http://tinyurl.com/36qtu7l

What do you reckon to this then?

Well that's the US for you.

Think I'll start watching Coronation Street.

There does come a point when you have to say enough's enough, you've had a fair warning.

S.

He is a danger to the public and kept away from the public by being locked up.

I do wonder if he was '…given the chance to change'. Just letting someone off several times for the same offence is very different to offering a much needed intervention (posh word for getting someone to MTFU and accept responsibility for their actions).

The same goes for drug addiction – is it a disease or is it an excuse for being weak willed – in my case I think it was the latter (all in the past now, thank Jehovah).

Getting perps into rehab rather than just locking them up and removing any opportunity for self improvement is simply a very good idea.

Aren't there loads of people in jail for life for things as stupid as stealing a few beers due to their 3 strikes rules in some states and having an abundant supply of idiots?

Aren't there loads of people in jail for life for things as stupid as stealing a few beers due to their 3 strikes rules in some states and having an abundant supply of idiots?

3 strikes is for violent crime only, iirc (can't guarantee that I've got that right but can't be bothered to google either).

'If this guy was using a shotgun to shoot lights randomly around his neighbourhood I doubt we'd be getting criticized for the sentencing.
'In this case he's simply using his truck as his weapon.

If only there was more thinking like that.

All very well saying

'This guy has a disease, he is an alcoholic and this isn't the kind of situation where he's acting with malice to hurt people,

The thing is there isn't an issue with him getting drunk because he's an alcoholic. Surely after 8 previous times if he was actually bothered about what he's doing he'd find a way not to end up behind the wheel once he'd got drunk though.

Life in prison seems OTT, but it's better than if he ran over and killed someone else when drunk.

Difficult to say, that's why I'm not a US judge.

Not sure about Texas (yee haa) but you get 12 step / AA programmes, banned from establishments, alcohol detecting bracelets and such here. Depending on the county and the judge. Would think there was ample time for him to change. He'll be out on parole though, the overcrowding in jails is probably a bigger problem.

The 12 steps

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Enforced religion through the courts, enough to send me to the bottle.

Is that the 12 step plan seriously? If it is then a bottle is the least of my worries, I'd be hitting something with a needle.

'This guy has a disease, he is an alcoholic and this isn't the kind of situation where he's acting with malice to hurt people'

More likely hes thinking of number one and how hes going to get about 😆