Banishment. Move a convict far away from home. The threat of isolation is a great deterrant. This would apply only to actual crimes in which a gun was used. It would apply only when someone was convicted of using a gun to injure, rob, kill someone, or a convicted felon in possession of a gun. It works like this. You do the crime, you do the time. But, you do the time in another state far away from your family and friends who might want to come visit you. Thugs don't like this. They enjoy parading around in the latest prison fashions in front of their family and friends. They also like showing off their new jailhouse tatoos. It ain't as much fun being a tough guy when there's nobody around that knows you and can appreciate your toughness. The Feds can already do this. They have a nationwide system of prisons and can move you wherever thay want. The states would have to set up reciprocal agreements where they would trade inmates. This would be especially useful in controlling gun crimes among gangs. I don't have the stats but I understand this is already being done in some jurisdictions with great success. This probably wouldn't help much on the crazies who shoot up schools and other places because a lot of them planned to kill themselves anyway, but it would work for a lot of other criminals. We've got a lot of corrections officers on this forum. Pro and con, what do you think about banishment?

When a boy I was a big reader on indians and the old west. The indian tribes didnt have prisions. The way they handeld their criminals was to bannish them from the tribe. From what I read that was almost worse than death to them. Outside of their tribe I guess it was like the mark of cain to them and without tribal protection their lives were in jepordy.
I dont know how much of that was fiction, but I darn sure know they didnt have jails!
Way back I had a GF that had a thug brother that had done time for murder. I belive he had been in a biker outlaw club. He got out, got in a accident and was paralised. He was in a skid row los angeles convalesant home. Quite a experiance to see. Anyway she conned me into driveing her down there to visit him. He wanted out so I got the honnor of pushing him in his wheelchair around some nearby stores for the afternoon.
We were wheeling around in a dollar store and another guy saw him, stopped me and asked him, folsom? Pelican? Quentin! Quentin, mark grunted!

I hear Antarctica is nice this time of year.

I used to live in lancaster california. In the early 60s it still was a fairly nice area. It was still hats and boots country. They built a state prison besides the county prision. Things went downhill as many prisioners familys moved in the area to live nearby. When things got thin at lockheed where I worked as a guard some of our officers took prision guard jobs. Once I got a little embarressed. I was in costco and ran into a old friend that now was working the tehatchipi prision nearby. I made the mistake of asking him how he liked it. That led to how he could smell cons that were out on the outside. He got a little excited and loud and started pointing out certain people in the crowd that he was sure were cons! Heads were snapping our way!

What was it Ted Nugent said? "I don't like repeat offenders, I like dead offenders."

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Centennial Every Day

Speaking about many of the Vermont natives in jail I'd want them to stay as close to home as possible. I'm not talking the hardcore felons but those serving a couple of years and returning to the community at the end of their sentence. What tends to happen is our "locals" end up "learning the trade" in out of state jails. They meet gang members and learn things they had never thought of. They also make "contacts" and, when they return to the community, bring drug dealers with them (and the dealers bring their guns). Then we bust the drug dealers, put them in our jails to mix with more of our locals, and the cycle continues. And as an observation, until we find a way to take the enormous profits out of the drug trade we'll never end this problem (and I dealt with this issue for 35 years, arresting 3 generations of druggies before I retired).

Send them somewhere they can never come back from. Ever.
Use of firearm in commision of crime= attempted murder= capital crime. Rape= capital crime, arson= capital crime.

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Halfway and one more step

Out of state work camps. Make the miscreants bust rocks for 18 hours a day. Be too tired to cause more trouble. And jail would be no picnic rite of passage for punks. Oughta be an extremely unpleasant experience that any sane person would want to avoid at all costs.

I used to see prisoners on the chain gang cleaning highway ditches in Virginia when I was a boy. They oughta bring that back, too. That was a visible sign to all who passed by as to what would happen if you broke the law badly enough to wind up in jail.

Ol' Sparky works or better yet and cheaper some rope.

How to reduce gun-crimes.....well, I would have my own gun.

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GA Carry member
Vietnam Vet

I say give them what they want. Those that are habitual felons due to drugs, inject them with drugs 24/7 for the duration of their entire sentence. Gang member? Put them in a cell with and chain them for their entire sentence.

Charlie, I'm not a C.O. nor never have been, but on the surface your idea has merit..

Prisoners need to earn their own keep. Busting rocks may be a little harsh for someone who got caught with a little pot, but what ever happened to the prison farms? These guys wouldn't be so eager to get back to the joint if they knew they would be spending their days digging taters instead of working out and playing ball.

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Insert short witty words here

Guys, I said this many years ago.......we should do prisoner transfers with someplace like China with death row and capital offendors.....think the gang bangers will like the chinese system?.......outsource......problem solved...

Make em shoot it out on regularly scheduled TV programs.
That would be some reality TV that i would watch.
Send them to the coliseum!

