Too rich to be punished!

So the latest news out of Texas is that a 16-year-old who, while under the influence of stolen alcohol and valium, careered his car into two others killing four people and causing severe brain damage to another, is too rich to be punished.

Ethan Couch (a young man with very rich parents) has successfully argued that his condition of affluenza prevented him from perceiving or predicting any consequences when doing such things as drink driving, taking drugs or attempting to sleep with 14-year-old girls. In short; he is too rich to understand the law or the fact that he has to obey it.

This man is a murderer. It is that simple; he has murdered four people. The fact that a state judge believed that 10 years probation is in any way an appropriate alternative to 20-year sentence normally attached to this kind of offence in Texas, is a product of a truly corrupt legal system. That is the only logical conclusion that can be drawn from this sentencing decision. Were it not the case, the state of Texas would have to release anyone who's criminal behaviour could be traced to their upbringing.

Let’s look at the condition that this young man supposedly suffers from. Essentially; he is apparently incapable of obeying the law because he has been raised to believe that he has enough money to get out of anything.

So he feels confortable in repeatedly breaking the law, as he can just get his dad to write a cheque and everything will be fine. So naturally, the best course of action for the court to take is to completely validate that viewpoint.

It is logically impossible for someone to be intelligent enough to be a state judge and simultaneously not intelligent enough to recognise a circular definition.  The Defence’s argument is that he does not obey the law because he does not see the punishments given by the law as incentive to obey the law, therefore he should be given no punishment.

The only way that this condition could exist is if the law truly doesn’t punish people like Couch.

Now, I’m not saying that Couch does have the ability to perceive risks or consequences in illegal, violent and destructive behaviours, but we already have a term for people like that; “psychopaths”.

At the very least, this guy is criminally insane and should be locked away, but as his dad probably owns the very building he was tried in, I doubt that will ever happen.