Ian Manuel, survivor of excessive child punishment, tells his story

https://eji.org/news/ian-manuel-survivor-of-excessive-child-punishment-tells-his-story/

146 109 5 years ago

Clewza313• 5 years ago

No programs or classes, no visitors, phone calls, or human touch, deprived of books, magazines, TV, and radio, and barred from talking or even looking out of his cell door

And this for a 13-year-old, who was sentenced to life without parole. WTF.

knownjorbist• 5 years ago

This is what "tough on crime" gets you - a race to the bottom.

w_t_payne• 5 years ago

At that point, the state is as criminally brutish as those it seeks to morally disparage and demean, and has lost any right to even be listened to.

drno123• 5 years ago

The same 13-year old was doing armed robbery and only by chance his victim did not die.

calt• 5 years ago

Ok. And in what wild world of ethics does this even hint at being justified?

Torture is not punishment. Torture is torture.

Griffinsauce4• 5 years ago

It sucks that they thought that was a good idea. A good hard look should be taken at the environment that led to that.

Also: why not teach them to be better, do you think 13 year olds are incapable of learning?

felipelemos• 5 years ago

At 13 years old you cannot decide to have sex, vote, drive, drink and so on, exactly because you are unable to decide or take responsibility.

tpush• 5 years ago

Here in Germany children under 14 can't even be guilty of any crime whatsoever. US society truly seems barbaric sometimes.

AvocadoPanic2• 5 years ago

Just another instance where American teenagers are more advanced.

The US has a violent minority population that persists in offending.

Germany is importing a similarly violent cohort. I'm sure your teens will catch-up.

scotty792• 5 years ago

I wonder how this guy even stayed verbal.

tomcatfish• 5 years ago

Because he was a very small boy, state prison officials decided to place Ian in solitary confinement, where he remained for the next 18 years.

What on earth? Solitary confinement starting as a child, potentially for life? What a weird way for this to hash out.

Strictly speaking, not being around others may be good, but solitary is an overadjustment.

pstuart• 5 years ago

solitary is torture.

mkelly• 5 years ago

Why is it even possible to “charge [someone] as an adult”. If you have the concept of “adult” and “child”, and a line in between them, how can the crime dictate someone’s mental maturity?

(Of course the answer is, I’m sure, is selective enforcement. So they can lock up black kids and let white kids off the hook.)

Aerroon4• 5 years ago

Because it's possible to game a system with rigid lines. Gangs could hire kids below the age cut off to do some of the work.

tomerv2• 5 years ago

That sounds like a serious crime by the gang leaders, and less so by the hired kids.

fortran77• 5 years ago

TO me this is the most amazing piece of the story:

With few contacts on the outside, Ian reached out to the shooting victim, Debbie Berkovits, to ask for her forgiveness, which she gave. A remarkable relationship emerged in which Ms. Berkovits became a supporter for a reduced sentence for Ian. But courts were nonresponsive.

fisherjeff• 5 years ago

Highly recommend the book Just Mercy, by Bryan Stevenson, which includes this story among others.

axiosgunnar2• 5 years ago

Just to explain the POV of the state, i.e. "why dont they release him if the victim is fine with it":

One of the reasons for incarcerations is vengeance, and another one is protecting the community from further crime.

If the victim forgives the perpetrator, you could argue no vengeance is necessary anymore; however, this person could still be a danger to future victims.

A life sentence for a 13yo is harsh of course, I am just trying to explain why the courts not letting him go after the victim forgave him is not as surprising as one might think at first.

wombatmobile3• 5 years ago

The U.S. is the only advanced nation that uses prolonged isolation as a routine tool of prison management.

What is the definition of "advanced nation"?

radmuzom• 5 years ago

Based on practical experrience, a nation that can get away with human rights abuses and illegal war crimes using their financial or military power.

atemerev2• 5 years ago

So, all of them?

agent3274• 5 years ago

In my experience, statements like the one you quoted are generally just made up on the spot, and the author adds phrases like "advanced nation" so he can weasel his way out if someone bothers to do a minimum of research and finds a counter example.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solitary_confinement#United_Ki...

