Summary
Stephanie Diane Dowells, 62, was strangled during an overnight visit with her husband, David Brinson, at Mule Creek state prison in California.
Brinson, serving life without parole for four murders, claimed Dowells passed out, but authorities ruled her death a homicide.
This marks the second strangulation death during a family visit at the prison in a year; Tania Thomas was killed in July 2024 while visiting inmate Anthony Curry. Investigations are ongoing.
California is one of four states allowing family visits to maintain positive relationships.
You’re the one arguing we shouldn’t imprison people for life. People in favor of life imprisonment can turn right around and say; “yeah, it would be great if we lived in a world where that wasn’t necessary, but that’s not the world we live in.”
“You should focus on reality instead of your fantasies more often.”
I was saying it’s better than the death penalty, not that it’s okay.
Wrong. I’m arguing that by your “logic,” the reasons you give against the death penalty are also applicable to life in prison. Therefore, you shouldn’t be saying one is okay but not the other, which is what you were doing.
Good, I’m glad you can at least be direct about it now. What should we be doing instead?
You started off arguing against life in prison.
I only said that life in prison is less bad than execution. I never said either were okay.
Create a society where there aren’t incentives to do crimes and then focus on reeducation and rehabilitation for people who need help adjusting to life in a peaceful society.
We need schools and hospitals, not dungeons. In some cases people might need to be involuntarily placed into reeducation and rehabilitation, but that’s far different from just locking them up as a form of punishment.
What should we be doing instead of sending people to prison until we have the society you envision?
Well we could start by massively reducing the prison population. If we addressed crowding, existing prisons would be far more humane.
I’m sure there needs to be a phase-out period while we build hospitals and schools, it really wouldn’t take that long if we actually marshalled all the forces of production on the project. If we built as fast as China we could replace all prisons in a year.
You didn’t really answer my question.
By instead, I meant instead of sending people for prison (possibly for life.)
“Reducing the prison population” still involves sending people to prison, possibly for life. What should we be doing instead of sending people to prison before we live in a society where people don’t commit crimes worthy of incarceration?
I’m sorry I have to be so specific with you, it feels like I’m talking to a genie lol.
Well I literally said we can keep the prisons open while we build the hospitals and schools. There’s no where else to put people who are a danger to themselves and others.
Also, we can definitely redefine what a “crime” even is; so many people are locked up that don’t need to be.
To be clear, since you don’t seem to understand what I’m saying, I’m saying that hospitals and schools replace the prisons. In a just society, antisocial behavior would be treated with rehabilitation in hospitals and reeducation in schools. Again, the hospitals and schools replace the prisons.
I’m sorry that I keep repeating myself but it seems like there’s some fundamental disconnect with what I’m saying that you don’t seem to be understanding. Are we communicating through translation software?
So… we go all the way back to my previous point where I said you think it’s okay to imprison people for life even with the possibility that they are innocent.
Stay on topic.
No, I understand exactly what you’re saying. You know it’s stupid to argue “the death penalty isn’t ok because sometimes people are innocent” while saying “but it’s okay to lock them up for life even though sometimes they’re innocent.” Instead of owning your incorrect stance, you try to pivot and derail to something else to avoid admitting you’re wrong.
Do you see how difficult it was for you to admit it’s necessary to lock people up? That’s because you knew you were wrong, but tried throwing as much shit at the wall to see if you could get away with it.
Lol, me too! I have to keep repeating myself because you don’t want to admit when you’re wrong. So you just keep saying the same thing in slightly different ways or throwing in distractions thinking it’s going to get you different results.
I said to keep the prisons open until we replace them. That necessarily means we aren’t imprisoning people for life, because the prisons will close. We just hold them for the length of time it takes to replace the prisons with schools and hospitals.
Get it?
Also I don’t know where you got the idea that I actually support life imprisonment? I only said it’s better than the death penalty.
I keep repeating myself because you seem to be willfully misunderstanding me over and over.