Justice is an elusive concept, difficult to pin down with a precise definition. It is so much more than accountability for a wrong. It is also the collective need to serve the interests of right. But even these basic social notions get murky at times when right and wrong seem to conflict because there is as much right as wrong in some given life situations.

And that’s the troubling thing about two recent cases involving criminal justice—one in Missouri, the other in Louisiana.

The Missouri case involves the April 9, 2024 execution of Brian Dorsey who, admittedly, murdered his cousin and her husband in 2006 while addicted to drugs.

The Louisiana case involves the April 22, 2024 parole of Warren Harris, Jr. who, admittedly, murdered three homosexual men on different occasions in 1977 in New Orleans while addicted to drugs.

The difference in the two crimes:

Dorsey killed his cousin after she and her husband took him in their home to protect him from drug dealers. He robbed and killed them with their own shotgun to support a drug habit. He was 35 years of age. He suffered from drug addiction psychosis at the time.

Harris killed three men who took him to their residences for a paid-for-sex encounter by stabbing them to death. He said he “hated homosexuals” and killed and robbed them to support a drug habit. He was 16 years of age. He also suffered from drug addiction psychosis at the time.

Both Dorsey and Harris compiled impressive records of individual rehabilitation during their incarceration. In short, both men were not the same individuals at the time of their execution and parole as they were when they committed their crimes. This was acknowledged by both penal systems that incarcerated them.

Dorsey’s execution was endorsed by members of his victims’ families while no one from Harris’ victims’ families offered any opposition to his parole.

Dorsey’s execution was advocated by the Attorney General of Missouri while the New Orleans District Attorney’s Office did not express any position on Harris’ parole efforts.

So were these the reasons why an admitted double murderer was executed and an admitted triple murderer was paroled?

Dorsey’s victims said “justice was served” by his execution while Harris’ supporters said “justice was served” by his parole.

Was it?

That’s the dilemma in both cases.

One thing is certain. Louisiana’s new governor, Jeff Landry, was elected on the promise that he would restore the state’s death penalty to an active status. He will have to deal with that dilemma in determining who and how many people on death row must die. There are dozens of inmates on Louisiana’s death row that have credible evidence of innocence or compelling mitigating evidence about how and why their crimes occurred.

The Dorsey/Harris cases inevitably raise this question:

Is it “justice” to execute or keep people forever incarcerated that have victim opposition while sparing or freeing others similarly situated that do not have victim opposition?

If so, that sort of seems like modernized lynch justice to me.

The State of Missouri executed 52-year-old Brian Dorsey on April 10, 2024. Dorsey had been convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of his cousin and her husband in December 2006.

Dorsey’s stands out because scores of current and former prison officials, including guards and wardens, endorsed his plea for executive clemency. These officials believed strongly in Dorsey’s rehabilitation.

Condemned inmates in Missouri are not housed on a traditional death row in individual cells. They are housed in a 92-bed, two-wing unit at the Potosi Correctional Center. Prison officials assign these inmates to classification statuses from minimum, medium, close custody, and administrative segregation. Minimum custody condemned inmates live in an “honor” dormitory while disciplinary condemned inmates are kept in “admin seg” cells.

In other words, good behavior and cooperation with penal management translates into improved custody status with the pinnacle status being an “honor dorm” assignment. Inmates assigned to the honor dorm are going to have more direct contact with staff and wardens given the level of trust they develop within this cloistered penal system.

Dorsey was a barber assigned in the honor dorm. He cut the hair of staff and upper echelon prison officials. It is an up-close personal type of relationship between keeper and kept. The barber learns a lot about the personal lives of the officials—their families, personal & professional problems, likes & dislikes, political inclinations, and life objectives. This official intimacy between keeper and kept translates into a confined power for the barber. The barber can use the power for either good or bad reasons.

From all public reports, Dorsey used his job position, and the power it accrued to him, for good, positive things. He got along with everyone, keeper and kept. He was just a nice, good guy who tried to help both staff and inmates alike in any way he could. He was content with just being a prison barber. He was prepared to spend the rest of his life in prison cutting hair and being a “pleasant peasant” inmate.

Brian Dorsey posed no threat to anyone, either inside the prison community or the outside free community. Prison staff and officials got to know and trust him through his nearly two-decade confinement. They were more than willing to let him finish out the rest of his life in their care and custody, benefitting from the tradeoff between his skills and their needs.

There are four historical purposes for punishment: deterrence, incapacitation, retribution, and rehabilitation. Dorsey’s execution served only one of those purposes—retribution. And that was only in a miniscule kind of way. The execution made a few people feel good—a few members of the victims’ families and friends.

