Reason First: Do Some Prisoners Refuse to Be Rehabilitated in Their Old Age?

Maybe you can’t keep an evil man down (for long). Multiple murderer, Albert Flick was released from prison because of his “old age.” Once set free, he committed a crime similar to what landed him behind bars in the first place; he stabbed a woman to death. Now, the initial person that he killed, that brought him to justice was his wife, Sandra Flick—in front of their daughter. The prison staff, in their infinite wisdom, chose to say that the man had served his debt to society, and that he should be amongst the general populace. Severe mistake. Flick had the nerve to say, “If I can’t have [Kimberly Dobbie], I will kill her.” That is how the man operated. With icy, vicious intent, he exacted that sentiment on Dobbie before the eyes of her eleven-year-old twin boys.

This is a complete disgrace to the entire American justice system. While there remain thousands of innocent men and women locked up, there are men like Flick who clearly could still carry out another stabbing despite his elder disposition. To allow a brutish monster back out onto the streets to commit nearly the same crime is despicable. Flick clearly possessed the feeling to do harm to another woman, because that grew in his psyche. His corrupt soul led him to carry out the unspeakable. How many times has this happened? And why should it continue? The prison system of the United States is greatly influenced by selflessness. If the system were built on an egoistic set of ideals, then “crimes” like drug possession wouldn’t exist, and the time and energy that is spent on capturing people trafficking such substances would be transferred into keeping filth like Flick incarcerated. If the prison system had, for a moment, stopped to consider that Flick could commit a crime again, then they would have never permitted him to walk out of confinement. The poor excuse of he was too old would be laughable if Dobbie had not been brutally murdered.

Age means nothing (obviously, now), because if a man or woman is going to commit atrocities, he or she is going to do it despite whatever their birth certificate reads. This terror should have stayed in his cell until he succumbed. There’s no way that such a vicious individual should have slid through the cracks of the justice system when young men and women are being beaten, starved, burned, and falsely vilified for crimes that they never committed.

Some may wonder, was it the color of his skin? Do black, brown, red, and yellow individuals get granted the same treatment? Is it truly about race? No matter the melanin content or hair texture, if a man or woman takes lives of others with such intensity and ugliness, then they deserve to have their name converted into a number until breath escapes from their body. So, it is possible to say that folks like Flick may still be released in the future. It is possible that the US prison system will allow the elderly to stab, shoot, dismember anyone that they wish just because of their advanced age.

Does this mean that some people just can’t be rehabilitated? Flick stayed in prison for decades. Does that mean that he never learned a trade, or fulfilled a field of study? Or maybe he did. He just laid low, completed tasks like picking up trash and completed courses. The brass at the prison in Maine must’ve evaluated him and found him to be a model inmate. He must’ve kept his nose clean long enough with ease to show that he could be considered for exoneration. Psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, prison guards, and the warden must’ve all been taken by the exemplary character that Flick exhibited. Now, sadly, we know the cost of their indiscretion. Age is still nothing but a number.