Last Thursday Christopher Franklin Weaver was released from jail. 55 minutes later he was robbing a Pacific Continental Bank a mile down the road. Less than two hours after being released, Mr. Weaver was back behind bars... for the third time.
Weaver's first offense: 2nd degree sexual assault. Next: parole violation. Finally: attempted federal robbery. But the biggest problem isn't Weaver. It's the people who put him behind bars.
Prison is supposed to accomplish three things. Protect society, punish the offender, and rehabilitate the criminal.
Protecting society is an obvious must. However, in this case the authorities clearly failed. Weaver was free to commit his third crime because of prison overcrowding. He was simply let loose to free up a cell.
Punishing the offender is the easiest of the three. And Weaver was punished, though perhaps not as much as his victims would have liked, or even as much as justice demanded.
Finally, rehabilitation. Sexual assault and prison. Back on the street, parole violation. Released again, and in less than an hour Weaver is holding up a bank. He gets worse, not better.
It's not surprising that healing was Oregon's weak point. Protecting society should be simple. It's a question of having enough money to keep criminals behind bars. Punishing is even easier. We do it all the time. We punish our children, complain about our boss, get back at others, and harbor lasting grudges - all in the name of justice.
That's why healing is the hardest. Punishing someone in a way that helps them. To heal, you have to care. And caring about the very people who have hurt us is above and beyond the call of duty.
Or is it?
Weaver's first offense: 2nd degree sexual assault. Next: parole violation. Finally: attempted federal robbery. But the biggest problem isn't Weaver. It's the people who put him behind bars.
Prison is supposed to accomplish three things. Protect society, punish the offender, and rehabilitate the criminal.
Protecting society is an obvious must. However, in this case the authorities clearly failed. Weaver was free to commit his third crime because of prison overcrowding. He was simply let loose to free up a cell.
Punishing the offender is the easiest of the three. And Weaver was punished, though perhaps not as much as his victims would have liked, or even as much as justice demanded.
Finally, rehabilitation. Sexual assault and prison. Back on the street, parole violation. Released again, and in less than an hour Weaver is holding up a bank. He gets worse, not better.
It's not surprising that healing was Oregon's weak point. Protecting society should be simple. It's a question of having enough money to keep criminals behind bars. Punishing is even easier. We do it all the time. We punish our children, complain about our boss, get back at others, and harbor lasting grudges - all in the name of justice.
That's why healing is the hardest. Punishing someone in a way that helps them. To heal, you have to care. And caring about the very people who have hurt us is above and beyond the call of duty.
Or is it?
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