In his LA Times op/ed titled There’s nothing funny about prison rape, Ezra Klein includes this quote from Bill Lockyer:
When Enron’s Ken Lay was sentenced to jail, for instance, Bill Lockyer, then the attorney general of California, spoke dreamily of his desire "to personally escort Lay to an 8-by-10 cell that he could share with a tattooed dude who says, ‘Hi, my name is Spike, honey.’ "
Sorry, but I laughed. Shame on me.
***
This old post on Instapundit interestingly proposes that the main reason we turn a blind eye to the prison rape epidemic is because men are the chief victims.
Too many people in this country think those convicted of crimes should be sent to prison to be ‘tortured’, so to speak.
It’s an uncivilized attitude– the punishment is being deprived of one’s freedom, not being stripped of all human dignity.
It’s a travesty that the U.S. imprisons so many young men for non-violent drug offenses.
Ben, I could not help but think that in many countries, around the world, when a woman is raped, there is a great deal of analysis of her clothes (revealing, short, whatever) until people come to the conclusion that she ‘asked for it’. So much so that in India, International Woman’s Day this year had the theme ‘I never ask for it’.
I suppose laughing at what may lie ahead for Ken Lay in the same stakes in the prison is not very different. In some ways, people who feel metaphorically raped and plundered, probably also might think he deserves every ignominy he gets. No?