Juan_Bottom wrote:In both instances, neither of us had intended to commit a crime, and we turned ourselves in.
In my associate's case, he wrote the bad check at a store I worked at. My store called him, and he agreed to come in to pay it with cash, meanwhile a police officer was called to the store to arrest him when he got there. Sure enough, the detective who came to the store let him pay it with cash before taking him to jail.
His story was that his gf spent the money in his checking account without telling him. Sounds pretty plausible.
And in my case I hit a bicyclist with the passenger-side mirror of this van the same day I bought it. I was driving it home with no plates or insurance, and I thought what I hit was a road-sign. But it turned out the bicyclist hit the road sign. Anyway, I parked my van on the street in plain sight, and when the cops showed up at my house, I gave a written confession and everything, all without a lawyer. I didn't even know I was in trouble. That was the week of my 19th birthday, and so I've got this felony for life, no rehabilitation, no redemption, no anything.
And while I agree that hitting a bicyclist and driving away (there were other cars that drove away too, confirming my belief that I hit a sign) is very shitty, it was also very obviously an accident, or why the hell else would I even do the confession? Now since I was 19 I've had the same resume as a rapist or murderer.
EDIT: Oh yeah, and crazy turn of events; my associate lost his job when the economy took a dive. He couldn't find a job anywhere, being a felon and all, and he ended up selling dope. That's why I just say he's an associate. I don't like the guy anymore. It's pretty sad that he went from just a normal honest kid to not caring anymore.
These explanations shed more light on your earlier post.
Woodruff wrote:Funkyterrance wrote:PLAYER57832 wrote:Woodruff wrote:Juan_Bottom wrote:I have a felony for failure to render aid after a traffic accident.
I know a cat who got a felony for writing a bad check over $200.
There are over 1 million felony convictions nationwide each year.
Think about that.
The public doesn't know sh*t about how felonies work.
Wait, what are you saying? That those offenses are minor? Writing a bad check over $200 is serious theft under the right circumstances and failure to render aid can be equally shitty.
I'm not saying they are necessarily awful, depends on the scenario, but just to mention them as evidence that people don't understand felonies doesn't seem complete.
I don't think anyone disagrees with what you're saying as far as severity, necessarily. But none of those things are worthy of losing a Constitutional right, which is what happens with a felony conviction. It's like crimes that are felonies have become extremely commonplace items yet the resultant consequences haven't slid down the scale at all, and that doesn't make sense.
Right, like when people envision a felon(as JB was alluding earlier) they don't picture someone like JB, they picture a serial murderer, rapist, etc.. That's partly the reason why I don't think people should lose the right to own a gun with a felony charge, especially if the charge has nothing to do with guns. The other reason is that, like I mentioned earlier, that if you've served your sentence shouldn't you be more or less back to square one as far as rights are concerned?
I can see taking someone's rights away if they've had numbers of infractions and not learned their lesson but losing a right for one mistake that is potentially not even related to the right lost does seem a bit irrational.
](./images/smilies/eusa_wall.gif "Brick wall")