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the rules? there are no rules

Mr. Veep said it in his interview prior to making a report to Mr. Pres. "The fed. Gov. does not have the time or manpower to prosecute!"

It is very plain, their agenda is more about controlling the law abiding gun owner than it is about controling the criminal element.

Let's face it, the current policy makers are not complete idiots. Surely they can see the stupidity of 'pass a law' when the criminal element will plainly ignore it just as they ignored the many other laws. Surely they can see the error in doing the same thing over & expecting different results. I can not draw any other conclusion other than the real idea is to disarm EVERYONE!

If the GOV. would prosecute ALL gun law violations, then & only then would they show a need for just one more law.

Some time ago, one of my guns was stolen from a friend's home. The gun was recovered & I was called to testify before a grand jury. In an interview prior to testimony, the prosicuting attorney asked me what I thought a fitting charge. I stated that the perp had armed himself while in the act of committing a felony robbery, the least the charge should be is armed robbery. Long story short, they bargained down to petty theft & malicious mischief. A small fine & time served, next case. By the way, it was his 2nd home burglary charge that was bargained away.

Sounds good to me, whatever happened to "three Strikes you're out" seems every murderer, thief, rapist, arrested has 15-20 prior arrests for violent crimes what the devil is going on??
Steve W

Hey, that guy was actually pretty good. Usually he got 4 out of 5 right unless a bunch of long haul truck drivers were around. Same walk, same stare - like looking down an endless road.
He was better at spotting other officers by their slow aimless walk. He called it the Tehachapi Shuffle. Kind of like a cowboy that had been on a horse too long and trying to walk that first ten steps with numb feet.

And no to the question of banishment. It only worked with Indian tribes because they had packs of wolves back then. Also most Indians had a bad habit of stealing each others women. When any were seen alone, the others got worried he was about to return the last woman stolen and put a arrow in him quick.

Banishment to another prison only works when you send him from a prison where his gang is dominant, to a prison dominated by another gang that hates his gang really bad.

Send them to New York City!!

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Richard Gillespie
FBINA 102

Transfer them to Afghanistan, and tell them to pick a side.

Edited to add: this was facetious, in case someone took it the wrong way (no disrespect at all for our troops.)

When I was young, my parents had a friend who had been in prison for armed robbery. He said that it was the worst time of his life, and that his was not a "camp" but an experience that impressed upon him that he never, ever wanted to return. So, he lived his life on the straight and narrow after his release. Prison should be punishment, and accomplish just that: no one should ever want to go back.

Our Constitution forbids cruel and unusual punishment.

No, they have no intention of disarming their rich friends. No one is going to give up their armed bodyguards. Particularly Hollywood Actors that live in expensive mansions.

No rich person or business owner wants police disarmed. When the alarm goes off at their factory they want an armed policeman headed that way right now.

Can you imagine working at a bank with unarmed police out on patrol. You would need to be in one cement room and the public in another. And customers would be afraid to walk in.

If politicians had no armed guards you would only see them on television. No public events - ever.

They only want to disarm me and you because our lives and houses and kids are not worth much.

Until fairly recently, prisons were only used to hold the accused until some kind of trial. Then they received various whippings, or execution. When the Romans conquered England (or wherever) punishment of the conquered-classes might even include being required to fight in the coliseum.

Scotts, Irish, and all Germanic tribes were like American Indians - Extended family groups where everyone is related. Grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings. When someone married into a neighboring peaceful clan or tribe it helped keep the peace and cut down on inbreeding.

Banishment? You might recall the story about Eric the Red, going on to discover Canada I believe. They were one people all related - except for the wives stolen from England.
The Vikings in Newfoundland

At some point well meaning great thinkers decided our United States prisons should NOT just be for holding people until trial and whatever whipping, torture, or execution. Give them time to repent. The Pennsylvania silent system with a bible to read and work in silence had some merit.
(Lots of insanity). Eventually we progressed to the wonderful system we have today.

When the Chinese finally take us over the convicts will no longer be permitted to run the prisons and the bad side of the cities. They love factory hard labor prisons. They also are real big on a pistol bullet to the back of the head thing.

Nothing new under the sun. Conquered peoples are always disarmed and mistreated in two class systems.

When the Chinese finally take us over the convicts will no longer be permitted to run the prisons and the bad side of the cities. They love factory hard labor prisons. They also are real big on a pistol bullet to the back of the head thing.

this idea has merit.
Also, I've seen shows on tv about prison in third world countries. prisoners there don't get 3 hots OR a cot. they have to earn the right to eat.

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UNDER THE CONE OF SILENCE

How about the "small" crimes? The ones where they get 30 days in jail. I don't like supporting these idiots for 30 days. Instead of expensive jail time, let's bring back stocks on the courthouse lawn. The guilty would have to spend one day in the stocks and be subjected to ridicule and soft objects (like rotten food) thrown at them. I'm not advocating allowing them to be permanently injured. But I do think real negative consequences are currently lacking in our judicial punishment system.