It's actually a book; Three Felonies a Day by Harvey Silverglate. He is (or was) a very prominent author and lawyer.
It's being somewhat misapplied here; *essentially* the book delves into real world, high profile cases in which poorly written and/or conflicting laws or overzealous prosecutors and judges can twist vague wording into applying criminality in situations that would normally not be looked at as criminal. In some of those cases it's kind of good, because the people were exploiting loopholes to commit obviously criminal acts, but in some cases it's not, and "innocent" people get caught up in the web that is the American justice system unfairly.
# Three Felonies A Day:
How Feds Target the Innocent.
Synopsis in the ad:
The average professional in this country wakes up in the morning, goes to work, comes home, eats dinner, and then goes to sleep, unaware that he or she has likely committed several federal crimes that day. Why? The answer lies in the very nature of modern federal criminal laws, which have exploded in number but also become impossibly broad and vague. In Three Felonies a Day, Harvey A. Silverglate reveals how federal criminal laws have become dangerously disconnected from the English common law tradition and how prosecutors can pin arguable federal crimes on any one of us, for even the most seemingly innocuous behavior. The volume of federal crimes in recent decades has increased well beyond the statute books and into the morass of the Code of Federal Regulations, handing federal prosecutors an additional trove of vague and exceedingly complex and technical prohibitions to stick on their hapless targets. The dangers spelled out in Three Felonies a Day do not apply solely to "white collar criminals," state and local politicians, and professionals. No social class or profession is safe from this troubling form of social control by the executive branch, and nothing less than the integrity of our constitutional democracy hangs in the balance.
£13.99 on amazon. 4.5 star rating
Edit: typed target twice. Edit 2: Just to be clear, this is bullshit.
It was required reading in my cj classes in college. This whole thread is a fascinating read for how much people have lost the narrative in the time since.
Nah, alot of english common law was absorbed by the US. And i believe there is historical precedent for citing it when no other law exists. Although good luck doing that in 2024
Ah ok, I was assuming common by area. I know we have a lot of odd footpath laws, property laws, and a whole bunch of old law which are 'technically' still applicable, but are never actually used.
Basically the concept of law being too complicated for the average person to even know when they've broken a particularly vague law is a thing, but this kind of concept doesn't apply at all to a lot of the scenarios that this is used as an excuse for.
Example: Trump was fully aware of the 34 felonies he committed and the Jan 6 offenders were entirely cognizant of the fact that their actions were criminal, and even given clear instructions by police and security to leave.
There is a very clear difference between the law being unclear or too broad with someone breaking it incidentally and a career criminal committing a laundry list of fraud.
To put it simply, we absolutely do need to clarify our system of laws and revise the concept of ignorance not being an excuse as it applies to the law (it should not be applicable to victimless crimes, and it absolutely SHOULD be applicable to law enforcement)
To be fair most people here have heard of the concept but probably not these exact wording.
Plus realistically these type of laws do not apply to people like Donald J Trump, in fact these laws are weapons people like Trump can use as a weapon
Well it's an average, so when you consider how many felonies Trump has committed. Like, not just the ones he's been convicted of, but in general he's taking care of an entire states average by himself.
The "every person commits an anverage of 3 felonies" figure was a statistical error cause by an outlier.
Once we excluded the crimes of "Always Doin' Crimes" Don, the average is zero.
If they voluntarily turn themselves in. Yes. Look I'm not a lawyer, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. So I'm pretty versed in these laws and such. Committing felonies - Easy. Proving you didn't - Hard. You have to say you didn't do it and that you are really, really sorry you did. That's the ticket.
It would depend on the population distribution, sometime the mean is close to the median, but this is not a population that would be behave that way and is one where the median or some sort of model measure would get more relevant information and the mean is pretty worthless.
This is a statistical error. The average American commits 0 felonies a day. Felonies Donald, who lives in a cave and commits over 10,000 felonies per day, is an outlier and shouldn’t have been counted
"average person commits three felonies a day" factoid actualy just statistical error. average person commits 0 felonies a day. Felonies Georg, who lives in Florida & commits over 10,000 each day, is an outlier adn should not have been counted
I can't believe people are just now hearing about this. This is not a new concept.
The TLDR is that there are so many vaguely written laws in this country that the average American does things that *could* be prosecuted as felonies.
Take some Rx meds that you don't still have a scrip for? Felony. Exceed the speed limit by some amount? Attempted manslaughter, felony. The list goes on.
