Education and Experience Does Not Prevent Crime!

I recently read two crimes stories from one of the news sources I use on the Internet, and the cases demonstrate a point I began making almost 40 years ago. Here's the point! Just as education, intelligence, money and other outside factors cannot prevent crime, neither does the lack of these things cause crime. Yet, people who, committed as they are, try to help criminals change continue crafting education and skills-based strategies. Despite more than 40 years of so-called prison ministry by a lot of well-meaning, sincere, hard working and committed people, crime continues it ravages across our nation. We continue building more and larger prisons. We continue to throw millions of dollars into the gaping maw of crime and punishment without making any significant impact on the problem.

For years, I have contended that we cannot punish crime out of criminals, and we can build prisons large enough or fast enough to corral crime's growth or stem its rampaging tide in our communities and across our nation.

Consider the following stories!

Associated Press journalist Holbrook Mohr filed the following from Oxford, MS: "Richard 'Dickie' Scruggs, the attorney who built his career by taking on tobacco, asbestos and insurance companies, was sentenced Friday to five years in prison for conspiring to bribe a judge. U.S. District Judge Neal Biggers Jr. called Scruggs' conduct "reprehensible" and fined him $250,000. The judge handed down the full sentence requested by prosecutors despite arguments from the defense for half that time in prison. Scruggs appeared to nearly faint as the federal judge scolded him for his conduct. Some people in the courtroom gasped as Scruggs started to sway side to side and his attorney grabbed his arm to steady him. He had to be seated before the sentence was read.

"I could not be more ashamed where I am today, mixed up in a judicial bribery scheme," Scruggs told the judge.

Scruggs must report to prison by Aug. 4 and pay the fine in one lump sum within 30 days.

Scruggs gained fame in the 1990s by using a corporate insider against tobacco companies in lawsuits that resulted in a $206 billion settlement. That case was portrayed in the 1999 film "The Insider."

Scruggs was indicted in November along with his son and a law partner after an associate wore a wire for the FBI and secretly recorded conversations about the alleged bribery.

Scruggs initially denied wrongdoing. But in March, Scruggs and former law partner Sidney Backstrom pleaded guilty to conspiring to bribe Lafayette County Circuit Court Judge Henry Lackey with $50,000."

Here's the other story, this one from Cleveland, OH: "A group of teenagers beat a homeless man to death as passers-by slowed to watch the attack, some of which was caught on videotape, police said. Anthony Waters, 42, suffered a lacerated spleen and broken ribs during the attack Wednesday night and died at a hospital, police said.

"The pack mentality going on in the city of Cleveland must end," police Commander Calvin Williams said Thursday at a news conference where he urged the attackers to come forward.

Portions of the attack were caught on a surveillance camera outside a towing company on the city's east side. Police said the videotape shows passing cars slowing to watch three teens attack Waters until he staggered into the parking lot, where he was assisted by employees of the towing company.

"It was just horrifying the way he looked," said Marlo Massey, Waters' sister, who saw her brother's body after the attack. "They beat him to death and I just can't stop thinking what was on his mind while it was happening."

Waters suffered from blunt abdominal trauma, a head injury and damaged internal organs, the Cuyahoga County coroner said.

The attackers, who appeared to be between the ages of 14 to 17, robbed Waters of a music player and headphones, police said.

On one end of this crime spectrum you have three teenagers who, to some, appeared to be between 14-years-old and 17-years-old, beating a defenseless man to death. That's murder anyway to slice it. On the other end, you have, a well-educated, apparently intelligent, financially successful lawyer pleading guilty to trying to bribe a judge. Anyway you slice it, that's stealing!

Now, if the lawyer's education, apparent intelligence, his privilege based upon the millions he earned from successful lawsuits could not prevent him from being a criminals, then the lack of the same cannot be blamed as the cause of crime.

So what, you might ask, causes crime?

