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posted by martyb on Wednesday October 21 2015, @08:15AM   Printer-friendly
from the Judge:-30-days-or-$100?-Arrestee:-I'll-take-the-$100 dept.

The New York Times is reporting on a disturbing courtroom scene in rural Alabama. A circuit judge apparently required those who owe fines to give blood or face incarceration.

From the article:

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” began Judge Wiggins, a circuit judge here in rural Alabama since 1999. “For your consideration, there’s a blood drive outside,” he continued, according to a recording of the hearing. “If you don’t have any money, go out there and give blood and bring in a receipt indicating you gave blood.”

For those who had no money or did not want to give blood, the judge concluded: “The sheriff has enough handcuffs.”

[...] The dozens of offenders who showed up that day, old and young, filed out of the Perry County courthouse and waited their turn at a mobile blood bank parked in the street. They were told to bring a receipt to the clerk showing they had given a pint of blood, and in return they would receive a $100 credit toward their fines — and be allowed to go free.

[...] On Monday, the Southern Poverty Law Center filed an ethics complaint against Judge Wiggins, saying he had committed “a violation of bodily integrity.” The group also objected to the hearing beyond the matter of blood collection, calling the entire proceeding unconstitutional.

Payment-due hearings like this one are part of a new initiative by Alabama’s struggling courts to raise money by aggressively pursuing outstanding fines, restitution, court costs and lawyer fees. Many of those whose payments are sought in these hearings have been found at one point to be indigent, yet their financial situations often are not considered when they are summoned for outstanding payments.

Is it ethical to require blood donations under any circumstance?

Is the threat of jail for non-compliance (given that, theoretically, we don't have debtor's prison in the U.S.) even constitutional?

Is this a Fourth Amendment issue?


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  • (Score: 3, Disagree) by ledow on Wednesday October 21 2015, @09:49AM

    by ledow (5567) on Wednesday October 21 2015, @09:49AM (#252653) Homepage

    It's discriminatory.

    Some religions cannot give blood. Whether you agree with that or not, that's discrimination based on their religion.
    It's a physical violation - without due cause, you're saying that a physical violation can be accepted in lieu of cash. That's not acceptable. If you have to violate a body for legal purposes, there's a LOT of paperwork involved (whether that's court-ordered immunisation, or body searches).
    It's not fair - some people are scared of needles and thus it's much more of a burden for them and they may have to pay just because they can't take an easier way out that others can.
    It's unrelated - giving blood does not compensate the victims for the fines imposed (e.g. lawyers fees etc.). In the UK, we have a victim surcharge for such things that is paid towards victim charities, compensation, etc.
    It's unprecedented - a judge out to know better than to attempt such things.

    I have ABSOLUTELY no qualms about a judge mentioning a blood drive outside his court, in even some quite heavy terms. That's a way to impose a bit of humanity into the people before him.
    But using whether or not they did as offset against fines etc. is ludicrous and discriminatory and liable to all kinds of problems (What next? A cake sale by his wife's club?).

    Now if the victim and the perpetrator themselves came to a similar sort of agreement (i.e. "Don't pay me back, but prove you've donated blood / helped a charity / cut an old person's lawn for them, I'll accept that as recompense"), even in court, that's up to them. But it's not for judges to do this kind of thing on behalf of unrepresented people, certainly not if it's unfair or discriminatory, and that in itself shows that this guy probably shouldn't have been judging people for many years as he doesn't understand his own country's laws.

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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @10:26AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @10:26AM (#252667)

    Now if the victim and the perpetrator themselves came to a similar sort of agreement (i.e. "Don't pay me back, but prove you've donated blood / helped a charity / cut an old person's lawn for them, I'll accept that as recompense"), even in court, that's up to them.

    These were fines and fees, not damages or reparations. So guess what? The victim was the state, represented by the court. So the victim's representative was indeed the one who made the agreement with the perpetrators.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @10:33AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @10:33AM (#252669)

    Religious objection is arbitrary, and therefore discrimination against religion is meaningless.

    • (Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @12:06PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @12:06PM (#252691)

      Religious objection might be superstitious, reactionary, bigoted, pig-headed and stupid. But for sincere believers it's far from arbitrary.

