As we continue to deal with the likes of Bernie Madoff and other swindlers who have lost millions of dollars for their investors, perhaps Elie Wiesel has a good idea on how to punish all of them. Holocaust survivor, human rights activist and author Elie Wiesel lost his entire life savings with Madoff. His charity, the Elie Wiesel Foundation, lost another $15.2 million. As Wiesel said, “‘Psychopath'” is too nice a word for him. This man knew what he was doing. I would simply call him thief, scoundrel, criminal.”
Speaking on a panel last week about what punishment he would like to see for Mr. Madoff, Mr. Wiesel said,
I would like him to be in a solitary cell with only a screen, and on that screen for at least five years of his life, every day and every night, there should be pictures of his victims, one after the other after the other, all the time a voice saying, “Look what you have done to this old lady, look what you have done to that child, look what you have done,” nothing else.
Professor Jonathan Hyman, in forwarding this lovely snippet to me, noted that this sounds a lot like part of a Restorative Justice process. I agree. Since Madoff will never be able to pay his victims back or help them put their lives back together, perhaps the best punishment is to be reminded daily of how many lives he ruined.
Cross posted at Indisputably.
This proferred punishment reminds me of Dante: the Florentine poet, were he alive today, would likely place Madoff squarely in the 10th Malebolge of the 8th Circle of Inferno, right along the other falsifiers. Or maybe even in the lowest rung of the ninth circle, alongside those traitors to their benefactors.
The solitary cell/screen idea, however, presupposes (I think) that Madoff would eventually be moved by pity/shame/fear/compassion to take genuine personal responsibility for his actions and make whatever amends he could to his many victims. I would sincerely hope that he would do so, but the realist/cynic in me is highly skeptical.
Likewise, I also worry that the looped video and voice approaches the forcible aversion therapy (the ‘Ludovico Technique’) done to the villain in ‘A Clockwork Orange.’ Recall that in the film, the prison chaplain objected that this ‘rehabitilation’ (or perhaps permanent incapacitation?) deprived the ultraviolent, loathsome Alex of his free will. If we had the capability today, should we deprive even the worst offender of his or her free will (and inherent human dignity)? What is the rational and constitutional limiting principle to this kind of 24/7 ‘re-education’ (I can well imagine a slipperly slope that leads to the very fascist evils and human rights abuses that Mr. Wiesel so courageously endured in Buchenwald during WWII and champions today).
Finally, on just a pragmatic level, is it not possible that Madoff would, after a while, just tune out the pictures/voice as just noise? Consider the risks of overexposure (e.g., playing the Rodney King beating video over and over may have desensitized viewers). Could the plan also fact backfire (e.g., he turn resentful and/or gloat over his victims)?
Overall, I can only hope that Madoff gets his just deserts.