Society would have benefitted far more than the victims “feel good” moment had Dorsey spent the rest of his life in prison. The other three purposes of punishment would have been fulfilled far more with a life time in prison than by the singular retribution purpose his execution fulfilled.

There are roughly 2300 people on death rows throughout the nation. Two-thirds of them would become inmates like Brian Dorsey in the prison community given the opportunity.

Why not given them the opportunity?

The fiscal costs benefits to society would be tremendous and the presence of the former death row inmates in the general prison population would contribute to those communities.

There are more than 200,000 people serving life sentences in U.S.—more than 50,000 of them are life without parole sentences. Virtually all of the without parole lifers will die in prison. Hospice care has become an industry within the prison industrial complex. Most of those without parole lifers live and die as “model” inmates, just like Brian Dorsey.

The death penalty is a barbaric “feel good” punishment established and maintained to punish people of color, people without resources and means, and people who do not count for much in the societal scheme of things.

At least let some condemned inmates live.

The Angolite Experiment.

Between August 1977 and November 1986, Wilbert Rideau and I shared the editorship of The Angolite, the official publication of the Louisiana State Penitentiary.

The Rideau/Sinclair writing team was hailed as the Woodward/Bernstein of prison journalism. Our co-editorship produced prestigious individual journalism awards (a George Polk Award and an ABA Silver Gavel for each of us for individual by-lined articles); the Robert F. Kennedy and Sidney Hillman awards given to The Angolite; and a host of other lesser journalism award distinctions for the Rideau/Sinclair writing team.

It became known as The Angolite Experiment.

In a recent Substack article, I detailed how The Angolite Experiment began and why it ended. I will let that public record speak for itself in that article.

The Substack article is a public response to a recent The New Yorker Magazine interview with Rideau in which he presents the narrative that he singlehandedly propelled The Angolite into national prominence in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

While the narrative has been spun by Rideau and his supporters, and casually accepted by members of the mainstream media willing to promote that narrative, for decades, it is simply not true. The below link to a 1982 Louisiana Public Broadcasting report reveals the truth, as supported by prison officials, that The Angolite Experiment was not a one-pony show as the Rideau narrative presents.

Why raise the issue now?

Rideau and I both are in our twilight years. He will die riding that one-pony narrative into the abyss and I will fall off this earth saying it is a lie. I am putting my side of the story in the public domain to let the reader decide—if they have any interest to do so—what they will: accept, reject, or ignore either or both sides.

And that is fine with me. The reader is always the king in any literary endeavor AND I BOW TO THE KING.

https://www.google.com/search?q=LPB+wilbert+Rideau+and+Billy+Sinclair&oq=LPB+wilbert+Rideau+and+Billy+Sinclair&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOTIHCAEQIRigATIHCAIQIRigATIHCAMQIRigAdIBCTEzNTAzajBqN6gCALACAA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:5eca7b7f,vid:6G_9VsByaU8,st:0

No one likes to see rain on a parade.

But there are times when rain is necessary.

University of Iowa’s star female basketball player Caitlin Clark recently broke “Pistol Pete” Maravich’s 3,667 point NCAA scoring record.

That was an incredible accomplishment—a parade of accolades definitely-earned and well-deserved.

But here comes the rain.

Pistol Pete set the record in 83 games. It took Caitlin 130 games to break the record.

Pistol Pete set the record without the 3-point shot. Caitlin broke the record with the benefit of the 3-point shot. No minor distinction since hundreds of Pistol Pete’s 2-point shots were made from the 3-point shot range.

The distinction is made more relevant by the fact that Pistol Pete averaged 44.2 points per game during his 83-game college career while Caitlin averaged 32.3 points during her 130-game college career.

Pistol Pete’s 44.2 per game scoring average remains Number One in NCAA history. Think about it a moment: None of the recent NBA stars, including the legendary Michael Jordan, finished in the top ten of the NCAA scoring average.

So before the misinformation media pundits bury Pistol Pete’s scoring record in the dust bin of history, let the rain fall on the parade of the current all-time scoring record.

I loved you Pistol Pete—floppy socks, dirty tennis, shaggy hair, and all. No one—at least not in this modern lifetime—will ever match the sheer magnificence of your scoring skills. Rest in peace knowing that, my man.

Okay, okay … the rain has stopped, the sun is back out, and the new scoring parade marches on in all its rightful glory.

Hold it, hold it … is that another rain cloud I see on the horizon?

American prisons exist to punish and rehabilitate.

American schools exist to educate and develop.

There was a time when prisons were institutions of violence: inmate-on-inmate homicides, guard-on-inmate homicides, inmate-on-guard homicides, and too many suicides to accurately record.

There was also a time when schools were institutions of safety: located in neighborhoods safe to ride bicycles, with playgrounds for recreation, and classrooms for learning.