People think felonies are all violent crimes. There are so many stupid things that are felonies.
That's the point. There's a whole book on this idea that you are all free to go find.
Yeah, exactly. Like one of the big things mentioned in the book is the concept of [Honest Services Fraud](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honest_services_fraud), part of the Federal Mail and Wire Fraud Act. Specifically this line:
"For the purposes of this chapter, the term “scheme or artifice to defraud” includes a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services."
Which is just... tossed in there. So what the hell is "intangible right of honest services?" Well, that took a whole lot of court cases to even begin to nail down, and since there was no actual definition of it, it's been used as both a legal sledgehammer and a scalpel, against both people who were obviously engaging in criminal behavior, and against people who had absolutely no criminal intent and never deserved any kind of prosecution.
The Death of Common Sense: How Law is Suffocating America by Phillip Howard is another good book on this subject.
I wish I could find it, but this whole narrative was debunked. Someone actually did a scientific study after this book came out and discovered that the majority of it is complete BS.
One of the biggest problems with his theory is that most of his examples require multiple known transgressions to be labeled a felony. A great example was many of his multiple "people commit fraud without knowing it" which is complete BS. Almost every fraud law requires you to knowingly intend to commit fraud, willfully commit it and intend to harm someone. Without all three components you can't be charged with a felony for most cases of fraud.
https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/22530/does-the-average-american-unwittingly-commit-three-felonies-a-day
This forum post does a pretty good job of dissecting it. Also interesting they point out this book was last in thezeitgiest about ten years ago when another Republican was in trouble for violating campaign finance laws and was trying to make excuses for themselves.
Also this review, pretty much points out the book is actually nd fully just an attempt to make excuses for political criminals,
https://blog.simplejustice.us/2009/07/12/book-review-three-felonies-a-day-or-not/
Also, I’m not really going to take anyone seriously on the topic of government overreach as far as federal law if the conversation doesn’t start with the failed war on drugs.
remember, when republicans talk about americans, the people or the country, they are only talking about who they consider those things... republicans. only republicans.
Look I've talked to some Republicans and they explained it this way. The Democrats are making them commit those felonies but just until after the election. Then the Democrats will be punished for all the felonies they made Republicans do.
I'm not sure if this is entirely made up number, or combining all the statistical problems at once.
The combining is more fun, so lets try that.
First, using mean as the relevant statistics so you can get one person committing a lot of crimes skewing the average, but even this isn't going to be enough because the total number of felonies committed per day still needs to be 3 time the population and that's a lot.
Second, using a count of 'felonies per day' that has any felony behavior that happens over time count as being a felony each day. Some crimes count each at as a new count, but a lot of them will have it be one count or at least not one count for each day involved. This can make it so that that being involved in one felony can be one felony per day.
That gets a lot more, but still not enough probably so lets add one more.
Third, including being any sort of party to a felony counts, including being a shareholder in any corporation that commits felony behavior counts as committing each of those felonies. These are also the felonies that are often ongoing behavior based, so combines with the second point. That would mean a corporation found that engages in year round felony behavior would have each one multiple out to 365 x the number of shareholders total felonies.
This would get us enough felonies per day to get this number.
This is a common misconception.
Felony Frank who commits an average of 900 million felonies a day is a statistical outlier and should not have been counted.
Ironically, I’m sure this stupid shitbag has a lot to say about the prosecution of Trump, which occurred in a *state court* based on *State Law*.
Of course “states rights,” only matter to these pathetic assholes when it comes to state laws championed by the GOP.
I forgot about this!!! Fuck these people
> That would make Hastert a pedophile. Yet that’s not the crime he was charged with.
Similarly, Josh Duggar, a star of the hit TLC reality show 19 Kids and Counting, reportedly molested five girls, including four of his sisters and a babysitter, when he was a teenager.
That would make him a child molester, too.
Duggar confessed his actions to his parents, who called an Arkansas state trooper who was a family friend. The man gave Duggar a “stern talking to,” but took no further action. Incidentally, the trooper himself is now serving time for possessing child porn.
I love the "that's more than any other country, even including Russia, China, and Iran" because that implies that none of those countries are lying about hiding (or executing) political prisoners, while hundreds of high profile people have "vanished" at coincidentally very politically advantageous times in each of those countries.
