Non-Violent But Persistent Felon; What Do We Do?

Parent Cafe
1

This clearly troubled young man is again in jail for stealing/interfering with the operation of a public commuter train. He’s been in the news for years. His fascination with subway trains began as a teenager. He’s never hurt anyone but clearly there’s something wrong with his cerebral connections because eventually he does it again.

Now the NY City Subway agency is adamant that he will not profit from his crimes, citing the NY State Son of Sam law which prevents felons from cashing in on media deals about their crimes. Will such a sanction stop this kid, once he serves his current sentence? I think it’s fair to say he will once again impersonate a conductor and steal a train. Is locking him up for several years the only solution?

2

Oops! Here’s the link.

http://nypost.com/2016/03/21/mta-gets-serious-about-seizing-movie-profits-from-transit-thief/

3

First thought: Maybe it needs to be a bit more difficult to “steal” a train.

4

That was my thought, too. This is on the NYC subway chieftains.

5

Obviously your point is valid, but you wouldn’t believe how persistent and skilled this kid is. At one of his escapades, he had a train operator’s attire AND KEYS! He’s a big kid so few transit employees, thinking he was an adult, thought twice about it if they saw him in the depot or conductor’s break room. The kid may be non-violent, but he certainly is pathological.

6

“Catch Me If You Can” comes to mind.

http://www.charlestoncitypaper.com/charleston/frank-abagnale-on-what-came-after-catch-me-if-you-can/Content?oid=5108230

Maybe they can pay the kid to help them with train security?

7

I had the same thought as sax. If someone could stir this kid towards doing something positive and useful…

8

The article states that he is now 50 yrs old. Far from a kid.

9

But this is CC. :wink:

10

There was another man who somehow got through security and managed to shake POTUS’s hand at several inaugurations. I don’t think he managed it with Obama though (although that would be celebrity couple did crash a state dinner).

11

Lol. I meant to say when he was a kid. The ship apparently has sailed…

12

He has been doing this for years, has taken both buses and subway trains. He is very clever at doing what he does, and many trains still have pretty rudimentary security on them, if you can get into the cab it is easy to drive them. In theory, something like a card key that are issued to employees would work, that you need that to run a train, lot harder to duplicate that (or a card with a chip, sort of like modern credit cards are going to), would be a lot harder to duplicate that. In one sense it is fortunate that he really does understand the trains and buses, apparently the people on the trains he operated didn’t even realize an imposter was running them.

If he truly has a psychological problem that is causing him to do this, then he either needs treatment (if it is possible), or they need to keep increasing the penalties on him when he does this, it seems a shame to take up jail space with a non violent offender, but this guy could also potentially cause a serious incident the next time he tries one of his stunts, people could be killed.

13

I wonder if he couldn’t just go ahead and get the proper training to be a subway operator, and then work in that capacity officially. Seems like a win win proposition.

14

@nrdsb4: On top of everything else, I think his criminal record would preclude him from getting a job with the TA.

15

And I’d bet a year’s college tuition that the owner of those keys was not even penalized, much less fired for his own lack of security.

Again, that’s on the transit authority. They could tighten security, but they choose not to.

16

I get that, but it seems channeling his passion to something useful would be better than continuing to arrest him. Does he have any violent offenses or theft type arrests? If it’s just taking trains because he loves to drive them, it could work if they were willing to give him a “pardon” of sorts.

I know, probably a long shot, but seems like it would be the best solution.

17

Seriously. Think about all the resources that could’ve been saved if they had channeled his passion into something useful.

I don’t know all the details but it just seems like he wanted to be an operator. Why not train him and go from there? Was that ever tried? (I have looked and can’t tell…)