Florida does it again: Soda theft bumped up to felony

[Panzersharkcat]

Link.

NAPLES, Fla. — A Naples man faces a felony charge after he was accused of walking out of the McDonald’s in East Naples without paying for a cup of soda.

After filling a courtesy cup with soda Thursday at the McDonald’s soda fountain and then leaving the restaurant, Mark Abaire, 52, of the 500 block of 14th Street North, was arrested by Collier deputies and now faces a felony theft charge, a sheriff’s report shows.

A manager told sheriff’s deputies that Abaire entered the store and asked for a glass of water around 10 p.m. Although the employee told him the cup was for water, Abaire filled it with soda at a fountain machine and sat outside the restaurant, according to an arrest report.

During a conversation with the manager, Abaire declined to pay for the soda, valued at $1, refused to leave the premises, and cursed at the manager, the report stated.

While his charge is petty theft, because of previous petty theft convictions, the charge for drinking the unpaid-for soda was increased from a misdemeanor to a felony, the arrest report shows. In Florida, a third-degree felony can result in a sentence of up to 5 years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

Abaire faces additional misdemeanor counts of trespassing and disorderly intoxication. On Saturday, he remained in the Collier County jail with bond set at $6,500.

Le sigh. I can only imagine the conversation he'll have in prison.

[SVPD]

So in other words, it isn't that soda theft has somehow become a felony, it's that repeated petty theft is a felony. While a bit silly for a $1 soda, the fact is that if he'd paid for his damn soda it wouldn't have been an issue.

I don't know what it is Florida is supposed to have "done again", but repeated misdemeanors becoming felonies is hardly an unheard of practice.

[Agent Fisher]

Eh, not seeing a real problem here. He had previous petty theft charges, plus the tacking a misdemeanor trespass and disorderly intox, yeah, third degree felony sounds about right.

No way he'd get the full five years. He'll probably take a plea, get the two misdemeanor hits knocked off and do a brief stint in jail.

[Panzersharkcat]

Well, my annoyance is over the fact that it was over a one dollar soda. That and my general annoyance over three strikes laws.

As for "done it again," that was a bad choice of words. It was mostly in reference to two other threads going on related to Florida.
EDIT: Really, the title should be in reference to that annoyance. I'm should probably just shut up and stop reflex posting in N&P.
EDIT 2: Thinking over it again, it still is really dumb because putting him in prison, even if it's just a short stint, would be a waste of taxpayer money. It'd be easier and more just to make pay restitution to that McDonald's.

[Kamakazie Sith]

Well, my annoyance is over the fact that it was over a one dollar soda. That and my general annoyance over three strikes laws.

As for "done it again," that was a bad choice of words. It was mostly in reference to two other threads going on related to Florida.
EDIT: Really, the title should be in reference to that annoyance. I'm should probably just shut up and stop reflex posting in N&P.
EDIT 2: Thinking over it again, it still is really dumb because putting him in prison, even if it's just a short stint, would be a waste of taxpayer money. It'd be easier and more just to make pay restitution to that McDonald's.

If you think your annoyance is bad just imagine being the owner of a business that keeps being hit by dozens of these thefts per day.

[JointStrikeFighter]

Oh yeah that McDonalds has no chance of being able to afford the 12$ a day they might lose.

[Block]

Oh yeah that McDonalds has no chance of being able to afford the 12$ a day they might lose.

That makes theft ok?

[fgalkin]

Even assuming it's only 12 people a day, that STLL adds up to almost $4500 in a year. And that's not counting whatever other stuff they may steal.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Bakustra]

Oh yeah that McDonalds has no chance of being able to afford the 12$ a day they might lose.

That makes theft ok?

Which is the greater social cost? The loss of thousands of dollars a year (at the top end) for a corporation that had a net income of 5 billion dollars a year (making this literally a drop in the fucking bucket), or the expenditure of police time, court time, employee time, and the like, all just to take a petty thief and render him or her unable to find more than marginal employment with felony charges on their record? I bet that the actual loss to the economy is greater than that from a hundred such people

Even assuming it's only 12 people a day, that STLL adds up to almost $4500 in a year. And that's not counting whatever other stuff they may steal.

I sign my posts manually for some freakish reason
-fgalkin

"whatever other stuff"? Jesus Christ, this is really the only thing you can easily steal at a fast-food restaurant besides shit like napkins and ketchup packets. Are we going to see that next? People doing prison time for repeatedly hoarding ketchup packets?

[Block]

Oh yeah that McDonalds has no chance of being able to afford the 12$ a day they might lose.

That makes theft ok?

