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Subscribe to RSSIn his first hours of freedom following a two-month stint behind bars, a North Carolina man didn't even make it past the jail grounds before getting thrown back in.
Rockingham County Sheriff's Offi
Rodney Dwayne Valentine faces 75 more days in jail for trespassing after refusing to leave.
Rodney Dwayne Valentine, 37, who has no permanent address, had been in Rockingham County jail since May 22 for injury to personal property, Rockingham County Sheriff's Office Deputy Kevin Suthard said.
He was released last Saturday around 8 a.m. but stuck around for five hours arguing with officers, insisting they drive him to a motel. They refused.
"We can't transport everybody that gets out of jail," Suthard told NBC News.
Valentine was charged with second-degree trespassing and is being held on $500 bail. He could face up to 75 more days in jail and a fine.
"It takes all kinds. That's the reason why our job is never boring in law enforcement," Suthard said.
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Life must really suck if you are going out of your way to insure a steady diet of jail food.
Got to be better and safer than eating from the Dumpsters all the time.
Whatever, those guys get 3 square meals, great medical attention, free education, workout facilities, place to sleep and a pot to piss in.... for free. That is a huge reason why a lot of people don't want to leave jail.
Make it a less desirable place to be and the trend will stop.
GimDan,
I see that comment of yours all the time.
Don't know where you people get that idea, but it's a total lie. And if you have personal knowledge of it, please inform us of which jail you are speaking of.
Breakfast is a small box of cold cereal. Lunch is a cold sandwich, if they are allowed lunch. Many states only serve two meals now, and allowed by law to do so. The only drink allowed at meals is a small bathroom size dixie cup of koolaide.
They are left in their cells, no work out gym. No cable TV. No education (where the hell did you ever get that?). No medical attention unless a bleeding open wound.
screminmimi, I'm glad you said something. I get so sick of people thinking that being in jail is like some sort of country club. In some jails they don't even give you shampoo or deodorant. They'll issue you a toothbrush, toothpaste, a comb and a small bar of soap. Any thing else you may need for personal hygiene needs to be purchased and if you have no money you're SOL you have to wash your hair with the bar of soap they give you.
Mimi, GimDan has been here sine 2008. He is friendless. What does that mean, do you suppose? Don't answer - just think about it.
Should we scalp him, grump?...lol.... or leave him for the Weendigo and Stone Hand?
What the heck? The guy sounds like Otis from the Andy Griffith show.
Ummmm, I thought the same thing as you screminmimi, until I talked to a C/O two weeks ago (yeah, someone who knows first-hand). Either it's different state-to-state (or jail-to-jail) or you don't know what you're talking about. This guy wasn't in a penitentiary for damage to property. He wasn't in a supermax, either. He was in a jail - and around here, they get a LOT of freedom. A LOT. They just have to be in their cells for certain things, the longest time they spend in there is when they are sleeping. Could be much different in a federal pen or supermax. But this guy wasn't in either.
OK, so this guy is basically homeless. When released from jail and with no way to get to a motel, and hanging around the jail because he couldn't get a ride to a motel, he was considered to be trespassing. The end result of trespassing on jail property is further incarceration. Being homeless, I somehow don't think this additional jail time matters too much to this fellow since he knows he's going to be fed and lodged for the foreseeable future. He's playing the system.
I recall homeless people in NYC throwing a brick through some store window just to get arrested so they can be lodged, fed, and receive medical/dental attention, all on the taxpayer's dime.
Maybe it means he doesn't like social networking, like so many on here claim - and then turn around and use this as a social network. It could also be because he speaks the truth, which is something much hated by this organization and a seemingly vast majority of its commenters.
gone4now,
I had a few run ins with the law many years ago, and spent some time in a few jails. There are no gyms, education opportunities r square meals in county lockups. Maybe state prisons, but county lockups are pretty meager with the amenities.
GimDan, are you fu@%in serious??? That jail seems to be way out away from anything else. If I'm broke and homeless I don't think I'm trying to walk around aimlessly for miles in the middle of this heat we've been having. If nothing else you usually freeze your balls off in jail.
How does one injure property and has it healed?
Where I live in Pasadena CA people pay to go to our jail. People who have to do weeks or a month or so, will and do pay to be sent to Pasadena City Jail rather than spend their time in county lock-up with all the dangerous crimminals wainting trial. The faciities are excellent, I'm told.