Oh look, the UK has 40 people in solitary confinement. I guess the UK doesn't qualify as an advanced nation then?

wombatmobile3• 5 years ago

What would you consider makes a nation “advanced”?

rxhernandez3• 5 years ago

40 people for the whole country? That doesn't sound "routine." The article mentions that there are 80,000 in any given day for the US.

rsynnott• 5 years ago

They probably mean "developed democracy", though even then it's probably not quite correct; Japan does it to some extent.

Barrin92• 5 years ago

Life without parole is an inhumane form of punishment. It takes away the mere chance that someone, after having bettered him or herself and paid their debt to society can be included in society again, which in my opinion is the only justified basis on which to incarcerate someone in the first place.

imiric2• 5 years ago

The US and most countries' prison system seeks to punish and extract cheap labor out of prisoners, not rehabilitate them for reintroduction to society. It's big business[1].

Cases like this are not uncommon. People slip through the cracks, get stuck fighting the legal system, and eventually with enough luck and media attention the government can go "oops" and reverse a decision that often has ruined people's lives. There's no accountability and this keeps happening.

[1] https://news.law.fordham.edu/jcfl/2018/12/09/the-american-pr...

xyzzyz4• 5 years ago

The US and most countries' prison system seeks to punish and extract cheap labor out of prisoners, not rehabilitate them for reintroduction to society. It's big business[1].

That’s just simply untrue. The value of labor of prisoners is so low that it wouldn’t cover the cost of imprisoning them, even if all of the prisoners actually worked full time (and the actual figures are well short of that).

Now, to be sure, a lot of people make money on prisons, mostly government employees (as great majority prisons are government run), but also some private businesses too. However, the causation goes the opposite way to what you seem to argue: majority of people in prisons are there, because they committed a serious crime, usually violent, not because the prison industrial complex has somehow snatched them from the street for cheap labor. Even the private prisons make most of their money on contracting with government, not on products of prisoner labor (which, again to reiterate, is worth very little).

hef19898• 5 years ago

Most countries as including all countries on earth, maybe. Most countries as in developed democracies, well most definitely not.

shadilay• 5 years ago

During the botched robbery attempt, a woman suffered a nonfatal gunshot wound. Ian turned himself in to the police and was charged as an adult with armed robbery and attempted murder.

I'm confused, did he shoot her or not?

lmm• 5 years ago

The article wants you to be confused; acknowledging clearly that he shot her, or giving more details to humanise her, would detract from its position.

falomor• 5 years ago

That’s when 13-year-old Ian pulled the trigger and shot her right in the face. The outcome could have been fatal. “It blew out all the bottom teeth and the gums on the lower left side of my mouth,” she said.

https://www.goalcast.com/2020/08/04/woman-frees-man-who-shot...

rendall6• 5 years ago

Heartbreaking. A US citizen is likely not fully aware of the caprice and barbarity of the criminal justice system until it touches their lives somehow, but once seen it cannot be unseen. I have a cousin in prison 10 years into a 20 year stretch, and my horror at her conviction led to my emigrating to more civilized lands.

Edit: she's "Elizabeth Crafton" in this article https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/alexcampbell/these-moth...

ALittleLight3• 5 years ago

Just from reading a couple articles about Elizabeth Crafton in that county her story sounds horrific. It seems like she knowingly exposed her children to a violent person who beat and tortured them. She observed injuries "appearing" on her daughter and knew her boyfriend was violent and never connected the dots?

I do think the criminal justice system in the US is deeply flawed and needs lots and lots of reform... But I'm not really seeing the problem with a conviction for a woman who would expose her children to this. Is there additional context you can add?

"The child was literally beaten from head to toe... She was bruised on the top of her head to the bottom of her feet.

The girl, who suffered some brain damage, had cigarette burns, a skull fracture and a broken wrist...

https://www.oklahoman.com/article/3521061/man-kills-self-aft...

https://www.enidnews.com/oklahoma/how-laws-meant-to-protect-...

verall• 5 years ago

Yea it's terrible but she got 20 years while the man who beat her child got 11.

rendall6• 5 years ago

I've never met Elizabeth, so I couldn't say for sure whether she knew or not, but it doesn't make sense given how much I know she loves her kids. It makes more sense to me that if she saw signs that she didn't want to believe it, rather than that she knew and approved.