From my personal perspective, plus almost 40 years of in depth research, I've learned to do or not do crime involves a relatively simple mindset. I experienced the beginning of this mindset personally when I was five-years-old. I lived in Durham, and my aunt Mattie and her husband Lloyd lived in Norfolk, Virginia. They worked in the same shipyard, and apparently were very well paid for the time--1948. In my family, Mattie was considered the rich relative. When she visited, my grandfather would usually comment: "We'll eat high on the hog while my baby's here." Mattie was the youngest daughter of Nathan and Charlotte Gibson's three living children--Hattie, the oldest; Nannie Ruth--my mother--the next oldest; and Mattie. Well, during the summer of 1948, Mattie came home for a few days, and I believe the morning after she arrived, I asked her for a dollar to get some sugar cookies from Mr. and Mrs. Dick's neighborhood store around the corner from where we lived. "I don't have a dollar, Milton," I remembered by aunt saying. I also remember thinking, why is she lying? She's the rich aunt. I probably would have not had a second thought about my aunt Hattie telling me no. She was a Licensed Practice Nurse (LPN) and frequently complained about being overworked and underpaid. But Mattie? Why was she telling me no? I went outside to play, but I was mad. Imagine! I was five-years-old, and I was mad with my aunt because I didn't get from her something I wanted, and even after she told me no, I still wanted the dollar.

Over the years, I've learned that this attitude--a relentless desire to have what you want constitutes the initial step to either ambition or crime. The next cognitive step plays the critical role in whether a person commits to community contribution or community crime. On that eventful summer day in 1948, I committed to community crime. I remember that as I played outside, I could not focus on riding my tricycle around the house, or climbing my favorite tree in the backyard. All I could think about was the suger cookies I wanted and the dollar that stood between me and them. No, sugar cookies were not $1 each. They were two cents each, but I wanted to be able to buy enough for my buddies in the neighborhood. I did not realize or understand it then, but I was experiencing the dangerous trek on the thin line between community contribution and community crime. I do not remember specifically when I crossed the line, but I remember thinking about what I knew about Aunt Mattie's habits. She always slept in the back bedroom when she came to visit. She always left her pockebook on the bed. She always kept her money in her pocketbook. The bathroom had two doors, one off the screened-in back porch, and one that opened into the back bedroom. Minutes later, there I was going to the bathroom while Aunt Mattie, Aunt Hattie and Grandma Gibson talked in the kitchen. I locked the bathroom door, and walked quietly into the bedroom, moving quickly to Aunt Mattie's pocketbook on the bed. I opened it, and saw a five dollar bill lying right there on top. Clutching it quickly, I went back to the bathroom, flushed the toilet walked onto the porch, waved at the women in the kitchen and went back outside to ride my tricycle. Minutes later, I sneaked around the corner to the neighborhood store and order 50 sugar cookies.

"Where did you get five dollars?" asked Mrs. Dick who owned the store along with her husband and who appeared to be about the same age at my grandmother. In that instance, I experienced for the first time another of the critically important aspects of criminal thinking: the L.I.E. Trust me, I did not understand all this until many, many years later, but I've tested the concepts against every crime I remember committing, and I've tested it in numerous interviews with other criminals. The acronym stands for Livable, Instantaneous and Effective. You see, a three-prong prime directive drives criminal thinking--to get over, to get away, and if caught to get out as quickly as possible. The lie sprang full blown into my mind, unrehearsed: "Aunt Mattie's home and she said she was going to give me my birthday present early because she was not going to be able to come home in October," I explained to Mrs. Dick. She believed me. Thus my first lie as a criminal was livable. She and I were willing to live with it. It was instantaneous--developed with little need to think about it--and effective because she believed it.

That's why, over the years, I've come to understand that crime is a way of thinking that justifies harming others to gain for self. This is also how I know that neither heredity, lack of opportunity nor environment cause crime. The way you think causes crimes. When you believe it's all right to harm others to gain for self, you have a criminal mindset. The critical issue becomes can and will the individual control the mindset, refuse to act on the criminal way of thinking? For the next 20 years of my life, I could not control my criminal thinking.

I was an "A" student in school. I lived in a relatively stable home. My relatives tried valiantly to teach me the values of "right from wrong." Yet, from five-years-old until 25-years-old, I was a criminal. Lying is a critical criminal skill, and often so is violence.

Dick Scruggs is a criminal. The teenagers that beat the homeless man to death are criminals!

It was not until 20-years later--the summer of 1968--that I began taking the initial steps to transformation. Forty years after that--1968 to 2008--I've experienced another epiphany, one of many that I've experienced during my transformation from community criminal to community contributor. Here's the epiphany: You do not have to plan to become a criminal, but without plan you will never conquer crime.

Next, I will share with you an overview of the powerful principles that I learned when I triggered the transformation process.