Posted on 08/20/2005 11:18:38 AM PDT by neverdem
SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 19 - T. J. Parsell was a lanky pimple-faced adolescent bent on mischief. So when he found a toy gun one evening in 1978 while wandering home from a high school party, he thought nothing of pointing it at a store clerk and grumbling, "Your money or your life."
He got $50 for what he now calls "a stupid impulsive prank." The incident landed the 17-year-old Parsell in an adult jail, where on his first night, an older inmate spiked his drink with Thorazine and sexually abused and raped him.
"While my friends prepared for our high school prom, I was being gang raped," Mr. Parsell testified on Friday to a Congressional commission investigating prison sexual abuse and rape.
Mr. Parsell, now 45, and a successful software executive who lives on Long Island, was one of six victims of prison rape to relate disturbing accounts with a bipartisan panel of The National Prison Rape Elimination Commission here.
"What they took from me went beyond sex," Mr. Parsell said. "They'd stolen my manhood, my identity and part of my soul."
The panel, which also heard from state and federal legislators, law enforcement and prison officials and mental health experts, has been investigating the prevalence, cause and possible solutions to a problem that many experts say has escalated as the prison system is collapsing. Overcrowding, staff shortages and budget cuts have contributed to an often taboo topic.
"As a society, we have an obligation to protect the people we lock up, even though they have harmed society," the commission chairman, Judge Reggie B. Walton of Federal District Court in Washington, said. "Some people say inmates get what they deserve. But they don't think about the overall impact on society."
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
As that emminent Philospher Forrest Gump said, "Stupid is as stupid does!"
Your probably better off not knowing it. it is just gross.
Amazing how many Freepers complain endlessly about how screwed up the government and courts are, but never stop to think that as a result, something like this might well happen to them. Especially the firearms owners, who in many states run increasing risk of imprisonment every day simply by carrying out day-to-day activities with firearms in their posession or in their vehicles.
A subset of conservative "Christians" that I call Old Testament Retributionists seem to be the primary offenders. God is on their side, after all, so who cares what happens to those other people.
I think they should attempt to establish order in prison and try to reduce rape but it does serve as a form of deterrance. If you don't want to do hard time, don't do the crime.
... with one hand tied behind his back?
He also had a stack of money.
He had his boyfriend in there, too.
Richard Speck?
And so are our children, especially those of slight builds. I'm totally against prison rape, especially in a country such as ours.
I knew a strong manic depressive man who ended up in prison (not uncommon for people with that in the manic stage) who claimed he killed a guy in prison who attempted to rape him, if his story is true. Manic depressives also sometimes have a tendency to exaggerate and make up things.
I'm thinking of my granddaughter's boyfriend who did time for traffic violations. He's very slightly built, and I was worried while he did some time.
My son also landed in prison for domestic altercations (most at the instigation of his hysterical girlfriend/wife) a few times. Her dad is a detective. She assaults his new girlfriend and was in trouble with the law, but I don't think she did prison time for it. The first time she and her mother attacked him at a ski resort (all had been drinking unfortunately), and he was the one who went to jail. I don't think anything happened to him; he's big and strong.
The next prison rape could be you or someone you love for a relatively minor offense under the law or, like the poster to whom this is addressed, a fuzzy or false accusation.
I was shocked to read a book in college about how rampant lesbian aggression is in prison, too, and that was back in the 70's.
Have our prisons always been like that?
The campaign against prison rape is one that Chuck Colson has long supported. He is putting his faith in Jesus into action.
which contributes to industry of murder and slavery thereby making the user and purchaser part of the killing
"Especially the firearms owners, who in many states run increasing risk of imprisonment every day simply by carrying out day-to-day activities with firearms in their posession or in their vehicles."
Excellent point. 5 years in the joint in some states for "high capacity" mags. 5 years. Insane.
"Your probably better off not knowing it. it is just gross."
Does it involve rape?
Parsell should have been lucky the clerk didn't have a real gun and blew him away to Kingdom Come.
Prisoners get what they deserve, maybe they'll think twice about committing crimes.
It has been established that prison rape turns non-violent offenders into violent, vengeful rapists of women when they get out. Having been hurt and humiliated, they seek to reestablish their manhood by violently abusing someone else. Any minimal "deterrence" it offers is not worth the cost to society.
Two points:
1. we should try to reduce prison rape for the reasons you stated and for humane reasons
2. but it does serve a useful purpose as a deterrance. Fear of rape is probably the number one fear someone has of going to prison.
every time a thread on this comes up,you get the people who say who cares.Its the attitude of sickos,no true conservative would condone or joke about this
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.