Guest Blog from Jackie - Response to Anonymous

"Do you have children, Jackie? Picture someone breaking into your house and RAPING your children, or possibly hypothetical children- tell me that person doesn't deserve punishment. Find out that this person has raped before, and has slipped through the system so he could repeat these offenses... OPEN YOUR EYES!"

First, I want to thank you for taking on this very difficult and painful subject and engaging in discussion.  I do have 3 children and 5 grandchildren and have worked hard to be close to them and to care for them.  And it is exactly from this place that I say that Ani does not need punishment in order to become responsible for his actions. 

I think we are both in agreement that the act of sexual violence is a terrible thing and that it does terrible things to people.  I think we are also in agreement that we must do all we can to prevent it from ever being done to anyone, and in particular to anyone that we care about.  It sounds like we are also in agreement that the system we have built to help us to stop this crime from happening is failing to do this and that it needs to work better.  The problem that I see and that I have seen first hand is that punishment does not accomplish this goal.  That is what makes me so sad and frustrated - that we keep doing something that in many cases is making things worse, making us less safe. 

There is much we can learn from Ani's life and one thing I have learned is that punishment has not made him either more safe or more responsible.  We need to look elsewhere to do that and that is where my efforts lie.  With my own children and grandchildren, I see the same thing - punishment does not work to provide them with valuable lessons in anything.  Instead, it makes them angry and hateful and vengeful - not qualities that I want to nurture in them.

Our challenge here is very important.  Yes, we simply MUST open our eyes to what we are doing when we use punishment to attempt to "teach" people to be loving, kind, and responsible to others and to how their actions impact others.  Our system certainly is failing us, and we can do better.  We can change the way we treat offenders.  We can spend more time and  money to find out what has caused them to act this way and to provide them with help to become responsible.  Those who do not or cannot use these services are free to stay in prison.  I see no purpose or value in the way that our current system locks people up for a magic number of years as if they will be somehow magically "cooked" after that number of years.  It is not the number of  years in prison that makes a person into a safe and responsible member of a community, it is what happens to a person during those years.  We spend way too much time and too many legal resources arguing about the number of years a person "gets" and way too little time and money discussing what should be happening to this person and with this person during the time that we are paying for their food, housing, clothing, and care in a state institution.  I guess, from my viewpoint of watching this happen to Ani for the last 30 years, I've had a ring-side seat.

I am not attempting to be "right" in stating my observations and opinions, but only to share what I think and believe to be true.  I welcome this dialog and these challenges and questions.  I think that it is through this kind of discussion that we will build a better world for us and for our children.