Jailed Frenchman Wins No Sympathy

Elizabeth Venant focused on the apparent tragedy of a recent French immigrant who fired two rounds from his pistol, one bullet lodging in his back yard and another into a parked car in front of his house. He was arrested and sentenced to six months in the Los Angeles County Jail.

I suppose the critical intent of her article was to engender sympathy for this allegedly naive immigrant from Western Europe who was “cruelly” subjected to the Los Angeles criminal justice system. All he did was get drunk, scare his wife, brandish and fire a handgun.

The Frenchman did wrong. The system, while cumbersome, worked. It worked to the point of even forcing the Frenchman to recognize his alcohol problem and attend an alcohol-rehabilitation program while in jail.

MARK MacCARLEY

Glendale