forcing female inmates to give him private lap-dances.

Village Voice

• In 2010, guards at CCA run Idaho Correctional Center, allowed several inmates to beat another inmate into a coma. It is said that they regularly used inmate violence as a way to gain leverage and maintain control.
• The state of Hawaii has removed all its inmates from private facilities.
• At Elizabeth Detention Center in New Jersey, a CCA run facility, an inmate was left to bleed to death on the floor – for 13 hours.

View this document on Scribd

And yet, GEO Group and CCA among others continue to spend hundreds of millions of dollars every year – over ½ billion just since 2000 – lobbying on both the  state and Federal levels. Their combined profits have been 3 Billion dollars since 2010. They lobby for such things as harsher sentences for drug crimes, stiffer mandatory sentences and 3 strike laws. In short, they profit by locking you up, and they are working tirelessly to make that easier to do.

CCA stock 10 year chart

You can see the original report here, but I have embedded it for your convenience.

BitcoDavid is a blogger and a blog site consultant. In former lives, he was an audio engineer, a videographer, a teacher – even a cab driver. He is an avid health and fitness enthusiast and a Pro/Am boxer. He has spent years working with diet and exercise to combat obesity and obesity related illness.

Related articles

• March 13th Digest Post (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• The More Americans They Put Behind Bars The More Money They Make (infiniteunknown.net)
• Private Prisons: The More Americans They Put Behind Bars The More Money They Make (thedailysheeple.com)
• Private Prisons; Policies & Profits (misbehavedwoman.wordpress.com)
• Happy Birthday CCA! You’re the New Parchman Farm! (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Deaf CCA Inmate Sues DC for Mistreatment (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• The Theft of Dignity by Pastor Mark Ehrlichmann (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Amnesty International Petition for Angola 3 Member (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Wasted Lives – Our Children Die in Adult Jails (deafinprison.wordpress.com)
• Event! DeafNation Expo at Gallaudet University (deafinprison.wordpress.com)