Which is the greater social cost? The loss of thousands of dollars a year (at the top end) for a corporation that had a net income of 5 billion dollars a year (making this literally a drop in the fucking bucket), or the expenditure of police time, court time, employee time, and the like, all just to take a petty thief and render him or her unable to find more than marginal employment with felony charges on their record? I bet that the actual loss to the economy is greater than that from a hundred such people

That has what to do with my question?

[Bakustra]

The point is that moral absolutism is a stupid policy that can easily end up hurting more than it helps. Do you freak out at plea bargains too?

[Cosmic Average]

"whatever other stuff"? Jesus Christ, this is really the only thing you can easily steal at a fast-food restaurant besides shit like napkins and ketchup packets. Are we going to see that next? People doing prison time for repeatedly hoarding ketchup packets?

How about loss of business due to drunk belligerent assholes trespassing and cursing at people like this guy was apparently doing?

[Bakustra]

"whatever other stuff"? Jesus Christ, this is really the only thing you can easily steal at a fast-food restaurant besides shit like napkins and ketchup packets. Are we going to see that next? People doing prison time for repeatedly hoarding ketchup packets?

How about loss of business due to drunk belligerent assholes trespassing and cursing at people like this guy was apparently doing?

Trespassing just means they told him to leave and he refused. But does that mean that public intoxication or using swears in public should result in being charged with crimes that can force people to the fringes of society? Because that is what is happening right now with this guy. Maybe there can be a different way, along the lines of "calling the police to escort him from the premises" without any of the disproportionate penalties you are implicitly endorsing.

[SVPD]

Which is the greater social cost? The loss of thousands of dollars a year (at the top end) for a corporation that had a net income of 5 billion dollars a year (making this literally a drop in the fucking bucket), or the expenditure of police time, court time, employee time, and the like, all just to take a petty thief and render him or her unable to find more than marginal employment with felony charges on their record? I bet that the actual loss to the economy is greater than that from a hundred such people

Aside from the fact that most McDonalds stores are franchises, the owners of which most certainly do NOT have $5 billion in revenue, the fact is that the social cost is greater to allow petty theft. Petty thieves are not int he habit of restricting themselves only to tiny thefts from very large corporations. Did you miss the part where he has prior theft convictions? Do you seriously think that this guy is so socially and morally conscious and conscientious that he really thinks "well, I'll only steal from McDonalds and similar large corporations and only in very tiny amounts because that way the social cost of my theft will not exceed the social cost to put me in jail"?

Punishing theft is not simply a matter of pure economic costs. If you set the precedent that theft is ok just because it's a small amount and its from a large corporation (never mind the situation of the franchise owner) then pretty much any criminal, petty or not, and even quite a few previously honest people will get the idea that it's "not theft" and do it a lot more, and then your thefts and costs will rise. Not only that, but since most people are not legal scholars and do not engage in the sort of careful evaluation of social costs that you seem to think they do, a lot of them would use this as an excuse to steal vastly more, and from a vastly wider variety of places than McDonalds. That's how the criminal mind works. Whatever standard is established, criminals will always interpret, twist, spin, or just outright misunderstand it in whatever way benefits them the most. That's why the term "jailhouse lawyer" exists.

This is not even a "stealing bread to feed my starving children" case, where some argument could be made that letting his kids starve is a greater moral wrong than theft of $1 worth of soda pop. This is a matter of a dipshit with a sense of entitlement deciding he was going to scam a free pop.

"whatever other stuff"? Jesus Christ, this is really the only thing you can easily steal at a fast-food restaurant besides shit like napkins and ketchup packets. Are we going to see that next? People doing prison time for repeatedly hoarding ketchup packets?

So what exactly makes you think that he only steals from fast-food restaurants?

[Block]

The point is that moral absolutism is a stupid policy that can easily end up hurting more than it helps. Do you freak out at plea bargains too?

The point is that this guy is a multiple offender, knew it, stole, was an asshole about it, and should be punished for it. If he were stealing to support his family that might be different, but he took advantage of the generosity of the owner of a franchise, who by the way isn't McDonalds but some guy or girl that pays franchise fees to use the name and only does as well or as poorly as his actual resteraunts perform, and took the free cup he was provided for water and used it to steal. Call it moral absolutism, whatever, people who casually steal tend to commit other crimes they don't get caught for.

[Bakustra]

So basically what you're saying is that we have only two alternatives; we can either take petty thieves and remove them from anything but the fringes of society, or we can have violent chaos. This is actually a common methodology of fascism- present an abhorrent plan in context to make it seem like the only way to go forward and survive.

However, all your bullshit is simply put, bullshit. The majority of flight attendants and pilots and aircraft maintenance personnel are petty thieves as well, snacking on the airline's provided food, taking magazines and even some books passengers leave behind... but curiously, expensive things (electronics, e.g.) or sentimental items are almost always turned into the lost and found, and I doubt that airplane crew really are more likely to commit crimes in their personal lives as your dehumanizing belief in a "criminal mind" suggests.