      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @01:37PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @01:37PM (#252719)

        You cannot accommodate every crazies out there, and they multiply.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @02:28PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @02:28PM (#252759)

          > You cannot accommodate every crazies out there, and they multiply.

          That you equate religion with craziness reveals more about your disconnect from the human experience than anything else. Just because your life hasn't included religion doesn't make the billions of religious people in the world crazies. Religiosity is not binary.

          • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Anal Pumpernickel on Wednesday October 21 2015, @04:29PM

            by Anal Pumpernickel (776) on Wednesday October 21 2015, @04:29PM (#252823)

            Individual religious people aren't necessarily crazy, but their religions are definitely crazy.

            As for the "human experience": Part of that seems to be to use arguments from ignorance to justify a belief in some magical sky daddy, in many people's cases. It's really an absurd part of the human experience.

            • (Score: 2) by edIII on Wednesday October 21 2015, @08:55PM

              by edIII (791) on Wednesday October 21 2015, @08:55PM (#252916)

              NOT SO FAST.

              There's an awful lot of rules and regulations in the various religions for the simple reason that it was the easiest and most effective vehicle to enact regulatory policing of the populace for their benefits. 2,000 years ago you would not have had a very successful time explaining to an average man why he shouldn't eat pork, yet in hindsight, we would all tell that man not to eat the pork. Granted this is somewhat connected to ancient alien theories, which is simply information presented to us in a context we could understand it. That being said, there's been quite a bit of information verified in a recent history to be quite "wise" regardless of the source.

              One of those is that you should not *receive* blood, or organs, from anyone. IIRC 7th day adventists and Jehova's witnesses carry that belief and blood transfusions are therefore not kosher, at all. We've labeled it ignorance, but I find it very interesting that we know now how that DNA is basically in flux all the time and is actively exchanging DNA with itself and other organisms (well beyond simple virus behavior). In other words, you can get modifications to your own DNA from contact with other DNA, which is information I think only presented to us this *year*. DNA is *not* read-only apparently, and beyond simple degradation, you have other factors in play that change DNA. It's also believed by some that diseases like Lyme disease are so difficult to treat because DNA is literally being changed detrimentally and permanently. I forgot who was researching that avenue, but they were quite adamant that it was a different delivery vehicle than simple bacteria, but was something else akin to a virus in how it altered DNA in the subject.

              I wish I could recall this other article as well, but there was a study which made a pretty good case that mothers often receive some type of cell from their offspring that quite literally rejuvenates their hearts with younger DNA and shorter telomeres. The study itself posited that these benefits could easily be generational in women that have children at different points in life. Again, that's very interesting when you contrast it against the seemingly ignorant information presented from religion. Perhaps that article was even posted here?

              Not everything from religion is sourced from craziness. Whether they were told, or just got lucky in hindsight, there does seem to be scientific reasons why we should hesitate (or at least carefully consider) the genetic sources of blood transfusions and organ transplants. Pork turned out to be quite wise simply because we understand now that pork is largely not healthy for us (most meat isn't), and hygienic conditions for the animals allowed much disease to be transmitted. Those are all scientific reasons we understand, and I believe there is a good chance we will find more.

              What if it turns out that quite a bit of information, including memories, are passed along in the blood? I would refuse for that reason alone, which is a logical objection against the dissemination of the information contained in my DNA. It's information leakage, and I prefer to tightly control how such information leaks, and to whom :)

              There are valid reasons beyond religion to carefully consider and hesitate with blood transfusions and organ donations. Although, I agree when the choice is "Cake or Death" though, you should probably take the cake.

              --
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              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @09:25PM

                by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @09:25PM (#252926)

                Barking up the wrong tree, eh? If an objection is expressed in a reasonable, rational, perhaps even scientific terms, instead of "god told me so", we wouldn't have this discussion, would we?

