Vigilantism? Wrong, or just Justice?

[twoblink]

I watched Boondock Saints, and while I don't condone violence, and I don't think that taking the law into your own hands is right, I do feel inner conflict..

On the news, I saw the egg truck pull up, and eggs go flying. That means someone didn't get the justice they were looking for.

Scenerio: A man is kidnapped and tortured and a call is made to the family for ransom. The family couldn't put up the money, (didn't have enough) and so they killed him. They people involved were put on house arrest... So I can imagine why the family is pissed off.

The crime scene was horrible too; the guy was handcuffed to a tree and beaten to death. He finally managed to break the branch his arms were slung around and handcuffed to; but he crawled a few feet and bled to death..

House arrest?? I don't know how many years, but obviously, anything short of life in prison was not satisfactory to the victim's family and CERTAINLY not house arrest! (I agree!!) So the victim's family pulled up in about 8 egg trucks, and started throwing eggs... At 300 eggs per crate, we are talking a few thousand eggs here..

The interview, you saw the widow.. (man was in his 60's) and you saw the brother and the son, who was screaming "Come on out, I'll handcuff you to a tree and beat you to death, see how you like it!"

I'm sorry, but I am on their side... The police you could tell, just rolled their eyes... Comments from the police like "There's not much we can do..." and "If this guy gets hurt and calls 119 (Taiwan's version of 911) I hope the ambulance is slow to get here.." is all the cops could say.

What do you all think of vigilantism?

As a gun owner, this is an inner struggle for me that has no definitive solution.. I admit it, I'll probably cheer silently if this guy got popped in the back alley someday..

But what do you do if you think you are not seeing justice??

 

[4570Rick]

Take some time, think things through, search your soul, then take revenge only, and in the amount you can live with. Remember, you may have to live in some form of confinement.

Put another way...I'm single, no children, few responsibilities other than to myself. Do harm to me or my family, you had better go straight to the cops and turn yourself in and plead guilty in court. It's that, or, find yourself burried up to your head in the mojave in july with a galvanized pail over your head.

 

[Thumper]

I don't condone violence

I don't know, man. I'm a firm believer in judiciously applied violence.

In fact, I believe there are some situations where it is immoral NOT to apply violence.

 

[Baba Louie]

Sometimes "You turn the other cheek."

Sometimes "An eye for an eye."

Sometimes "Hangin's too good for em."

If it was my family so affected...and that was the only justice meted out...

Let me ponder a spell...

Adios

 

[Art Eatman]

I only know of the events from the first post, okay?

The attitudes and the egg-throwing on the part of the victim's family has nothing to do with vigilantism. They feel dumped on by the Justice System, and well they should, but it's not vigilantism. If local courts continue to punish with the proverbial slap on the wrist, vigilantism could ensue, of course.

Vigilantes generally work in the absence of LEOs. That is, they represent the only force for law and order which is available--because of this absence. Police powers derive from We the People. These powers are delegated by us to government. In the absence of responsibility on the part of government to perform its duties, vigilantes are a very rational answer to a problem with crime.

The fact that vigilante groups can become irrational and/or wrong in their own behavior does not mean that vigilantism is inherently wrong or always to be denigrated.

Art

 

[Lone_Gunman]

Some people just need killing, whether by a vigilante, or the state.

I wonder sometimes whether the world would be a better place if there was more vigilantism. Lets say that some freak murders a child. If the father, in a fit of uncontrollable, psychotic passion, was to beat the the murderer to death with a tire tool, would justice not be served? And would such actions not provide a good deterrent to other people contemplating such crimes, if they realized that justice would be swift and severe.

I do not think taking justice into one's own hands is a bad thing; that is where it should already be anyway.

 

[critter]

Have to go with Art on this one. Vigilanties thrive in the absence of an EFFECTIVE law enforcement/judicial system. In the beginnings of this country, that was often the case. Vigilanties applied the 'law' as they saw it. "AS THEY SAW IT" is the problem. When they have the power AND also have a 'personal ax to grind', sometimes it gets out of hand and becomes something else entirely.

The 'powers that be', however, should remember the above phrase: 'in the absence of an EFFECTIVE law enforcement/judicial system' or vigilanties will become prevelant. Want an example? Check the private groups in Arizona patrolling the southern border!

 

[braindead0]

The judges are too busy putting pot-heads in jail, no room for murderers and rapists.

They recently let a bunch of people out of a county jail nearby, they let child molesters go?? But they kept this one guy who was convicted of being a pot dealer, claimed that he was a bigger danger to the community?

Okay, granted, dealers should be put out of business (preferably by legalizing ;-).. but I can't imagine a pot dealer being more dangerous to society than a child molester.

