Mandatory Minimums: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)
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Published 2015-07-26
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All Comments (21)
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Everyone's heard of this one, but "drugs can ruin your life. So when I catch you, I'm going to ruin your life." -police officer
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I almost cried when that one guy was reading his pardon.
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Non-violent drug offenders often serve longer prison sentences than rapists. Just think about that...
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Remember when we could say "who cares what Donald Trump said"
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As a criminal defense attorney, I can't thank Jon Oliver enough for doing these videos. Civil forfeiture, municipal violations, bail, and now mandatory minimums, I cannot ask for anything else. He is doing more to bring these issues to light far more than 1000 attorneys can ever do.
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No victim, no crime.
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To anyone who wanted to know, both Weldon Angelos and Sharanda Jones have been released.
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"Who gives a shit what Donald Trump says?" 2015 was indeed an easier time...
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I am surprised that John didn't bring up the income inequality part of this story. Anyone who could afford a good lawyer could have had their sentence changed once those laws were repealed. The problem is that the majority of the people who are in prison for drugs do not have the ability to afford a lawyer of any kind. Many of them probably had to rely on a public defender for their original trial. If proper legal council was offered to these prisoners many of them wouldn't need a pardon in the first place.
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Mandatory sentences don't even work as a legal concept: how can ANY prison time be considered just or moral if it's OBLIGATORY, and handed down regardless of context/circumstances?!
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John Oliver's videos are literal instructions on how to undo a huge percentage of what's wrong with the US.
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According to Google: Sharanda Jones was released in Dec 2015 (17 years served) Weldon Angelos in May 2016 (13 years served) and Kevin Ott in July 2019 (23 years served) Glad they're all out, but it's still life ruining how long they were in for drug charges. :(
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But if you let those prisoners out and get rid of mandatory minimum sentencing... Where are the private for profit prisons going to get their profits from? Have you thought of that? Huh? Why aren't you thinking of the multi million dollar profiteers of the prison system?
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A close friend of mine had to do mandatory time in juvenile detention, simply because someone from school prank called the police and told them that he posed a serious threat and there was a terrorist attack being planned. Despite there not being any shred of evidence, as a juvenile he did not receive any real sort of legal representation, so now not only does he have a record, he can never serve in any military branch and has had his 2nd amendment rights stripped indefinitely...all because of a prank.
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I remember reading a story where a convicted child rapist got every other weekend in prison "because she needed to see her kids". But apparently they can't let a minor drug offender off for one day of a life sentence to watch her daughter graduate ..... WTF?!
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As a law student in Argentina, I came to understand that in most countries, if you're convicted for a crime which later stops being illegal, or for which the mandatory time lowers, it applies automatically to your own sentence. It is called the "most benign law" principle. And it's used in almost all french revolution constitucion based constitutions, which is most of them.
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Gets caught jaywalking Mandatory sentence is death by ants "Seems fair"
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Where can I buy John's book?!
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My dad was arrested multiple times whilst I was 3 for suspected and actual drug possession, but since we had no war on drugs in the U.K. the most he had to do was spend a week in the cells once. His punishment was usually having to go on anti-drug courses. Hasn't touched any drug that's illegal or alcohol for ten years. I still got a childhood if I lived in the U.S. that would've been taken away
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What's also a problem is released prisoners can't vote! What the heck is the logic there? Are they gonna vote for a president who will legalize The Purge?