Furthermore, you don't really understand context, apparently, since I was responding to a statement that, in context, seemed to be about fast-food restaurants.

The point is that moral absolutism is a stupid policy that can easily end up hurting more than it helps. Do you freak out at plea bargains too?

The point is that this guy is a multiple offender, knew it, stole, was an asshole about it, and should be punished for it. If he were stealing to support his family that might be different, but he took advantage of the generosity of the owner of a franchise, who by the way isn't McDonalds but some guy or girl that pays franchise fees to use the name and only does as well or as poorly as his actual resteraunts perform, and took the free cup he was provided for water and used it to steal. Call it moral absolutism, whatever, people who casually steal tend to commit other crimes they don't get caught for.

So he should be forced to the fringes of society for his crimes? That is what a felony conviction means in our society- it effectively exiles him from any sort of rehabilitation, and indeed will probably exacerbate whatever problems he already has. I guess you have never committed any crime whatsoever, to be able to confidently declare that a history of petty theft (the tipping point of which is literally a dollar and change) should doom you to a life of marginal work and probable chemical addiction, with a high chance of being raped along the way.

EDIT: In other words, if you want to defend this, you must defend the whole of it. Explain why this deserves a heightened chance of being raped, which is a common consequence of prison time, or why this deserves a life of marginal employment. Please give detailed reasoning and accept that these are consequences of this decision.

[SVPD]

Trespassing just means they told him to leave and he refused. But does that mean that public intoxication or using swears in public should result in being charged with crimes that can force people to the fringes of society? Because that is what is happening right now with this guy. Maybe there can be a different way, along the lines of "calling the police to escort him from the premises" without any of the disproportionate penalties you are implicitly endorsing.

Maybe because there aren't any disproportionate penalties? This is not just a matter of $1 in pop. It's a matter of this guy being punished several times for stealing and going ahead and doing it anyhow.

He's already 52 years old. He hasn't learned that stealing is not acceptable. His prior theft convictions probably make it pretty hard for him to hold decent employment as it is; no one puts someone with a history of theft in a trustworthy position, especially not when he's done it more than once.

Your method would set a new societal standard that petty theft is acceptable. It would lead to a massive increase in petty theft, because quite a few people would say "well, if all that happens is that I get escorted off the property, I guess It's not a crime."

Let's say he'd taken soda from an independantly-owned convenience store with some elderly man as the owner and operator? Still acceptable? Should society tell the little old man "no, sorry, to expensive to arrest this guy because we want to only consider the costs of this one crime in a vaccuum like Bakustra tries to do"? No, you'd arrest him then? Ok, then why not at McDonalds? Because they have more money? Well, great; you just sacrificed the concept of equal protection under the law. Nice work. Oh, but they're a big corporation, and therefore the boogey man, so it's more important to come up with bullshit reasons why it's ok to do it to them.. and ignore the franchise owner in the process.

[Block]

The point is that moral absolutism is a stupid policy that can easily end up hurting more than it helps. Do you freak out at plea bargains too?

The point is that this guy is a multiple offender, knew it, stole, was an asshole about it, and should be punished for it. If he were stealing to support his family that might be different, but he took advantage of the generosity of the owner of a franchise, who by the way isn't McDonalds but some guy or girl that pays franchise fees to use the name and only does as well or as poorly as his actual resteraunts perform, and took the free cup he was provided for water and used it to steal. Call it moral absolutism, whatever, people who casually steal tend to commit other crimes they don't get caught for.

So he should be forced to the fringes of society for his crimes? That is what a felony conviction means in our society- it effectively exiles him from any sort of rehabilitation, and indeed will probably exacerbate whatever problems he already has. I guess you have never committed any crime whatsoever, to be able to confidently declare that a history of petty theft (the tipping point of which is literally a dollar and change) should doom you to a life of marginal work and probable chemical addiction, with a high chance of being raped along the way.

I'm pretty sure he forced himself to the edges of society by his own choices. A 52 year old man who's still stealing from McDonalds after being convicted of theft multiple times is more than likely not exactly a productive member of society anyways. Again, this is not a theft of need, this is a theft of a soda.

[Panzersharkcat]

And? He's still relatively harmless and his crimes should be treated as such.

[Bakustra]

Trespassing just means they told him to leave and he refused. But does that mean that public intoxication or using swears in public should result in being charged with crimes that can force people to the fringes of society? Because that is what is happening right now with this guy. Maybe there can be a different way, along the lines of "calling the police to escort him from the premises" without any of the disproportionate penalties you are implicitly endorsing.

