Thread. A lot of people not familiar with judges don't know about one of the biggest ongoing scandals: profiting off poor people's blood. Over the years, many of my clients have been forced by judges to sell their own blood plasma in order to pay court fees for minor arrests.
The blood bank industry is worth $14 billion. As @historyprofsena pointed out to me, blood bank executives earn millions by trafficking the blood of mostly poor people for high profit margins. Only a deeply sick society profits from the blood of its poorest people.
The everyday violence perpetrated by judges goes unnoticed. When people die at Rikers, media does not focus on the prosecutors and judges in fancy suits and robes who are most responsible for that disaster. As a general rule, the nicer your suit, the more violent you are.
I cannot think of anything more violent than threatening to cage someone and separate them from their kids if they do not sell their blood to pay minor court debts. And yet, this is what judges, probation officers, and prosecutors in several thousand jurisdictions do every day.
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