              • (Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Wednesday October 21 2015, @10:06PM

                by Anal Pumpernickel (776) on Wednesday October 21 2015, @10:06PM (#252944)

                There's an awful lot of rules and regulations in the various religions for the simple reason that it was the easiest and most effective vehicle to enact regulatory policing of the populace for their benefits. 2,000 years ago you would not have had a very successful time explaining to an average man why he shouldn't eat pork, yet in hindsight, we would all tell that man not to eat the pork.

                Appealing to a magical sky daddy just isn't a very effective or truthful way to go about anything. If you cannot explain why it's not a good idea for someone to eat pork, then chances are you have no reason you know about to tell someone else not to eat pork. If you knew of a reason not to eat pork, then you could tell them. No magical sky daddies necessary. Then you have to consider that, along with these 'good' bits of information (which are typically poorly explained, and communicated in a 'because I said so' fashion), there are also tons of evil commandments. Religion really isn't good overall, even if you can find the occasional truth in some religious text. But regardless of how much 'good' religion supposedly does or did, people who care about truth will naturally steer clear of it, or at least they likely will if they have not been indoctrinated or they get over their indoctrination.

  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by RedGreen on Wednesday October 21 2015, @10:57AM

    by RedGreen (888) on Wednesday October 21 2015, @10:57AM (#252673)

    "It's unprecedented - a judge out to know better than to attempt such things."

    No history knowledge at all, there used to the old join the army or go to jail sentencing IMHO way worse than this would ever be...

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    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @06:22PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 21 2015, @06:22PM (#252858)

      I had a buddy in the Army that while he wasn't told to join the army or go to jail, it was implied that he would be allowed to join the army in lieu of jail.

      He had already started the process to join, and being sent to jail would have borked that possibility. Even he agreed, the army was a much better choice then jail, and last I knew he was doing a good job keeping his nose clean. He just needed a bit of direction. In fact I think a lot of people who are going to jail for low level stuff should be give the option of Army/Marines bootcamp instead. About 6 months of that can do a lot to straighten out some poor youthful attitudes, and give you the self confidence to accomplish something.

      • (Score: 2) by RedGreen on Wednesday October 21 2015, @11:54PM

        by RedGreen (888) on Wednesday October 21 2015, @11:54PM (#252991)

        Yeah well that is same shit different pile as far as I am concerned implied/instructed to do is same thing.

        --
        "I modded down, down, down, and the flames went higher." -- Sven Olsen
  • (Score: 2) by Alfred on Wednesday October 21 2015, @02:22PM

    by Alfred (4006) on Wednesday October 21 2015, @02:22PM (#252754) Journal
    I don't give blood anymore but this hardly discriminatory. Every activity can only be performed by a subset of the population, including breathing. To say that any of those activities will benefit you if done is discriminatory to those who can't do it is life. Life is unfair and harsh, equality does not naturally exist.

    What the judge did was provide an easy out, he didn't mandate anything. He threw a bone to some criminals, there was no physical violation because it was optional. I suspect that he was wanting them to think about helping others or doing something for the common good. Something they wouldn't have normally thought of and something most of us do for free. I also suspect it didn't do that much good.
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anal Pumpernickel on Wednesday October 21 2015, @04:35PM

      by Anal Pumpernickel (776) on Wednesday October 21 2015, @04:35PM (#252825)

      Life is unfair and harsh, equality does not naturally exist.

      You could use the same reasoning to justify anything. That life is unfair and harsh is no reason to make it even more unfair and harsh. Just the opposite: We should strive to make life more fair.

      What the judge did was provide an easy out

      We could also provide a way out by not creating the problem in the first place. That is, don't give people absurd fines they have no ability to pay and then threaten to send them to a de facto debtors' prison if they can't pay it. There is no real choice here.

  • (Score: 1) by simonInOz on Thursday October 22 2015, @03:44AM

    by simonInOz (2173) on Thursday October 22 2015, @03:44AM (#253083)

    I am not permitted to donate blood. I was in the UK whilst mad cow disease was rampant, and thus the Australian Blood Service will not accept donations.

    Fortunately, I don't live in Alabama. I don't know if they have heard of mad cow disease - or the UK.

    I think the idea of blood donation being unacceptable was well covered by the Merchant of Venice (Shakespeare, 1605)

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