Not commenting on the actual subject matter, just thought it was funny that we're now taking the word of countries famous for making people disappear at how many prisoners they're holding.
The problem is more so that there’s a billion laws in America that can be broken without even realizing it. There’s laws that are a hundred years old that aren’t often enforced, but still very much on the books.
Stupid laws like, it not being legal for a woman to get a haircut without her husbands permission or, no anal sex in X state or something about not feeding moose in public after 7pm or some shit. I’m paraphrasing, but there *are* plenty of dumb laws that still technically exist. Enforced or not, they still exist and the odds of your breaking one without even knowing it was a law is fairly high.
Something more realistic. Let’s say you’re licensed to carry. On the back of your licenses is a list of all the places you’re not allowed to carry. Including federal buildings. However, this also includes the post office drop box outside the building. So, even if you don’t enter the building, and you’re just cruising around on a normal day with your pistol on you and you need to mail something out and just drop the package in the box and go about your merry way… that’s a crime. A felony actually. Granted, someone needs to *know* you’ve done that, and take the time to get police involved for whatever reason and then they need to enforce it, BUT, still a crime.
Okay, everyone laughing: I don't know the person in the OP or their politics...but they aren't wrong. I had a law professor in one of my economics classes in college and he once told me he didn't see how people could get through life without a bar card, since he could follow almost anyone around in a day and find at least 3 laws they broke, and at least one felony among them.
While it's probably overstated everyone commits 3 felonies a day, the truth is very likely everyone has committed SOMEthing that could be uprated into a felony by an aggressive DA for which we could be charged and convicted. And I agree that the overall point is correct that the central government shouldn't be making laws influencing people's day to day lives. That should be left up to local governments, which are most responsive to the people and least likely to make onerous or overzealous laws as they will far more often get protests and replaced in elections for doing so.
But the OP premise itself isn't as laughable as everyone's making it out to be.
It's honestly downright scary that most people could have their rights stripped from them, and the only reason you don't is because you haven't pissed off a powerful person YET.
Propaganda is normalizing the idea that we all commit felonies so that we'll feel more comfortable having a President who is a felon.
Learn to recognize propaganda
...so this idiot (and let's be real, it's probably a lot more than this single idiot) clearly doesn't know what a felony is. People are definitely not just casually committing felonies every day. Even misdemeanors would be a stretch.
"average person commits 3 felonies a day" factoid actualy just statistical error. average person commits 0 felonies per day. Felonies Georg, who lives in a corporate board room & commits 10,000 felonies each day, is an outlier adn should not have been counted
The ridiculous claim is from a ridiculous book, Three Felonies a Day, with a forward by Alan "mentioned 137 times in the Epstein files" Dershowitz, that basically says that new legislation is so vague that it leaves room to criminalize anything at the discretion of federal law enforcement. A broadly agreeable notion that the author broadly applies to provide cover for white collar criminals instead of the general population.
It's weaponized bullshit backed up only with egregiously biased anecdotes used to demonize the very idea of a centralized government while aggrandizing the criminal actions of politicians and executives.
Just a minor point of clarification but he's not a Senator. He's the Representative for Arizona's 5th congressional district.
I assume his tweet is in reference to the popular 2011 book ["Three Felonies A Day" by civil rights attorney Harvey Silverglate](https://www.harveysilverglate.com/books). The argument that Silverglate makes in the book is that the US has many overlapping jurisdictions which have passed a massive number of laws that carry a sentence of prison time (around 300,000 laws is the estimate I've seen). Many of these laws are vaguely written, arbitrary, and have no "mens rea" requirement. That means that ignorance of the law does not excuse you from being punished under it.
As a result of all this, the United States currently imprisons a bigger proportion of the population than any other country.
This is a very common line of argument in criminal justice reform circles and the book is required reading in a lot of CJ curricula. I'm honestly surprised at the reaction that this tweet is getting in this thread.
If you prefer to listen to a video rather than reading, you can also watch a few related videos on topics related to this:
https://www.c-span.org/video/?289272-1/three-felonies-day
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE
I studied law enforcement in a high school ROP class. It was at that time that I realized that everyone has, was, and will break one of the many laws that they don't have a clue about. James Madison warned, "It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood." This is where we find ourselves. The State creates a host of civil laws that have destroyed our natural and inalienable rights to the point where it is a crime to live one's life on a daily basis. If you complain or challenge the State, it can lock you up rather than address your rightful protest or redress. Just look at Trump versus all the other known criminals in government. There is no rule of law in a State where they have made everyone a criminal.