Lucky for us the whole Iraq thing started making big news, so they could go back to ignoring this.

 

[Oleg Volk]

Death Wish by Brian Garfield is a good book on the ethics of vigilante justice. Not much in common with the movie of that title.

Vigilantism is essential at times (if law enforcement is either ineffective or if the state is the criminal) but has a high proabability of errors, over-reaction and other problems. So you take your choice and take the risks that go with it. But vigilante response (i.e. someone murders your kid, you kill the perp when you see him a week later) can be entirely reasonable and should be so treated by law...or can be un-reasonable and subject the "avenger" to prosecution. Case-by-case.

 

[MrAcheson]

Vigilantism and Committees for Public Vigilance were used back in the old days when the law either wasn't available or was rampantly corrupt (in which case the Committee was used to force the government to reform).

Frankly the likelihood of this sort of thing being necessary today is small. There are better ways to reform the government today than by essentially holding it hostage with weapons. Likewise on an individual basis, just because someone "knows" its true don't make it so. We're finding out many of the people on death row didn't actually commit the crimes they were convicted of thanks to DNA testing. In most cases these were people that everyone "knew" was guilty.

I think we have reached the point where the only people who like our legal system are the lawyers. We need sweeping legal reform, but legalizing vigilante justice ain't it.

 

[TallPine]

if law enforcement is either ineffective or if the state is the criminal

[ X ] All of the above are true.


Oops - this isn't a poll. Well, that's how I would vote anyway.

 

[Joe Demko]

I'm not enchanted with the idea of vigilantism. Had to read a good bit on the history of lynching in order to write a paper, once. A recurring theme in lynching seems to have been the mob seeking "justice." Why, then, I must wonder were the overwhelming number of people lynched black? Also some Mexicanos, some Indians, a few Jews, even a couple of Italians. You know, though, in poring over all those old newspaper accounts, I don't remember reading about any great numbers of white folks getting lynched. So, apparently either higher-pigmentation types commit all the crime (rape of white women was something the newspaper accounts reported over and over) or the lynch mobs were motivated by something other than a pursuit of justice. I'm more inclined to believe the latter. As MrAcheson already pointed out, just because somebody "knows" something is true, doesn't make it so.

 

[oldfart]

MrAcheson said:
"There are better ways to reform the government today than by essentially holding it hostage with weapons."

Pray tell me, what would be a better way? Voting? Writing letters to our 'representatives'? Perhaps we should all write letter to the editors of our local papers.

No, as many others before me have pointed out, the Second Amendment to the Constitution is both a safeguard for our freedom and a warning to our leaders that we will not go quietly into that good night. The mere fact that we own weapons capable of being used to forcibly change the leaders of the administration is meant as a subtle hint that their term of office is temporary and at the whim of the people. Over the years we have allowed them to become too powerful and too complacent. Eventually, that will have to be dealt with, but not with ballots or letters or polite persuasion.

 

[critter]

Golgo-13, this is not to discount what you have said and neither is it trying to be social commentary. It is, however, a fact that in our current legal system, minorities are also over-represented greatly in convictions and incarcerations. Just food for thought.

 

[NewShooter78]

Vigilantism is something I have thought a lot about especially in my city. The police are either under-staffed, or out of touch with what is really going on in the area. Cops cannot be everywhere, all the time. I'm not sure that I would condone vigilantism, but if there were killers on the loose, rampant drug kingpins, and other assorted deadly criminals that the law can't or won't handle then what choices are there? People shouldn't feel like prisoners in their own homes.

I'm sure we all know romantic stories of vigilantism (my personal fav is the Punisher comic book series), but emotion can cloud mental clarity too much to be always trusted. I don't think vigilantism would work too well in modern times because there is no clear cut consensus of what is right and wrong. I'm sure a lot of us can agree on the old testement idea of and eye for an eye when it comes to murderers, but what about drug dealers, rapists, pimps, and other assorted nasties? Where are the lines drawn?

Another thought: wouldn't a vigilanty be considered a "terrorist" in today's media world? I think the credits after Boondock Saints shows that the public wouldn't all agree that they did something good. Personally I wouldn't miss any lowlife scum that happened to go missing or end up dead. But in today's world criminals "rights" are looked after more than the victims in a lot of cases. We've all heard about families of criminals suing victims. There is more than one case where a criminal died trying to commit a burglary, and the family sued the business and won in civil court! ***! Just imagine what would happen if a vigilanty was caught and procecuted.

That's just a little bit of my .02.

Edited to add, see my sig line.

 

[Bob Locke]

In the absence of responsibility on the part of government to perform its duties, vigilantes are a very rational answer to a problem with crime.

Precisely.