That was then.

This is now.

The corrupt and vitriolic American political system has turned this social dynamic on its head. Prisons, and the gang-infested yards inside them, are now safer than schools and the playgrounds that surround them.

According to Statista, there were 143 inmate homicides in American prisons in 2019 (the latest year for which statistics are available) while, according to a January 5, 2024 U.S. News report, there were 346 school shootings across America in 2023 that left 248 people either injured or killed.

In America today, where white supremacy and violence have found an acceptable niche in the body politic, a student entering a classroom has a greater fear for their safety than an inmate entering a prison chow hall.

Why?

Guns and their availability; namely, the deadliest military-style assault weapons and the most powerful ammunition manufactured are easier for a student to buy than a bottle of beer.

A convenience store clerk in Texas will ask an 18-year-old student for identification when purchasing a $10.00 six-pack of beer—identification that is necessary to carry beer.

A Texas gun store clerk, on the other hand, will not ask an 18-year-old student, regardless of how mentally unhinged they may appear, for identification when purchasing a $3,000 in military-style assault weapon and ammunition.

This is the way hardcore Texas gun owners want it. They believe mass shooting violence is a product of mental illness, not guns.

It has been reported in the past that the Sheriff and Mayor of Uvalde, Texas attributed the May 24, 2022 shooting death of 19 Robb Elementary School students and two teachers to a high incidence of mental illness in the community.

That is not only a shameful insult to the people of Uvalde but is a sophomoric assault on basic logic.

Prisons have a higher incidence of mental illness among its population than any other place in the U.S. Yet mentally ill inmates are not committing mass murder against their fellow inmates.

Was the mass shooter at the Robb Elementary School mentally ill?

Sure he was. That issue is not subject to debate.

But a reasonable argument can be made that the insurrectionists who stormed the nation’s Capitol Building on January 6, 2021 intent on hanging the Vice President of the United States were also mentally ill, not “patriots” of democracy as many right-wing politicians would have us believe.

Like it or not, violence is not a manifestation of mental illness, rather mental illness of a manifestation of violence.

And the seed of violence, and the bumper crop of death it produces, comes from the soil of gun manufacturing, especially those manufacturers that assembly-line military-style assault weapons.

Guns have, and always have had, one singular purpose: to kill life, whether human or some other species.

It is the very deadliness of guns that demand regulation of them—something that can be achieved without wholesale confiscation or unreasonable control of them.

Common sense regulations like a 21-year age limit in order to purchase a gun, identification and background check prior to purchase, of the gun, and community safety-driven restraints on the “privilege” not “right” to open or conceal carry guns.

Any right thinking person should be able to live with these basic, responsible regulations. They would have prevented the deaths of 19 innocent children and two teachers.

But gun regulations do not have a friendly audience in this country, especially in politically conservative states, because too many gun owners believe, regardless of how irrational, that an unrestrained accessibility to guns is a necessary defense against the “government is coming to take your guns” conspiracy theories.

Need proof?

News reports inform that Americans spent nearly $17 billion on guns and ammunition during the Obama presidency but gun sales immediately declined under the Trump presidency.

The conclusion is simple: a large percentage of white Americans, especially gun owners, felt racially threatened under Obama but racially secure under Trump.

These racial fears, and the social divisions they spawn, have a tragic consequence: namely, an increasing number of white gun-owning parents are not only teaching their children how to use guns but instilling them with a race driven anti-government hatred necessary to turn their guns on people of color in defense of some QAnon-inspired cause.

Gun ownership is no longer about the right to “keep and bear” a single shot musket or a flintlock pistol for either self or community protection. It is now about the right to “keep and bear” the most deadly guns available and to use them under whatever circumstances (whether legal or not) the individual deems appropriate, such as in “road rage” moments or attempts to break up social protests.

If this insanity is allowed to continue, our schools will become a breeding ground for future inmates. Violence begets violence, and children grow into adults—and if children are victims of, or exposed to, violence, they will seize violence as a reflexive response to any life situation that displeases them.

America can be a safe, gun-owning society but the nation will continue to reap a bitter harvest of violence so long as parents abuse their children and society marginalizes them based on their race, sexual preference, religious beliefs, or economic status.

The bottom line is this: mental health is being made a scapegoat for tragedies like the Uvalde school shooting when, in fact, it is the political system that allows shooters to casually purchase or access their weapons of mass destruction that is responsible for gun-related tragedies.

Where does a deranged teenager, who cannot afford a pair of jeans, get $3,000 or more to purchase assault weapons and ammunition?

And who are the gun store clerks selling teenagers so many weapons and so much ammunition without at least alerting law enforcement about the purchase?