Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2021/01/15/boston-marathon-bomber-sues-over-his-right-to-wear-a-baseball-cap-in-prison.html
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Seems like the prison confiscating a hat they themselves sold him is stupid and petty. If they have a dress code then they should enforce it for all prisoners equally.
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It is stupid and petty, as are the 3x week showers. Let the arsehole wear the cap during his hour in the yard and give him 5 showers a week. It doesn’t cost anyone anything and his life will still be miserable.
I’m hoping that he gets a few new “neighbours” after the events at the Capitol. MAGA caps are more clearly indicators of terrorist affiliation, though, so I hope none will be available in the commisary.
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Maybe Buffalo Guy will share his horns.
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3 times a week is fairly common, for better or for worse.
Prisoners deserve the basic human decency of allowing them to clean themselves on a daily basis.
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Yes, I agree that those are petty and annoying, and I would reject that lawsuit if it were simply a matter over his right to wear his cap and take more than 3 showers/week. But what isn’t petty is confining him to a 7x12 cell for 23 hours a day with very little human interaction. That isn’t petty. It’s cruel, and will absolutely contribute to a mental and physical decline.
FWIW, I also live in Boston, and after training for 8 months, I ran in the Boston Marathon that year, and was stopped at the 25 mile mark. I hold no sympathy for Tsarnaev, but I do have a belief in his inherent worth and dignity, and placing him (or any human being) in a cell for 23 hours/day, 7 days/week is not punishment. It’s retributive torture.
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“At the same time, I don’t think anyone deserves death, or cruel and unusual treatment while incarcerated.“
Lots of people deserve Death or Cruel or Unusual treatment. That doesn’t mean we should lower ourselves to providing it.
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The idea that humans need to be cleaned every day is a weird product of the 20th Century. Unless you are doing aerobic exercise or changing transmission fluid, 3 showers a week is fine.
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At the very least, allow him the bandana. COVID is killing prison people.
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Many prisoners do exercise frequently. It’s often one of the few activities available to them – and necessary to reduce the physical consequences of being stuck in solitary 23 hours a day. Three days of daily exercise without a shower would be pretty gross.
I also agree that many less-active people can get by on three showers a week… provided you get to determine when those showers are. If those showers are on a rigid schedule, the next one might be 48 hours away or more – even if, say, you just had a nasty bout of food poisoning that left you spewing out both ends. That would be pretty miserable.
Some of the cells at ADX florence have personal showers inside them. It’s hard to imagine a valid reason to not allow those individual showers to be used daily.
I have very little sympathy for the likes of Tsarnaev, but regularly being denied access to basic hygiene facilities does sound unnecessarily cruel.
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Treating people with some basic humanity also drastically improves their willingness to comply with the rules/expectations of the facility in which they’re housed. I’ve worked in secure settings with a “strict” (abusive) mentality and those where the staff/guards are encouraged to be firm but compassionate. The latter facilities are infinitely safer places for the staff to work, even when controlling for the severity of the inmates’ offenses.
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A traditional baseball cap has hard plastic brim that could easily be fashioned into a dangerous weapon. Maybe a soft floppy all fabric cap with no plastic or metal components.
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JHC he’s in prison for bombing people to shreds.
No fucking hat.
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Some are plastic but most in my experience use a cardboard. They will have metal eyelets, and a metal button on top—which can sometimes also be plastic. The back will either be fitted (cloth), Velcro, plastic, or cloth strap with a metal buckle.
I would imagine they’d have restrictions on materials used, like any other items. I’d hope anything sold in commissary would already meet those requirements.
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I was thinking more in general about the 23 hours of isolation per day. That seems inhumane. Not being allowed to wear a hat is nothing I’m worried about.
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Should he be on the production line, stamping-out vehicle license plates?
I’m not sure why you think I’m recommending forced labor rather than maybe a reasonable amount of social/exercise time.
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If the fuckin’ QAnon “shaman” can get an all-organic diet, shouldn’t this dude get his cap? The careceral state sucks.
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Is it a MAGA hat? I’m all for letting him wear a MAGA hat.