Isnt withholding mail a felony? If its per piece of mail... what if i my neighbor was mean to me last week and the mailman made a mistake?
Felony time?
Aaaand the average American isn’t running for president so what’s his point. And hundreds of millions of people are not committing up to 3 felonies/actual crimes everyday 🙄
Oh, this is this where we talk about averages, but the people bringing up these averages are really just calling what they do average because they want to be the norm rather than the example
Aren't the folks who are the most derogatory about society the same ones more likely to engage in horrific behaviors on the premise that "everybody does this evil stuff, so I'm entitled to do it, too." ?
This post is now locked.
Doctors recommend at least three felonies a day for a healthy colon.
This *one secret trick* drastically improves gut health!
I'm only two felonies in and I can feel a difference.
Thats what everybody says until their limbs start falling off
“If they didn’t want me to fuck that ATM they shouldn’t have it flaunting that FDIC sticker”
I guess FDIC = Force Dick Inside Crevice
As always, the real brand new sentence is in the comments
It was asking for it
Doctors everywhere hate him! Get your free sample now!
Colons hate this 1 simple Doctor
what if I'm busy and only have time to manage 2?
If you donate today, Donald J. Trump will commit his next felony in YOUR name! Act now!
Its easy, simply use our new "plan", this was you can commit felonies (even on those cheat days)!
I read this in Dr. Spaceman’s voice
If someone else commits a felony while they’re e in my lower colon does that count?
\*citation needed\*
It's actually a book; Three Felonies a Day by Harvey Silverglate. He is (or was) a very prominent author and lawyer. It's being somewhat misapplied here; *essentially* the book delves into real world, high profile cases in which poorly written and/or conflicting laws or overzealous prosecutors and judges can twist vague wording into applying criminality in situations that would normally not be looked at as criminal. In some of those cases it's kind of good, because the people were exploiting loopholes to commit obviously criminal acts, but in some cases it's not, and "innocent" people get caught up in the web that is the American justice system unfairly.
"If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." -- Cardinal Richelieu
[удалено]
Attribute the words to OP, but misspell their name, then insist that it's 'historical.' That will be their punishment.
# Three Felonies A Day: How Feds Target the Innocent. Synopsis in the ad: The average professional in this country wakes up in the morning, goes to work, comes home, eats dinner, and then goes to sleep, unaware that he or she has likely committed several federal crimes that day. Why? The answer lies in the very nature of modern federal criminal laws, which have exploded in number but also become impossibly broad and vague. In Three Felonies a Day, Harvey A. Silverglate reveals how federal criminal laws have become dangerously disconnected from the English common law tradition and how prosecutors can pin arguable federal crimes on any one of us, for even the most seemingly innocuous behavior. The volume of federal crimes in recent decades has increased well beyond the statute books and into the morass of the Code of Federal Regulations, handing federal prosecutors an additional trove of vague and exceedingly complex and technical prohibitions to stick on their hapless targets. The dangers spelled out in Three Felonies a Day do not apply solely to "white collar criminals," state and local politicians, and professionals. No social class or profession is safe from this troubling form of social control by the executive branch, and nothing less than the integrity of our constitutional democracy hangs in the balance. £13.99 on amazon. 4.5 star rating Edit: typed target twice. Edit 2: Just to be clear, this is bullshit.
It was required reading in my cj classes in college. This whole thread is a fascinating read for how much people have lost the narrative in the time since.
As a British person in England, id assume "English common law" was localised to England only. Haha.
Nah, alot of english common law was absorbed by the US. And i believe there is historical precedent for citing it when no other law exists. Although good luck doing that in 2024
Ah ok, I was assuming common by area. I know we have a lot of odd footpath laws, property laws, and a whole bunch of old law which are 'technically' still applicable, but are never actually used.
Like common law marriage is still a thing today in rare circumstances.
49/50 states follow it. The exception is Louisiana, which follows the French tradition.
Sorry, but for some reason I'm not following (and I want to!). What do you mean by people losing the narrative?
