Last week it came to light that a Northampton Co. PA juvenile court judge, the Hon. William F. Moran, told a white kid he was lucky because minority kids would probably get treated worse in court for the same crime. He was attempting to raise the larger question of “invidious racism” in the American criminal justice system.
I wrote four pieces defending the judge and expanding on the issue of racism in American justice. The forth essay is:
The invidious economics of Jim Crow
“Undereducated and poverty oppressed children, with little in the way of economic opportunity in the Lehigh Valley, today face anarchy in the totally unregulated enticement of an annual $ 295 million retail black market in illicit drugs. A $ 6 billion black market state wide annually. Children are expected to run the gauntlet of their formative years between addict peers, gangsters and predators, offering them economic opportunity, power and high on one side. Minimum wage, police, criminal laws, prison and the threat of mandatory minimums of anal rape tough love on the other to dissuade them from the glamor, glory and riches of drug market profits.”
