Believe it or not, most cons don't like to see children mistreated. Take my word for it.

Twinpac, I've had the unfortunate experience of working with ex-cons in the sweatshops of Texas. I was always in the A/C'd laboratory and people would find any excuse to come in out of the heat, even if was to shoot the breeze. Forgive the pun.

Many of the workers were ex-cons and the only legitimate work they could find was non-unionized intentured servitude. I learned a lot of cons they would pull and got an incomplete education on how to be a low-life, but one thing they all would tell me is that, even though they were crooks, kids were off-limits. Even cynically, hurting a kid will never help you in front of a Judge.

Now, with mobsters, it might be a different story, but with run-of-the-mill jailbirds, it is not kosher.

Please forgive this bit of s--thouse pschoanalysis, but it occurred to me that some people who've been judged ne'er-do-wells are looking for an opportunity to do something heroic that will redeem them in the eyes of the public. Don't mistake me for not thinking there are some very, very bad people in jail, and should be there and kept away from the non-murdering, non-armed robbery public. A good deal of them are in for drug charges, transportation, posession of a pound of weed, etc. But my argument stems from the fact that after I've been punished in the past as a child, I seemed to want to do something that would prove I've been punished unfairly. That I was actually a good kid. Perhaps this same impetus is in convicted people, but just didn't figure out how to stop ------ up like they should've learned as kids.

Rusty, do you have anything to add? I know the state of our prison population is a 31 priority with you.

Also, my sister is a probation officer for one of the Texas metroplex's counties. She's gotten callous over the years and believes everyone should be in prison. And that all her "clients" are constantly trying to pull the wool over her eyes. I had to tell her, look at their predicament. They have no out, few programs, and just feel like flotsom in a society that offers so much material wealth, just too few know how to get it, and weren't reared/fostered by a good family to give them a hand up in their early 20s when you begin to start down one path or another. Many of the homeless are orphans with no family. Vets wandering around in a vodka-fuelled haze are obviously suffering from PTSD. Etc.

Sbe still thinks everyone but her little bubble of probation officers should be in jail. But, since none of the posters here know her, I'll let out a small secret that she is seeking psychiatric counselling because of it. So there is hope.