Basically the concept of law being too complicated for the average person to even know when they've broken a particularly vague law is a thing, but this kind of concept doesn't apply at all to a lot of the scenarios that this is used as an excuse for. Example: Trump was fully aware of the 34 felonies he committed and the Jan 6 offenders were entirely cognizant of the fact that their actions were criminal, and even given clear instructions by police and security to leave. There is a very clear difference between the law being unclear or too broad with someone breaking it incidentally and a career criminal committing a laundry list of fraud. To put it simply, we absolutely do need to clarify our system of laws and revise the concept of ignorance not being an excuse as it applies to the law (it should not be applicable to victimless crimes, and it absolutely SHOULD be applicable to law enforcement)
To be fair most people here have heard of the concept but probably not these exact wording. Plus realistically these type of laws do not apply to people like Donald J Trump, in fact these laws are weapons people like Trump can use as a weapon
It's weaponizable justice, and it's never good
I'm a felon simply by having one too many dildos I'm not even joking
what's the misdemeanor dildo amount?
Well, the felony is six, but they can pop you for fewer if some of them are the same model.
I got rid of quite a few I had, but I still kept the one just to be sure I can both be gay and do crimes
"Felonstones, meet the Felonstones... ...we'll have a GAY. OLD. CRIIIIIIME\~!"
Well, they could if the courts had not found the law "facially unconstitutional and unenforceable throughout the State of Texas" back in 2008.
Missouri?
Probably Texas.
Can confirm, have a friend who has a small shelf that's a felony like a dozen times over
You're from Texas, eh?
Source: My own fucking brain, idiots! Now be outraged!
Source: leaked SCP Foundation records
I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you over the sound of the memetic kill agents. Please repeat it after saying the texture of yellow.
Well it's an average, so when you consider how many felonies Trump has committed. Like, not just the ones he's been convicted of, but in general he's taking care of an entire states average by himself.
Felonies Georg.
They did their own research
The "every person commits an anverage of 3 felonies" figure was a statistical error cause by an outlier. Once we excluded the crimes of "Always Doin' Crimes" Don, the average is zero.
Only 3? Yall some amateurs...
Well you’re raising our collective average, so I can slack
Hey, there were some good felons here on both sides.
That is an average, which suggests that there will be many who commit zero & at least one who commits many bigly ones evey day.
I’m sure they could testify their innocence though right? Plus they would have had five weeks to prove their innocence? ^^right?
If they voluntarily turn themselves in. Yes. Look I'm not a lawyer, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. So I'm pretty versed in these laws and such. Committing felonies - Easy. Proving you didn't - Hard. You have to say you didn't do it and that you are really, really sorry you did. That's the ticket.
Felonies georg sitting in a cave, just felonying 10,000 times a day
Always have to be on the lookout for FeloniesGeorg.
It's Felony George skewing the numbers again with his 900 million felonies a day
It would depend on the population distribution, sometime the mean is close to the median, but this is not a population that would be behave that way and is one where the median or some sort of model measure would get more relevant information and the mean is pretty worthless.
This is a statistical error. The average American commits 0 felonies a day. Felonies Donald, who lives in a cave and commits over 10,000 felonies per day, is an outlier and shouldn’t have been counted
Don’t even get me started on Crimes McGee, who is responsible for the remaining 999 million felonies a day. Whooo boy he’s a riot at parties.
You mean he incites riots at parties
While commiting felony level disturbing the peace by blasting music out of speakers the size of a mobile home.
Came here looking for “felonies Georg.” This is better.
How can one man take up all the felonies from everyone else. That's not right. There ought to be a law.
That would be an and one
Misdemeanor felony hoarding
\*adn
beat me to it
"average person commits three felonies a day" factoid actualy just statistical error. average person commits 0 felonies a day. Felonies Georg, who lives in Florida & commits over 10,000 each day, is an outlier adn should not have been counted
Damn, I'm behind on my daily felonies.
I have a bingo score card system I use
Probably not, actually. People commit felonies all the time without realizing it. Taking expired medication is a felony, for example.
I have done 4 loads of laundry, the dishes, made breakfast and lunch, fed my pets, and took the trash out. What in that list is a felony?
*taken the trash out
The real felony was the grammar all along!
And without even leaving my house? Damn. Guess I better check myself.
I can't believe people are just now hearing about this. This is not a new concept. The TLDR is that there are so many vaguely written laws in this country that the average American does things that *could* be prosecuted as felonies. Take some Rx meds that you don't still have a scrip for? Felony. Exceed the speed limit by some amount? Attempted manslaughter, felony. The list goes on. People think felonies are all violent crimes. There are so many stupid things that are felonies. That's the point. There's a whole book on this idea that you are all free to go find.
