Why should convicted felons be punished if they have a gun?

I suppose it depends on the state, and what the felony was, but in many cases, having been convicted of a felony removes many of what most folks consider their rights from those individuals. Perhaps they should have considered the consequences of their felonious acts before committing them, and then consequently being convicted of them.

If this isn't something you like, by all means engage in the political arena to change it.

 

Yes, it very much depends on what the felony was.
And not just that, I think it also very much depends on what the situation was.

That's true of course, but it's usually only for a limited period of time.

Taking away someone's rights for 2 years is not the same thing as taking away some of their rights for life.

 

Please show evidence that the definition of felon has changed. I didn't realize it ever had a different definition than what federal law now defines, which means that it's a criminal offense that has a punishment of over a year.

 

Citizenship comes at a price, does it not? If you chose to violate the law to the extent that you lose your voting rights, isn't that something that you should have considered prior to committing your felonious act?

And yes, if folks have served their time, I agree that they should be integrated back into society. As long as all of their conditions for being incarcerated and sentencing have been satisfied, why not? Does that mean they get their vote back? Again, a choice of the individual states, and if you want, in your state, you can engage the political process and advocate for it.

 

It's not so simple as that, in all cases.

I just think if we're going to automatically take away rights, we need to be more specific in what type of cases we take them away.

The law enforcement system doesn't work like how you think.

There are additional issues like burden of evidence, and there can be situations where it is appropriate to send someone to prison but not take away their rights when they leave. Sometimes a serious crime has been committed and the authorities just send people to prison because they happened to fall under suspicion in the situation they were in, even though there's no clear direct evidence they committed the crime. I could provide all sorts of examples of this.
Here's one example: Mom kills home invader, now going to prison for the gun she used
The woman in that link was pretty much pushed into a plea bargain by the prosecutor and didn't even end up being sentenced to any prison time, but she was now a convicted felon.

 

Why? If mom commits a felon in the execution of her stand your ground rights, and uses and illegally obtained gun, and of course commits the felony, why do you feel that she shouldn't also then suffer the consequences of her crime here?

I doubt authorities just "send people to prison because they fell under suspicion"... Because absent either a change and conviction or charge and plea deal, folks aren't going to jail.

I didn't ever suggest that this as simple, but the idea here is that there should be a well known social standard, and part of having committed the crime and upon conviction that future gun ownership and or voting rights would be reinstated subsequent to the incarceration and satisfaction of the sentencing. Folks should know that. It should also be sufficient to create or cause pause prior to committing those crimes.

 

I'm not understanding what you're saying. It wouldn't be a crime if she had not previously been convicted of a felony.
There was no direct evidence she had actually been the one who committed that original felony. And she was never sentenced to prison time for that original felony, though she had probably already spent a little bit of time in jail. If she had not pled guilty, she risked facing years in prison.

 

I also don't understand how it's appropriate to punish people for a crime by threatening to punish them if they do something else that's legal for other people.

In some cases the punishment for doing the second thing might exceed the amount of punishment for the first crime.
How does that make moral sense?

That's like if someone steals $100, and then after that has a gun in violation of the law, we punish them with 3 years, but if they only stole $100 we only punish them with 1 year. And if they didn't steal $100 and had a gun, they don't get any punishment because then it would be legal for them to have that gun.

It doesn't make logical sense, and it doesn't mathematically add up.

 

Good points. Many if not most of the felons wasting their lives in our prisons should have been caned and released.

 

Look, if we truly view guns as an individual right, then we need to be careful exactly what types of things can take away that right.

Again, we're not talking about temporary taking away rights, but laws that automatically permanently take away rights.

If you're going to permanently take away rights from an individual, for the rest of their lives, they need to have done something very very serious, and we need to be very very sure that they did that crime. I mean even more certain than is needed to put them in prison for just a few years.
I don't believe the burden of evidence should be the same. So having those long-term rights taken away automatically connected to a guilty verdict is not appropriate.

I can think of all sorts of situations where it would be appropriate to punish people even if we weren't really fully sure they committed the crime, and people often do get sentenced in these situations. They're normally offered a plea bargain and only serve just a few years (or even less) in prison because the authorities are not completely sure.
This type of story is as old as the Bible. Think about the story of Joseph, someone stole Pharaoh's gold wine cup, they weren't sure who. It had to be either the baker or the cup-bearer, so they put both of them in prison.