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| Source: www.salon.com |
On my previous blog titled Poverty and Criminal Justice in the United States, I have discussed how the poor are the once who suffer the most in the criminal justice system because they cannot afford to pay high court fees and other charges such as getting an expensive lawyer to defend them in a fair trial. It is no secret that our criminal justice is in favor of the wealthy people who can pay their way out of jail or harsh sentencing.
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| Source: news.nationalpost.com |
There is a double standard is our justice system. You are likely to get a light sentence if you are rich in our society. Lets look at the case of Ethan Couch (affluenza teen) who was sentenced to 10 years’ probation after killing four people and paralyzing one person while driving drunk in June. If Ethan Couch had been part of the poor class his punishment would have been jail time. It is no secret that the rich can get away with anything, and the poor who cannot get themselves out of jail have unfair trials.
According to PRA, the poor are given a bad representation when they cannot afford to pay an expensive lawyer. Some defendants who cannot afford to hire an attorney themselves are never assigned a public defender. Many death row prisoners have been represented by incompetent and incompatible lawyers. But different would be the case for someone who would be wealthy and able to pay for a good lawyer to represent them in a fair trial.
Like I said before “a solution to the problem is to have a legislative reform or to ratify the sixth amendment and have set prices on lawyers to represent every single person equally and fairly. This would eliminate the rich having fair trials because of their money. This way everyone would be treated equally and we would be given a fair trial.”
1 comment:
In Carolina Vazquez's post, "Wealthy and Criminal Justice in the United States", she argues that sixth amendment should be ratified and have fixed prices on lawyers for every person to be represented equally and fairly, which would remove the affluent peers from having the fair trials because of the wealth they possess. And therefore, everybody would be treated with justice, equality and would be given a fair trial.
I completely agree with the argument she made. After looking at the articles she has used to support her argument, it is indeed true that rich people get away because of their money and is not some undisclosed secret and which I find very unfair. In one of the case, Vazquez’s used in her argument was astonishing, in which Gurbaksh Chahal, a millionaire who was charged with 45 felony counts but later was reduced to misdemeanors and was just condemned to 25 hours of community service. This case definitely supports her argument and proofs the point she is making very well. I would also like to discuss this case, where a Texas judge decided not to send a teenager from a rich family to prison after he killed four people while drinking and driving. This is not fair that he got off so easily because if it was for a poor person they would have to spend a lot of time in jail. This should be changed so people will not trying to find there way out of law by using money.
Overall, her argument seems very thoughtful and coherent.
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