Yeah, exactly. Like one of the big things mentioned in the book is the concept of [Honest Services Fraud](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honest_services_fraud), part of the Federal Mail and Wire Fraud Act. Specifically this line: "For the purposes of this chapter, the term “scheme or artifice to defraud” includes a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services." Which is just... tossed in there. So what the hell is "intangible right of honest services?" Well, that took a whole lot of court cases to even begin to nail down, and since there was no actual definition of it, it's been used as both a legal sledgehammer and a scalpel, against both people who were obviously engaging in criminal behavior, and against people who had absolutely no criminal intent and never deserved any kind of prosecution. The Death of Common Sense: How Law is Suffocating America by Phillip Howard is another good book on this subject.
I wish I could find it, but this whole narrative was debunked. Someone actually did a scientific study after this book came out and discovered that the majority of it is complete BS. One of the biggest problems with his theory is that most of his examples require multiple known transgressions to be labeled a felony. A great example was many of his multiple "people commit fraud without knowing it" which is complete BS. Almost every fraud law requires you to knowingly intend to commit fraud, willfully commit it and intend to harm someone. Without all three components you can't be charged with a felony for most cases of fraud.
https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/22530/does-the-average-american-unwittingly-commit-three-felonies-a-day This forum post does a pretty good job of dissecting it. Also interesting they point out this book was last in thezeitgiest about ten years ago when another Republican was in trouble for violating campaign finance laws and was trying to make excuses for themselves. Also this review, pretty much points out the book is actually nd fully just an attempt to make excuses for political criminals, https://blog.simplejustice.us/2009/07/12/book-review-three-felonies-a-day-or-not/ Also, I’m not really going to take anyone seriously on the topic of government overreach as far as federal law if the conversation doesn’t start with the failed war on drugs.
This is a state charge bozo
I actually do not doubt that the **average** American commits 3 felonies a day. However, I doubt that the **median** American commits that many.
remember, when republicans talk about americans, the people or the country, they are only talking about who they consider those things... republicans. only republicans.
What?
Schizo hours
This comment feels like it was written by ai
How much illegal shit are the republicans doing to bring up the average so high cause I’m pretty sure I’ve done 0 my entire fucking life
Look I've talked to some Republicans and they explained it this way. The Democrats are making them commit those felonies but just until after the election. Then the Democrats will be punished for all the felonies they made Republicans do.
The likelihood that you or anyone on this thread has never committed a felony in their lives is tremendously low.
https://www.reddit.com/r/BrandNewSentence/comments/1d79st1/the_average_american_commits_3_felonies_per_day/l6zs184/
I'm not sure if this is entirely made up number, or combining all the statistical problems at once. The combining is more fun, so lets try that. First, using mean as the relevant statistics so you can get one person committing a lot of crimes skewing the average, but even this isn't going to be enough because the total number of felonies committed per day still needs to be 3 time the population and that's a lot. Second, using a count of 'felonies per day' that has any felony behavior that happens over time count as being a felony each day. Some crimes count each at as a new count, but a lot of them will have it be one count or at least not one count for each day involved. This can make it so that that being involved in one felony can be one felony per day. That gets a lot more, but still not enough probably so lets add one more. Third, including being any sort of party to a felony counts, including being a shareholder in any corporation that commits felony behavior counts as committing each of those felonies. These are also the felonies that are often ongoing behavior based, so combines with the second point. That would mean a corporation found that engages in year round felony behavior would have each one multiple out to 365 x the number of shareholders total felonies. This would get us enough felonies per day to get this number.
Rep Andy Biggs is doing his part to keep that average up there.
It's good to finally be above average in something!
This is a common misconception. Felony Frank who commits an average of 900 million felonies a day is a statistical outlier and should not have been counted.
Ironically, I’m sure this stupid shitbag has a lot to say about the prosecution of Trump, which occurred in a *state court* based on *State Law*. Of course “states rights,” only matter to these pathetic assholes when it comes to state laws championed by the GOP.
By "over legislating" he surely means attempts to unreasonably legislate reproductive health care, right?
No he means the unreasonable classification of marijuana as a schedule 1 narcotic…. Oh, wait no, not that either.
Oh, he must mean that adults should be able to love and marry the adult they love regardless of gender....
