The State claims and exercises [a] monopoly of crime ... and...it makes this monopoly as strict as it can…. It punishes private theft, but itself lays unscrupulous hands on anything it wants, whether the property of citizen or of alien.... Of all the crimes that are committed for gain or revenge, there is not one that we have not seen it commit – murder, mayhem, arson, robbery, fraud, criminal collusion and connivance. (Albert Jay Nock)
Stephen Slevin, 57, was arrested in August 2005 in New Mexico’s Dona Ana County, charged with aggravated driving while under the influence and possession of a stolen vehicle, although Slevin maintains the car was lent to him by a friend. On Tuesday, a federal jury in Sante Fe awarded him $22 million in damages for enduring inhumane conditions in the Dona Ana County jail.
Slevin had one medical examination after being arrested and was labeled suicidal, his lawyer said. He was jailed in lieu of posting a $40,000 bond. He never appeared in court. He never saw a psychiatrist. And, despite being permitted an hour's exercise per day, frequently spent the entire 24 hours locked in a windowless cell. Toenails curling around his foot because they were so long, fungus festering on his skin because he was deprived of showers, Robinson Crusoe mingled with Josef K, lost inside the grinding wheels of the state.
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