Regardless, I can't see how in a just system she would get nearly twice the sentence of the man who actually did it, especially when even the prosecutor admits she didn't abuse the children and wasn't in the house when it occurred.

Look, I get it. We want to believe that if someone gets 20 years, it must be reasonable in some way. I'm probably biased, but I just can't see it, here.

forcry• 5 years ago

Heartbreaking..

Civilized society is just an illusion. Imagine. How many people with power and authority must have known about Ian Manuel, and did nothing about it. What is civlilized about that?

And finally the action had to come from a non-government body, even after the POTUS banned the thing?

rendall6• 5 years ago

Civilized society is just an illusion.

It's a fragile, flickering flame, for sure. Many don't understand how fragile. I don't think it's an illusion, personally, but I can see that in more situations than not it's non-existent.

ur-whale2• 5 years ago

her conviction led to my emigrating to more civilized lands

Here's to hoping you left the US altogether.

rendall6• 5 years ago

I don't understand why you'd say something like that.

simonbarker87• 5 years ago

Life without parole, given to someone who is 13 beggars belief. How can someone believe that that is what is best for society?

We are basically different people every 5-10 years and at that age even every 2 or 3.

A 13 year old committing this kind of crime is more an indictment of the country/county/city failing that it is a reflection of the person. Should there be a punishment? Certainly. Should there be rehabilitation and education as well (more so even)? Yes.

Put aside the moral and ethical cost here, just the shear financial cost or this punishment is unbelievable. The judge mustn’t have viewed this boy as a person, the only way you can doll out these kinds of punishment is to see the person as some kind of animal. I dread to think how many other cases they issued similar horrendous sentences on.

fergie• 5 years ago

Put aside the moral and ethical cost here, just the shear financial cost or this punishment is unbelievable.

Yes, it is very odd. It seems like a lot of people have gone to a lot of effort to keep Ian Manuel in prison- but why? What is the motivation here? Profit? Revenge? Public safety? Who benefits when kids are incarcerated for decades?

int_19h• 5 years ago

The motivation in general is to appease the "tough on crime" voters. Cases like this are simply the inevitable consequence of laws and policies that flow from that.

choeger2• 5 years ago

All sentiments aside, some kids and teenagers are extremely dangerous. It could be that such a punishment came out of the desire to protect others (e.g., own kids).

Society does not have an answer to the more extrem cases of deviants, sadly.

But that consideration aside, putting a 13 year old into solitary confinement for years is a crime against humanity. The barbarian nation that does this should get a good old-fashioned regime change.

pjc50• 5 years ago

Racism. I guessed before I clicked through that Ian was black, and I was correct.

There will be one or two long serving white child prisoners, but it will be far rarer. The UK had exactly one case of children being given effectively life imprisonment, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_James_Bulger , and that was for a horrific murder by 10-year-olds on their own initiative.

darkerside• 5 years ago

It seems like a lot of people have gone to a lot of effort to keep Ian Manuel in prison

What makes you say that? I find that in cases like this, people are generally incentivized to do the least possible, out of a combination of laziness and fear of liability. I haven't read the book, but from the article, I don't think anyone had an agenda to keep him locked up. It's just that nobody in the system cared to get him out.

cltby2• 5 years ago

Public safety. Commission of violent crimes is a strong signal of underlying violent tendencies. These are largely congenital, and there is no known social intervention to fix them. The rest of us benefit when such individuals are warehoused, preferably for the rest of their lives. Their moral claim to a second chance counts little against my right to not be brutally victimized.

anm89• 5 years ago

The us correctional police justice complex is a system that has reached a complicated equilibrium. This isn't the whole story but the easiest way to understand is that it pays a lot of salaries, gives a lot of people access to big budgets, and gives a lot of people political power. This accounts for 100s of thousands of people every one of which potentially adds resistance to systemic change.

toomanyducks• 5 years ago

We can't keep pretending that our justice system is utilitarian. It's so very clearly not about helping those that commit crimes improve themselves. If it was, we wouldn't be punishing people with literal torture methods such as solitary, and we wouldn't care so much about being 'tough on crime'. We need to refocus our justice system on the criminalization process so that we reduce the importance of 'correctional' facilities. There is nothing utilitarian about the above story, let's not deceive ourselves.