That homeless guy outsmarted those Goober and Gomer cops. 3 square meals a day (not from a dumpster), a bed, medical, entertainment, air conditioning, showers, clean clothes, toilet wine, smuggled in dope etc etc etc.
Well it depends on the type of crime you commit. The pot smokers and basic street thugs get nothing but a life of hell even after they do their time. the record follows them forever and keeps many from ever being gainfully employed. the white collar crimes get the cable, net the good food and job waits for them to return and continue the life style they are use to.
@pauliegirl. Oh, please, are you going to tell me that someone who is convicted of a white collar crime can be gainfully employed? Probably not.
This is really sad...they could've just taken him to a darn motel! I'm sure some people have others to pick them up...he wasn't that lucky. And doesn't sound like he's a violent criminal. Sad.
He already has a mode of transportation, it's called FEET. You put your right foot in front of your left foot, then your left foot in front of your right foot, repeat sequence several times and eventually get to where you want to go.
While I agree he could have walked I have no idea how far the motel was away. The cops don't have time to drive him 10-30 minutes to a hotel but have enough time to gaurd this man for another 75 days at an estimated cost of 30k / yr then we're talking $6,165.38 the taxpayers are ponying up because the cops couldn't provide or arrange for a simple ride away from jail.
This guy was in for injury to personal property for 2 months already - $4,931.50.
Costs for this punishment will be over $10k for 4 1/2 months jail time. How many working families could have been helped instead?
Heck my mortgage for a year is only $8k.
The last time I checked, cop cars were black and white...NOT yellow. Cops are not cabbies or chauffeurs. Use you damn LPCs (leather Personnel Carriers) to get to the motel.
Well, that's true, except here in PA. If you're the budget secretary's wife and you get busted for DWI, the police will leave the governor's mansion and come get you and take you home.
They should have sent him to a mental health facility rather than jail. More appropriate, and probably less appealing. Bet he wouldn't want to go back there!
Throw him in Sandusky's cell :)
Nosferatu, the same thing happens here in Albuquerque: if you're the wife of APD Chief Darren White, and you crash your car while driving drunk, he'll drop whatever he's doing and come to the scene and take you directly to the hospital - you know, just to make sure you're safe.
double tap
Fishhead & Jennifer,
I guess next time I need to make a run to the grocery store or get a ride to work, I'll just dial the cops. I'm fairly sure they'll give me a ride but I'm also fairly sure it isn't going to be to the grocery store or to work.
You might want to call the Black n White Cab service at 911 and see how it goes for you. :-)
Nearest hotel about 5 miles away. He could have hoofed it. I think cops dropping off broke homeless people in front of businesses might be frowned upon.
The land of the free baby! The land of the free!
There are officers coming and going all the time dropping off prisoners. They could have just thrown him in the back of one of the cars leaving and taken him to the nearest main road and been done with him.
Since the jail in my county, being very rural, is 5 miles down a dirt road from the nearest paved road they take people being released to the paved road and kick them out there. That way they do not have the problem of people hanging around near the jail trying to get a ride from someone.
With a 25% real unemployment rate, more and more people will be happy to be imprisoned in order to receive those 3 squares & shelter... it's just a preview of the corporate dorms everyone in America will inhabit as we transition to a more open Corporate-Feudalist system
He has no place to go, no job, no home. This is not unusual in the South, including Florida and all of the "south-west,". The Juvenile Justice and the Justice System are the chief providers of Social Services, and the chief mental health providers. Do you think you can really get by with little or no state income taxes? It is hypocritical, but it is also humane. It is sad this "real story" was only hinted at, in the end of the article, and by Law Enforcement of course.
He's become institutionalized. Haven't you all seen The Shawshank Redemption?
I was institutionalized for 23 years and then in 1999 my wife passed away.
Do you make better choices now?
Jail isn't the best place to be..granted some states like Pennsylvania feed you 3 meals a day..some have cable tv..(that you will be stuck watching reality tv/MTV 24/7 on)..they do provide medical assistance..but don't expect to be treated like royalty..lol
MRSA and staph infections are VERY VERY VERY commonplace in prisons..(and you are given a bar of dial soap,bleach and some antibiotics if you catch either of em...to clean yourself up with.)
Not to mention..you get about 4 hours yard time if you're a good boy/girl..and the other people in jail; are not all in there for traffic tickets either...lol
(rape/beatings/murders are commonplace..as well as guards that make their own rules and see what they want to see depending on who you are or if they even give a rats ass about you..which they probably won't)
...
