I Would Rather Be In Jail

You probably all heard about the 10 escaped felons who managed to escape from the Orleans Justice Center in New Orleans….

Perhaps you can discern a pattern in the mugshots but only if you are racist.

Of the ten escapees, 8 have been recaptured at this point and understandably there has been a lot of focus on how they got out and what can be done to prevent future escapes. More on that in a moment.

Not surprisingly, these 10 physics-enthusiasts had help getting out of the Orleans Justice Center. One of them was the fella with the super elongated neck, middle pic top row above. The giraffe impersonator is one Derrick Groves and his girlfriend was arrested for aiding their escape. Her name is Darriana Burton and….steel yourself my brethren, here she is….

Great Caesar’s Ghost!

You might think the picture is the worst part but you would be wrong. From the story out of Fox 8 in NOLA:

U.S Marshals arrested Darriana Burton, 28, the girlfriend of escaped inmate Derrick Groves, on Monday (June 9) as part of the ongoing investigation into the May 16 jailbreak at the Orleans Justice Center.

She is 28.

28!

I would have pegged her at late 40s at a minimum. Being the “girlfriend” of a murderer is hard on a gal I guess. Her boytoy Derrick Groves is linked to four killings and he is still on the run along with a 2G named Antoine Massey, top row first on the left above, a swell guy with face tats who is accused of rape and kidnapping along with a slew of other charges.

Damn son, she is 28?

Darriana Burton once worked for the correctional system but had a minor infraction leading to her dismissal:

Burton is a former Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office recruit who, in February 2023, was arrested after officials say she brought a folding knife and a Cheetos bag full of tobacco and synthetic marijuana into the jail facility. She was booked for malfeasance in office and introduction of contraband into a penal institution.

Come on, who among us hasn’t smuggled synthetic Mary Jane into work in a Cheetos bag?

What made me slap my forehead was that the story details her involvement in planning the escape while on a FaceTime call with a Burton as well as a later call with a different inmate. Burton apparently had a phone that he used to include a different person into the conversation.

Silly me but I thought these guys were in jail but they are on FaceTime and have contraband phones and sheeiitt.

Hottie extraordinaire Darriana Burton is now in jail while her “boyfriend” Derrick Groves is still on the run. A suspicious person might think that he was using this homely chick to help get him out of jail but didn’t really love her. At least I hope so because the thought of a hot and sweaty reunion with her after escaping from jail would encourage me to take my chances in the jail shower room. They say prison changes a man but come on.

*****

While looking at this story I saw different story from Fox 8 that focused on the obvious problem of how ten violent felons just waltzed out of a jail: Three weeks into jailbreak, NOLA Coalition leaders shift focus to how it happened.

The NOLA Coalition is a huge umbrella organization in New Orleans that has a ton of business sponsors with millions in donations already. The President of the NOLA Coalition is a guy named Michael Hecht, a Yale grad with an MBA from Stanford, and his take on the jailbreak?

“From the economic development perspective, we would like to see a system which is as much reformatory as it is punitive,” Hecht said.

Hecht stated that auditing the jail to identify its shortcomings is part of the NOLA Coalition’s mission, particularly since the jailbreak occurred during a decline in violent crime in the city. He added that inmates often spend too long in jail due to slow court proceedings.

“Why were some of those individuals in there for up to two years?” Hecht said. “One of the things that you’re supposed to get through due process is the right to a speedy trial.”

Maybe the court proceedings are slow because NOLA has such an enormous volume of violent crime that it takes forever to get them to trial? An attorney for one of the escapees who was recaptured echoed this sentiment:

Attorney Tanzanika Ruffin represents Lenton Vanburen, one of the most recent escapees to be recaptured. She said Vanburen awaited trial for more than three years on a murder charge.

“Because he was in jail for over 1,200 days, people began to get frustrated, and when you’re frustrated, sometimes you don’t make the best decisions,” Ruffin said.

He murdered someone but dang the poor fella is frustrated about being in jail 1,200 days. I wonder how frustrated he will feel after he is a decade or two into a life sentence? By the way, here is attorney Tanzanika Ruffin from her website. She looks like a fry cook at a Popeyes.

This does get to a serious problem in our justice system. People credibly accused of murder are sitting in jail for years awaiting trial and one major reason for this is the sheer volume of criminal cases in America. Crime has been a major problem in America for a long time but starting in 2020 America’s criminal class went on a rampage and presumably many of those who were actually arrested are clogging up the system.

The system is bogged down by the weight of so many cases but also by a system that is endlessly being delayed by motions and appeals and dragging out of trials. Lenton Vanburen, the 2G represented by the water buffalo above, shot and killed a man named Aurrel Brown in November of 2021. It is ridiculous that Vanburen was still awaiting trial over 3 years later. He should have been tried, found guilty of murder and executed shortly thereafter before Easter of 2022.

The real problem in the “justice” system is that we have a system based on a more high trust, homogenous society and thanks to decades of erroneous court decisions the system is now designed to keep criminals out of jail. When you combine that with a growing population of blacks and mestizos that is prone to crime, you end up with swamped courts and overcrowded jails. The solutions to these problems are obvious but are also impossible under the current system, and that again reminds us we need a completely different system.