Punishments for laws broken.. Why do they differ so much?

United States
October 15, 2008 1:29am CST
i totally dont understand the american law or should i say rulings/punishments for laws broken.. one person will get life, the other 15 years, then there is parole and murder in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd degree etc.. 1 person can murder a person and only get a few years and another one get death.. and the ones that get parole only serve a few years out of the sentence.. is there any logic to this? i dont understand why its so different!! i think if its a certain law it should be a standard sentence for it.. or am i just dumb as a box of rocks??
2 people like this
3 responses
• United States
15 Oct 08
I think its different in cases like murder because of motivation and how the person was murdered. Why should someone who was drunk and killed someone get the same punishment for someone who had brutally murdered someone.
1 person likes this
• United States
19 Oct 08
yeah but which is what? 1,2,3 degree matching which ones?
• United States
19 Oct 08
lol yeah.. i can never understand legal crap anymore though.. i tried to read this thing on a law they passed that is suppose to be good for people with fibro and it might as well been in Klingon
• United States
19 Oct 08
No idea, that should be something interesting to look up when i get bored. If i remember to.
1 person likes this
@ahgong (10064)
• Singapore
15 Oct 08
You are not alone in this confusion as well. I too sometimes cannot understand how the rulings were derived at. Take for example, a person killing a person gets a slap on the wrist and a hefty fine due to reckless driving. But a person who kills a dog could get jailed. Unless I study law myself, I will never be able to fully comprehen how the people who pass judgement gets around to deciding on how much punishment a guilty person deserves.
• United States
19 Oct 08
i think even if we were to study it that law and its insanity is always evolving
1 person likes this
@ahgong (10064)
• Singapore
21 Oct 08
I am not surprised either. Sometimes, I wonder if the law books were written specifically to confuse. Especially the layman who needs to seek redress. I mean, there seems to be possible to play around with the definitions of words, punctuations and sentence structuring to interpret the meaning of some of the laws. Especially with regards to the parts where severity of sentencing comes to play. Some get it off so easy. Others pay a hefty price for petty crimes. sigh....
1 person likes this
@Hatley (163781)
• Garden Grove, California
18 Oct 08
moonlitmagikchild I think some laws can be amended for different situations like a wife who kills the coward who keeps beating her, she might get a lighter sentence than a serialkiller who kills for the sick pleasure of it. I think we must have a few degrees difference because not all killings are the same. Youkill somone in self defense you should not be sent to prison for years, it was his or her life, or yours, so sentences must be amended at times. the more brutal the murder the bigger the sentence.
1 person likes this
• United States
19 Oct 08
yeah but which degrees are for which ones? i can understand if it was different cases for that but a lot of the exact same crimes seem to get all different kinds of sentences