[selchie]

I was thinking on this subject the other day... I think there are cases where these plans could be appropriate. For example, we have friends who have a developmentally disabled adult daughter. She's operating on perhaps a ten year-old mentality. She had been working for a woman who apparently wasn't very nice to her. So she retaliated by stealing some of the woman's checks, forged and cashed them for small amounts. The judge took her condition into consideration, made sure she understood that such behavior was not acceptable, and sentenced her to several weekends in jail. She also has to repay the woman. This way she can continue at her current job, but also has enough punishment to drive the lesson home. Nothing other than vengeance would have been served by sending her up the idiomatic river.

But hopefully cases like the ones Mr. Powers cited would not be included.