S_A_P• 5 years ago

I don’t know how it feels and hope I never have to feel the grief that a homicide of a loved one. I also don’t think that locking a 14 year old up for their entire natural life is appropriate either. My son is 13. He is not even close to being capable of understanding the long range consequences of his actions right now. I could see how letting him roam around the streets without adult supervision could put him in a very tough spot. IMO At this age kids need love and guidance and small doses of agency to allow them to make choices and learn how to navigate the world. I think that a lot of these kids that end up in this circumstance are likely from broken or otherwise dysfunctional homes. I’m not sure how to fix it, but life in prison doesn’t seem to be the right way.

hkt• 5 years ago

To be clear, the article specified that he was jailed for a non-homicide offence.

xyzzyz4• 5 years ago

Yes, it didn’t end up being a homicide — not for the lack of trying, though. He shot his victim in the head.

azundo• 5 years ago

Also on the most recent episode of criminal: https://thisiscriminal.com/episode-170-ian-manuel-7-30-21

roschdal3• 5 years ago

Ian Manuel was arrested and charged with a nonhomicide offense

Which actions did Mr. Manuel do that resulted in his arrest?

rebuilder• 5 years ago

It’s just a few paragraphs down in the article:

“ 13-year-old Ian was directed by older juveniles to commit a robbery.

During the botched robbery attempt, a woman suffered a nonfatal gunshot wound. Ian turned himself in to the police and was charged as an adult with armed robbery and attempted murder.”

roschdal3• 5 years ago

Mr. Manuel shot a woman. I approve of his punishment.

xyzzyz4• 5 years ago

During the botched robbery attempt, a woman suffered a nonfatal gunshot wound.

Strategic use of passive voice is a classic tool of narrative making. Instead of assuming people have agency in their actions, it is suggested that a gun he just happened to have in their hand just happened to discharge a projectile in the direction of the person who just happened to be robbed around the same time. It is all just something that happens to people.

HiroProtagonist• 5 years ago

He shot a woman in the face:

That’s when 13-year-old Ian pulled the trigger and shot her right in the face. The outcome could have been fatal. “It blew out all the bottom teeth and the gums on the lower left side of my mouth,” she said.

atemerev2• 5 years ago

I am always shocked how cruel some people can be, and so many of them. Even in this thread, there are people who _approve_ these atrocities. There isn’t much hope for the world.

jmacd• 5 years ago

The sheer number of judges, bureaucrats, prison administrators, prison guards, medical staff, and dozens of other people who would have come across this boy and his plight over those decades would have been significant.

That none of them would, or could, do anything to ease his suffering even in some small way is disappointing. I hope I could do better in a similar position of authority.

bsenftner2• 5 years ago

The US "justice system" is a farce, and a worth reason to leave the United States. I have a brother that was a troublesome teen, and the police basically never let him alone. Situations cascaded simply due to immature behavior on both sides, but the police are institutionally not supposed to be immature children, but THEY ARE! After decades of harassment, he left and now lives very happily in Germany.

randompwd• 5 years ago

"troublesome teen" is a wide-ranging gamut.

Was he putting other people in danger? What actions was he doing that caused the police to get involved?

Great that he's happy now but would he have continued down a more dangerous path if left to his own devices?

bsenftner2• 5 years ago

Basically speeding and being mouthy in bars, sometimes leading to parking lot fights. But that was early, young, and they basically used that to harass him continually.

scotty792• 5 years ago

This reminds me of times when people put on trial and sentenced animals for crimes against humans.

Ian Manuel, survivor of excessive child punishment, tells his story

Related Stories