WATCH: Inmates In L.A. County Jail Share Water Bottle, Rub The Same Mask On Their Faces To Contract COVID To Force Their Release
Many of them are in prison precisely BECAUSE they are opportunistic and prey on perceived weakness. Why should this tactic surprise literally anybody?
You’ve heard the phrase ‘one man’s trash is another man’s treasure’? There are a wide variety of applications to that little proverb. In this case what most people do NOT want, but is valuable to this group of people is a get out of jail free card.
COVID is very scary. For some people.
But apart from the handful of people with underlying conditions, it’s been proven to be a comparatively minor illness for anyone who is otherwise medically uncompromised.
There are a lot of people not terribly worried about contracting it. Especially if the benefits of contracting it might outweigh the risks.
And since all of human existence is a complex balancing act of risk versus reward, of immediate gain versus long-term benefit, some inmates have found a way to use the public fears of this illness as their very own get-out-of-jail-free card.
Watch these guys sharing water bottles and masks for deliberate exposure.
NEW: The LA County Sheriff says video surveillance shows inmates at a jail in Castaic sharing a water bottle, then rubbing the same mask on their faces to purposely infect themselves w/ #COVID19 because they thought it would force their release. 21 ended up infected. @FOXLA pic.twitter.com/7XuqSM7OXY
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) May 11, 2020
Who knows for sure what the endgame was.
Early release? A lawsuit against the jail for getting infected? Get the guards infected and cause staffing chaos? Some other motivation?
Who knows, really? Seeing how many inmates have been released from prison due to the simple fear of COVID, it’s probably just a case of playing on the fears and humanity of people running the jails who might otherwise look like they are responsible for ‘endangering’ inmates with this ‘dread disease’.
But they got busted. The video shows these guys are deliberately exposing themselves to the disease.
Whatever their end game was, as far as their short-term goal of getting infected? Mission accomplished — 21 took ill with CCP Coronavirus.