May 03, 2006
Mr. Moussaoui? Meet Your New Cellmate Ben - Ben Dover.
Dr. Rusty's got the round-up on the breaking news that terrorist Zacharias Moussaoui has been given life in prison.
I'm not going to get into a debate with anybody here about the wrongs or rights of the jury's verdict. Instead, I'm simply going to throw out the question: As a practical matter, how long do you suppose this joker's going to last in the pen?
I'm guessing "life" in this context, as in "length of", is probably a very fluid concept.
Posted by Robert at May 3, 2006 04:38 PM | TrackBackBen? Glad to meet ya, Victor Hugo...
Posted by: Basil Seal at May 3, 2006 04:41 PMHe won't be kept in GP--general population--so unfortunately there won't be enough time for him to become someone's "bitch" or get a shiv in him. Instead, he'll have a private jail cell for the next 30 years, where he'll have a Koran delivered to him by a prison guard with white gloves every morning, he'll be given a prayer mat, and he'll have an imam come visit him once a week to discuss his misunderstanding of the word "jihad" in the Koran.
Posted by: Rusty at May 3, 2006 04:44 PMLet's not forget the specially prepared halal meals, Rusty.
To be honest, I don't think this trial ever had any prospects for a conclusion that would have satisfied me. Even a death sentence would have led, not to a lethal injection, but to a decade+ of automatic appeals, while Moussaoui sat on death row getting better service than your typical guest at Motel Six.
Posted by: utron at May 3, 2006 05:02 PMIf he did get tossed into the general pop, it take much less time to send hi to Allah than a death verdict.
Too bad he will be in ClubFed...
Don't worry. At some point there will be a mistake and "oops, he was left in an area with other inmates. Gosh, we're sorry about that, Mouss's mom. Well, here's his body. Unlike 2500+ families who didn't get a body to bury."
Posted by: rbj at May 3, 2006 07:10 PMPlease let me disabuse you of the idea that he will spend the rest of his life in ClubFed. Instead, most likely he will be sent to the SuperMax prison in Colorado where he will spend 23 out of 24 hours in solitary confinement. He will get 1 hour a day in a concrete walled yard - alone. He will not have contact with any other prisoners. He will not have access to many perks - the prison determines what the prisoners get in terms of any perks. It is not a fun place.
That said, I was hoping for a different verdict.
Posted by: jen at May 4, 2006 08:40 AMI'd have loved to see the sentence I proposed in 2001 for Bin Laden imposed here: He is to be released immediately. However, there's a catch. He's to be released immediately, with nothing but the clothes on his back, and he is to be released at the southern tip of Manhattan. All air and boat traffic around the island and all subway and vehicle traffic on the island is temporarily suspended. If he can make it off the island on foot alive, he is a free man. But anything anyone does to him IN MANHATTAN will not be prosecuted.
Barbaric? Why, thank you.
Posted by: Brian B at May 4, 2006 11:36 AM