Maybe because there aren't any disproportionate penalties? This is not just a matter of $1 in pop. It's a matter of this guy being punished several times for stealing and going ahead and doing it anyhow.

He's already 52 years old. He hasn't learned that stealing is not acceptable. His prior theft convictions probably make it pretty hard for him to hold decent employment as it is; no one puts someone with a history of theft in a trustworthy position, especially not when he's done it more than once.

Your method would set a new societal standard that petty theft is acceptable. It would lead to a massive increase in petty theft, because quite a few people would say "well, if all that happens is that I get escorted off the property, I guess It's not a crime."

Let's say he'd taken soda from an independantly-owned convenience store with some elderly man as the owner and operator? Still acceptable? Should society tell the little old man "no, sorry, to expensive to arrest this guy because we want to only consider the costs of this one crime in a vaccuum like Bakustra tries to do"? No, you'd arrest him then? Ok, then why not at McDonalds? Because they have more money? Well, great; you just sacrificed the concept of equal protection under the law. Nice work. Oh, but they're a big corporation, and therefore the boogey man, so it's more important to come up with bullshit reasons why it's ok to do it to them.. and ignore the franchise owner in the process.

This is literally what you just said: "Rape is a proportional penalty for a succession of petty thefts." Because that is a common consequence of time in a state prison, which is where this guy has a good chance of going for a FELONY CONVICTION, which is what I am personally disagreeing with. Again, FELONY CONVICTION. I am not saying that petty theft should be legal or accepted, but that it should be treated proportionately, and that the consequences of FELONY CONVICTIONS are not proportionate in any sense. The rest of your bullshit is really irrelevant and built on a tower of air.

[Block]

And? He's still relatively harmless and his crimes should be treated as such.

Where do you draw the line? As SVPD said, what if it's from a small convenience store owner, where $4500 dollars in yearly losses is a big deal? Why is he not responsible for his own actions? Especially when he knew what would happen if he got charged and convicted again?

[Bakustra]

When, in your view, does rape become acceptable as a penalty for petty theft. Is it after the second time or the third time. I really would like to know.

[Block]

When, in your view, does rape become acceptable as a penalty for petty theft. Is it after the second time or the third time. I really would like to know.

Rape is not the penalty. Felony conviction is. That the prison system needs to be fixed is a seperate issue, but keep building the strawman.

[SVPD]

So basically what you're saying is that we have only two alternatives; we can either take petty thieves and remove them from anything but the fringes of society, or we can have violent chaos. This is actually a common methodology of fascism- present an abhorrent plan in context to make it seem like the only way to go forward and survive.

Oh quit whining about facism you strawmanning idiot. It's not a matter of having "violent chaos" and no one said it was; it's a matter of having a lot more petty theft, and it's either that or prosecute repeat offenders.. Yes, there's a cost in having such people at the margins of society, but even petty theft convictions do that without being a felony since they reflect on the moral turpitude of a subject.

The majority of flight attendants and pilots and aircraft maintenance personnel are petty thieves as well, snacking on the airline's provided food, taking magazines and even some books passengers leave behind.

1) How do you know the airline prohibits snacking?
2) If the airline does not choose to prosecute, that's their problem
3) Where exactly is picking up lost property theft?

but curiously, expensive things (electronics, e.g.) or sentimental items are almost always turned into the lost and found, and I doubt that airplane crew really are more likely to commit crimes in their personal lives as your dehumanizing belief in a "criminal mind" suggests.

I have not seen evidence that taking them would be theft. They could easily be argued to be "abandoned property."

Furthermore, you don't really understand context, apparently, since I was responding to a statement that, in context, seemed to be about fast-food restaurants.

So he should be forced to the fringes of society for his crimes? That is what a felony conviction means in our society- it effectively exiles him from any sort of rehabilitation, and indeed will probably exacerbate whatever problems he already has. I guess you have never committed any crime whatsoever, to be able to confidently declare that a history of petty theft (the tipping point of which is literally a dollar and change) should doom you to a life of marginal work and probable chemical addiction, with a high chance of being raped along the way.

Yes, as a matter of fact he should be. He's already done that to himself by repeatedly committing this offense. What the hell rehabilitation do you really think it's "cutting him off from"? Theft 12 step groups? Why the fuck has he not already availed himself of this "rehabilitation"?

Theft offenses reflect poorly on one's suitability for any trustworthy position. By your argument we should not even prosecute petty thieves for a fairly minor misdemeanor charge because it will "push them to the margins of society", especially if they have repeat offenses. Why? We should essentially cover for thieves so that people who might hire them don't find out that they're thieves?

[Haruko]

There aren't enough reasons to end up in prison here in the States.