Harry Boy

Gosh....

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court ruled Monday that federal officials can indefinitely hold inmates considered "sexually dangerous" after their prison terms are complete.
Court: Sexually dangerous can be kept in prison

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Harry Boy (Genius)

In The Absence Of Law And Order Society Will Surely Destroy Itself

chicowalker

Curious to hear what the other "small government" folks here think about this.

While the people affected in this case are about as low as you get, this kind of law imo is a clear overreach by the government and has very dangerous ramifications.

I'm guessing that the Supreme Court decision here is very narrow and that this law will wind up being overturned on other grounds.

mcgraw_wv

Yes, this is horrible. Anyone convicted of a crime and serves their sentence deserves to be free.

It is the Judges and Jury's job to determine how long they should be detained.

If Judges are worried they won't be rehabilitated, give them a life sentence, with a parol hearing every year to determine their ability to safely be released into society.

khayos

What kind of "small government" people are you looking for? Fiscal conservatives who are more interested in Federal entitlement programs and don't really care or libertarians who hate the cops?

Mrs.PatsFanInVa

Just a few points:

1) Today's Supreme Court simply upheld a 2006 ruling that allows the federal government to provide for the continued detention of sexually dangerous federal inmates who have completed their prison terms.

The Supreme Court in 1997 ruled that U.S. states could confine dangerous sex offenders to mental institutions after they served their sentences - the current administration has argued that the federal government also has the same authority.

That right was granted in 2006 and upheld today.

2) Federal Law defines sexually dangerous as someone who suffers from a serious mental illness, abnormality or disorder who would have difficulty in refraining from sexually violent conduct or child molestation if released.

So, in other words, once a person is defined as "sexually dangerous" he has been pre-diagnosed as suffering from a serious mental illness or disorder - which means the state (or the government) can confine him to a mental institution.

Prisoners will not be held in prisons past their release date - but they can be confined to a mental hospital until pronounced "cured." (Most likely never.)

FT.com / US / Politics & Foreign policy - US top court upholds federal sex offender law

Yanno, I'm ok with that.

Leave No Doubt

Indeed this is a very slippery slope however detention without reason is not a new law, Bush put indefinite detention in place after 911 and Our Leader chose to continue it almost directly after he took office. The fact it's now specific to sexual offenders is probably designed to garner popular support but it's only a tiny tip of what's a very nasty slope overall. Bizarre as it sounds and difficult as this may be to say, I hope this goes away. Dangerous precedent.

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edit...2012 BABY!

chicowalker

Anybody who claims they believe in "small government"

If you're a fiscal conservative but don't care about the government locking people up indefinitely without due process, you don't really want small government.

Harry Boy

Probably makes a lot of Rape Victims smile.

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Harry Boy (Genius)

In The Absence Of Law And Order Society Will Surely Destroy Itself

chicowalker

Do you know anything about involuntary confinement to psychiatric facilities?

If this is in line with those laws (and those laws are reasonable -- which I'll assume they are for this discussion), I have no problem with the decision -- aside from the fact that the law would seem unnecessary.

If that's the case, however, I'm not sure how it should have anything to do with the prisoners' incarceration (and, in fact, shouldn't they be in a psychiatric facility in the first place, if this is the case?).

DarrylS

Elena Kagan successfully argued this case..

Those darlings of the right Thomas and Scalia dissented.. interesting eh?

BTW this only applies to Federal Prisoners already in custody, and has no application for individual states...

United States v. Comstock - ScotusWiki

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"Being the best doesn't mean you always win. It just means you win more than anyone else".. tweet from Kurt Warner to Tom Brady.