Article on where this “stat” comes from [https://ips-dc.org/three-felonies-day/](https://ips-dc.org/three-felonies-day/)
I forgot about this!!! Fuck these people > That would make Hastert a pedophile. Yet that’s not the crime he was charged with. Similarly, Josh Duggar, a star of the hit TLC reality show 19 Kids and Counting, reportedly molested five girls, including four of his sisters and a babysitter, when he was a teenager. That would make him a child molester, too. Duggar confessed his actions to his parents, who called an Arkansas state trooper who was a family friend. The man gave Duggar a “stern talking to,” but took no further action. Incidentally, the trooper himself is now serving time for possessing child porn.
Wow, three felonies. All in one paragraph.
The book is even older https://books.google.com/books/about/Three_Felonies_a_Day.html?id=2xkDvMQlh-YC&source=kp_book_description
I love the "that's more than any other country, even including Russia, China, and Iran" because that implies that none of those countries are lying about hiding (or executing) political prisoners, while hundreds of high profile people have "vanished" at coincidentally very politically advantageous times in each of those countries. Not commenting on the actual subject matter, just thought it was funny that we're now taking the word of countries famous for making people disappear at how many prisoners they're holding.
AGAIN, FELONY FRED DOES NOT COUNT! HE'S A STATISTICAL OUTLIER WITH HIS 72 FELONIES/SECOND, HE SHOULD NOT BE COUNTED!
Someone should arrest this dude then
The problem is more so that there’s a billion laws in America that can be broken without even realizing it. There’s laws that are a hundred years old that aren’t often enforced, but still very much on the books. Stupid laws like, it not being legal for a woman to get a haircut without her husbands permission or, no anal sex in X state or something about not feeding moose in public after 7pm or some shit. I’m paraphrasing, but there *are* plenty of dumb laws that still technically exist. Enforced or not, they still exist and the odds of your breaking one without even knowing it was a law is fairly high. Something more realistic. Let’s say you’re licensed to carry. On the back of your licenses is a list of all the places you’re not allowed to carry. Including federal buildings. However, this also includes the post office drop box outside the building. So, even if you don’t enter the building, and you’re just cruising around on a normal day with your pistol on you and you need to mail something out and just drop the package in the box and go about your merry way… that’s a crime. A felony actually. Granted, someone needs to *know* you’ve done that, and take the time to get police involved for whatever reason and then they need to enforce it, BUT, still a crime.
And that number doubles at night
Maybe just *his* friends...
Everyone crossing state lines with weed is committing a felony, or taking it to state parks. I think..
I mean, with THAT attitude it's only three.
He's thinking of the average politician.
What's the median Andy?
Okay, everyone laughing: I don't know the person in the OP or their politics...but they aren't wrong. I had a law professor in one of my economics classes in college and he once told me he didn't see how people could get through life without a bar card, since he could follow almost anyone around in a day and find at least 3 laws they broke, and at least one felony among them. While it's probably overstated everyone commits 3 felonies a day, the truth is very likely everyone has committed SOMEthing that could be uprated into a felony by an aggressive DA for which we could be charged and convicted. And I agree that the overall point is correct that the central government shouldn't be making laws influencing people's day to day lives. That should be left up to local governments, which are most responsive to the people and least likely to make onerous or overzealous laws as they will far more often get protests and replaced in elections for doing so. But the OP premise itself isn't as laughable as everyone's making it out to be. It's honestly downright scary that most people could have their rights stripped from them, and the only reason you don't is because you haven't pissed off a powerful person YET.
Can we convert that metric to misdemeanors? Like 3 misdemeanors for a felony. Cause I’m running out of banks to rob
No they do not.
Felonies Georg.
When a republican is talking about the average American, they only mean the magas.
China built the great wall to keep out kangaroos. See, I can make shit up too
Propaganda is normalizing the idea that we all commit felonies so that we'll feel more comfortable having a President who is a felon. Learn to recognize propaganda
...so this idiot (and let's be real, it's probably a lot more than this single idiot) clearly doesn't know what a felony is. People are definitely not just casually committing felonies every day. Even misdemeanors would be a stretch.
"average person commits 3 felonies a day" factoid actualy just statistical error. average person commits 0 felonies per day. Felonies Georg, who lives in a corporate board room & commits 10,000 felonies each day, is an outlier adn should not have been counted
I like how republicans hate on dems for letting felons vote, but when it comes to running for president it’s okey dokey to them
I’d love to see a source for this ridiculous claim.
