[Magdalen] Heather Cook

[Jay Weigel]

I sort of disagree, because the point of that is to open their eyes to what
drunk driving *does*. I would actually prefer something more in the nature
of servitude to the family, but not sure how that would be accomplished in
this case. I don't consider either revenge at all.

On Thu, Oct 29, 2015 at 7:17 PM, Molly Wolf <lupa at kos.net> wrote:

>  I don't doubt, as Don has said, that the family has the right to bring
> suit for civil damages.  But "menial" duties and rubbing the criminal's
> face in his or her crimes is retributory justice, not restorative justice.
> The object isn't to bring the offender back into right relationship with
> God and the community, but to destroy the offender.  Strictly eye-for-eye
> stuff.
>
> I think Don has a better right to speak to this than I do.  In my active
> alcoholic days, I too drove drunk.  I'm coming up on six years of sobriety,
> and I never had an accident, but it gives me a sense of "there but for the
> grace of God..."
>
> Molly
>
> The man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no
> other way. -- Mark Twain
>
> > On Oct 28, 2015, at 9:30 PM, Jay Weigel <jay.weigel at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On the other hand, restorative justice would, at least to me, demand that
> > Heather Cook be liable for a rather large sum of money to Tom Palermo's
> > family, and that perhaps she also should serve in a menial capacity in an
> > ER on weekends for a goodly stretch of time so that she could see and
> deal
> > with, on a visceral level, the results of drunk driving, and other
> > alcohol-related crimes. (The latter has been pretty effective with teen
> > drinkers, BTW.)
> >
> >> On Wednesday, October 28, 2015, <thedonboyd at austin.rr.com> y thwrote:
> >>
> >> As some of you know, my daughter Amy was killed in November of 1992
> when a
> >> drunk driver drove his vehicle head-on into the car Amy was driving.  I
> do
> >> not claim that this circumstance gives me any special authority or
> wisdom
> >> greater than any of the rest of you, but it is fair to say that I have
> had
> >> a long time to think about the issues around drunk driving.  Here is
> what I
> >> think at present:
> >>
> >> (1)  The wishes of the family of the man who was killed are irrelevant
> to
> >> the criminal case against the driver.  To define drunk driving as a
> crime
> >> is to declare it an injury to the state, to all its people, and the
> >> criminal justice system should aim to make them (not the family of the
> >> decedent alone) whole if possible, and to deter others from committing
> >> similar crimes in future.
> >> (2)  "Retributive justice,"  aka vengeance, is not something I can
> >> endorse, nor can I understand what people who claim that it can help to
> >> give the victim's family "closure."
> >> (3)  There is no such thing as "closure" as the term is used above.
> >> (4)  To the extent that a fiscal injury to the family of the victim can
> be
> >> demonstrated, there are civil remedies that may apply.  Liability (as
> some
> >> of your posts have suggested) may attach to Ms Cook's employer as well
> as
> >> to her person.   (Here--and only here IMO--are arguments about equity in
> >> magnitude of punishment in relation to magnitude of offense relevant.)
> >> (5)  As far as my awareness goes, drunk driving cases are extremely
> >> difficult to prosecute.  This may be due to the very high incidence of
> >> alcohol and/or drug abuse (and hence the disposition of jury panelists
> and
> >> judges to think that in some circumstances they themselves could have
> >> committed similar offenses).
> >> (6)  As others have pointed out, severity of sentencing does not
> correlate
> >> with reduced recidivism.  There is no evidence that the high cost of
> >> incarceration is compensated by reduction in the incidence of offenses.
> >>
> >> Finally, sin is sin is sin.  Heather Cook's sin (in this and in all her
> >> life) is between her and God, and is none of my (or anybody else's) damn
> >> business.
> >>
> >> God be merciful to me, a sinner.  God be merciful to Heather, a sinner.
> >>
> >>
>