As I said in a thread some time ago (may have been on TFL) concerning the border and the citizen's patrols that have been in action down there: When the government fails to do its job, it shouldn't be surprised or angry when The People pick up the slack.

And I've thought long and hard about what would happen to someone who did serious harm to one of my children or my wife, and the conclusion I reached was similar to one posted here: That person better get himself to a jail cell while he can, so I can't get to him.

A buddy of mine is on the Weld County S.D. here and told me about a child molester who took flight to the hills around the Colorado/Wyoming shortly after being found out. Word got out that the locals had formed up a posse and were "looking" for him. He decided it was best that he turn himself in, and quickly, before they found him.

I believe the knowledge that there are still people who feel that way does in deed help in deterring crime.

 

[DeltaElite]

It depends upon the scenario.

 

[Watchman]

Unfortunately, I have seen times were "vigilanteism" might not have been a bad thing.

Most people do not deal with or associate with some of the real scum of the earth like many cops do on a daily basis. As a Reserve Deptuy, I have seen my share of people that simply needed killing.

There are people out there they prey on other people and they use the "law" as a shield. These predators have no fear from the law, a trip to jail means nothing more to them than a warm place to sleep and 3 meals a day with unlimited medical attention. They use the "law" to their advantage and there are plenty of lawyers out there to insure that they dont spend much time in jail.

An example would be the chronic wife abuser. In and out of jail, everyone knows hes violent and he makes no bones about beating his wife or kids to a bloody pulp every time he gets drunk. The trouble is, this yahoo listens to a police scanner, has a all the right channels dialed into it, and is NEVER there when the cops show up.

So all we get a chance to do is take a report, maybe some pictures, put a warrant out for his arrest and that about the extent of it. Sure, we can drive by his house ocassionally to let him know that we havent forgot about him, but with just a few deputys out in a big county with a lot of turf to cover we just cant be there when the time is right, its next to impossible. I can tell you for a fact that it can be frustrating.

Now picture this bozo doing this a couple of times a month. The trouble is, the wife is too scared too leave, has nowhere else to go, and probably coudnt afford it even if she did get the nerve up to leave.

As LEO, my options of dealing with this jerk are very limited. However, rest assured that if this was my sister, I would take great pains to ensure that the punk got real "justice" where other justice ceased to be a factor.

Sometimes politicians will scream and throw a fit about letting the police "do their jobs", and how as model citizens we "cant take the law into our own hands" and they'll talk about the "breakdown of law and order"and all of the other worthless drivel that politicians that do nothing for a living dream up. The word "Vigilante" even scares the urine out of some of them.

Besides... anything that scares a politician to the point of incoherent speech cant be a "bad" thing...


I happen to agree with Art Eatman's statment:
The fact that vigilante groups can become irrational and/or wrong in their own behavior does not mean that vigilantism is inherently wrong or always to be denigrated.

But then, Im a simple man...

 

[JPM70535]

I happen to agree that sometimes Vigilante justice is warranted.
The Justice system in this country is slanted way too far in favor of the criminal. One example comes to mind. Back in the late 70s or early 80s, a BG named Dalton Prejean killed a State Trooper in Louisiana. No question about it. During a traffic stop near Lafayette, this scum got control of the Troopers gun and shot him to death. In the ensueing search, the local Sheriffs Dept made sure that no State Trooper got anywhere close to him. Prejean was taken into custody, tried , convicted, and sentenced to death. I'm not certain of the date, but I believe it was sometime in the mid to late 90s that this cop killer was finally executed.

For close to 20 years , this trash got to eat,and sleep and exercise and watch TV, he got to see his kin on visitors day. He got the finest medical attention and unlimited Legal advice, all at public expense.

The trooper had a wife, who for all those 20 years had to endure the knowledge that her husbands killer was still enjoying the priviledge of living, One can only imagine the suffering she must have endured, as time after time, an execution date came and went as appeal after appeal was filed and denied.

I had the dubious distrinction of having been working the adjoining Parish that night and along with every other trooper on that shift, would not have hesitated for an instant if Prejean had been contacted by us instead of the SO. I personally would have saved the State untold sums of money and the widow untold grief and anguish. So do I think Vigilante justice is an acceptable response. Sometimes.

 

[WilderBill]

To paraphase Art a little, sometimes, if you want a job done right, ya just gotta do it yourself.

 

[twoblink]

You know what guys? It's a relief that I'm not alone on the line of thinking..

I can tell you, if it was MY FATHER that got tortured to death and they guy didn't get the electric chair for 15 years, I'd be like "pass me some lithium grease, my M1A and a few of them nosler partitions..."

I think vigilantism shows effectiveness of the "law" to provide us justice..

From the people (gun owners) I've met, most are fairly passive, but you mess with their families...

I have noticed that, most gun owners are very good family men and women...