The nation's first mulatto president will no doubt weigh in on this one.
Your name says it all. Thanks for that!
I'm not an Obama supporter but people like you are complete morons.
I suppose you're not a racist either?
...
1. He is the first mulatto president of the U. S.
2. He normally weighs in when he perceives a travesty against blacks.
Both statements true.
...
Sure, As far as I'm concerned, you California fag gots can fall in to the ocean.
Nosferatu
What a ignorant thing to say. Poor, poor person
Which is cheaper for us tax-payers? Driving the dude to a motel or giving him 75 more days in jail?
Instead of limiting gun rights, it would be more useful to limit internet access.
Great idea! Then you might be absent from these threads.
be careful what you suggest. you won't stop them from trying to strip you of your ability to defend yourself from the government... but you don't have to encourage them to limit other rights as well.
Come on people,,,jail is easy for them! They DO get fed, exercise, even schooling! It is our tax money that supports this. so for all you thinking jail isn't so easy then think again.
america's social system, enjoy.....
Sounds like he just wanted his free daily "three hots and a cot" to continue on. Motels/Hotels cost money, getting jailed doesn't. (At least not to the jailee)
Good for him
Hey man. 3 meals a day and a bed? Some people might think that's the cats meow.
just pepper spray him till he leaves. has he ever tried walking?
Wow, so instead of paying $20 for a taxi, you put him back in jail and cost Taxpayers thousands of dollars, don't go breaking your arms patting yourselves on the back there... idiots.
Not even that. There's probably a coffee shop near where the bum wanted to go. One of the cops could have dropped him off on the way to the cop's next break.
I can understand the sheriff not giving the guy a ride to a motel but, how much will it cost the county to house this character versus a ride in a squad car away from the jail? I guess their county budget is unlimited. This will really teach Valentine a lesson, right? Whatever happened to common sense and compromise? I suppose that is too much to expect. The U.S. Congress has even losted touch with common sense and compromise so why expect it from a county sheriff.
In my area some Amish teens were jailed on vandalism charges. Central heat, running water, no work. It was pure luxury. Probably similar for a homeless guy.
"Judge not lest be in his shoes"........... Imagine yourself with no where to go......... I have to respect this man for he did not want to commit a crime to live and he literally asked to stay in jail..........
yep it would have been cheaper for the taxpayers to just give him a ride to the motel. very logical.
I have been to jail but one night back in 1976 when I was 19 years old. I was drinking a Michelob and driving my Roadrunner and the local cops didn't want a loud 383 Magum Roadrunner roaring through the streets with a long haired 19 year old at the wheel. I remember the jail as being not so bad except for the loud dude in the next cell. The food did suck and I was let go the next morning after posting $28 for bail. Little did those cops know I had a $10 bag of weed (back then a full ounce) in my underwear. They never searched me when we arrived at the jail. It was funny and I'll never forget it. But I assume jail is no fun and don't won't to find out. I toured Alcatraz a few times and it looked tough.
How does fining someone who does not even have enough money to rent a place, let alone own a house make any sense?
Jail/prison - could this begin a trend towards a new welfare program?
Interesting.
I would guess that of the 2 million plus inmates in this country about half are victims of a justice system that is out of control, consisting of people "guilty" of "crimes" in which they themselves were the only victims and non-violent to boot. Federal prosecutors are notorious for coercing pleas with threats of interminable incarceration based on very questionable "conspiracy" charges.
What would happen if about 30 or 40 million people turned themselves in to federal law enforcement for possession of "controlled substances" (which aren't really controlled or so many people wouldn't have them in their possession, now would they?) ? What an amazing clusterf**k that would be! Would they (the people), all be charged with some kind of vague conspiracy? Conspiring to overload the limited minds of the bureaucracy? Conspiring to exhibit the inadequacy of inane legislation being enforced by mental midgets?
What a great country, what great people, what a screwed up, completely inadequate government.
So True.... We read about over ambitious Federal Prosecutors........Later we read of many innocent people being threatened and forced to take a plea............ But some may say, who cares for it seems happenings have gone over the cliff and where they will fall is anyone's guess.... Good Luck to all...
He ain't right.
Rodney, you better thank them! Free room & board! You won't have to be paying any MOTEL bill! Now that's what you call LIVING OFF THE FAT OF THE LAND!