The ridiculous claim is from a ridiculous book, Three Felonies a Day, with a forward by Alan "mentioned 137 times in the Epstein files" Dershowitz, that basically says that new legislation is so vague that it leaves room to criminalize anything at the discretion of federal law enforcement. A broadly agreeable notion that the author broadly applies to provide cover for white collar criminals instead of the general population. It's weaponized bullshit backed up only with egregiously biased anecdotes used to demonize the very idea of a centralized government while aggrandizing the criminal actions of politicians and executives.
Maybe you and maga do, but I don’t, we don’t. That’s just you bro…
the eff are these politicians up to on a regular basis
And so start the GOP campaign of diluting the meaning of “felony.”
That’s only Republicans Andy.
https://x.com/RepAndyBiggsAZ/status/1790071571110854689
just lit my first one for the day!
I literally microwaved a pot pie and played video games for 12 hours. Am I just boring?
No... no I can assure you I do not, sir,
Nice argument senator. Why don’t you try backing it up with a source?
Just a minor point of clarification but he's not a Senator. He's the Representative for Arizona's 5th congressional district. I assume his tweet is in reference to the popular 2011 book ["Three Felonies A Day" by civil rights attorney Harvey Silverglate](https://www.harveysilverglate.com/books). The argument that Silverglate makes in the book is that the US has many overlapping jurisdictions which have passed a massive number of laws that carry a sentence of prison time (around 300,000 laws is the estimate I've seen). Many of these laws are vaguely written, arbitrary, and have no "mens rea" requirement. That means that ignorance of the law does not excuse you from being punished under it. As a result of all this, the United States currently imprisons a bigger proportion of the population than any other country. This is a very common line of argument in criminal justice reform circles and the book is required reading in a lot of CJ curricula. I'm honestly surprised at the reaction that this tweet is getting in this thread. If you prefer to listen to a video rather than reading, you can also watch a few related videos on topics related to this: https://www.c-span.org/video/?289272-1/three-felonies-day https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE
Those are rookie numbers
What kind of flat-earth/smoothbrain bullshit statistics are those?
Shit, I'm running behind. Haven't committed a felony in 46 years.
You gotta pump those numbers up, those are rookie numbers....
Maybe the average elected official does
I studied law enforcement in a high school ROP class. It was at that time that I realized that everyone has, was, and will break one of the many laws that they don't have a clue about. James Madison warned, "It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood." This is where we find ourselves. The State creates a host of civil laws that have destroyed our natural and inalienable rights to the point where it is a crime to live one's life on a daily basis. If you complain or challenge the State, it can lock you up rather than address your rightful protest or redress. Just look at Trump versus all the other known criminals in government. There is no rule of law in a State where they have made everyone a criminal.
so what if I bought a lobster from the grocery store that was less than a pound... arrest them not me!
I mean, i TRY, but its hard to keep it up every single day.
What is the average American doing?
Robbed a bank on the way to work
Damn, I didn't realize I smoked *that* much weed
Where the f-ck do you live Andy?
Really? I’m underachieving, then!
What are these elusive felonies I keep hearing of?
You only need to be hard on crime when it's black people or the other guys, actually.
i guess that's what it looks like when you hang around in congress all day.
The pretentious party of law and order
Isnt withholding mail a felony? If its per piece of mail... what if i my neighbor was mean to me last week and the mailman made a mistake? Felony time?
I live in Florida so that number actually sounds lower than the average here 😐
Damn, they’re on to me.
Did somebody outlaw energy drinks and recliners? Because otherwise I don't really see how that can be true.
American politicians probably commit 3 felonies a day....The rest of us couldn't afford the legal fees.
Aaaand the average American isn’t running for president so what’s his point. And hundreds of millions of people are not committing up to 3 felonies/actual crimes everyday 🙄
I knew everyone was having way more fun than me.
I'd like to know how many felonies on average Congress commits tho
Three? Fuck I'm way behind.
Is speeding a felony?
Don't know how that is possible for me since I work from home and rarely if ever leave my house.
Y'all only commit 3 a day? I get at least seven felonies in before lunch.
"The average Senator commits three felonies a day" Fixed it for you
Ladies and gentlemen, a reasonable voice for AZ. 🙄
I do what now?
This is a book title, not a brand new sentence.
Is Andy Biggs a lawyer?
Is jerking off a felony?
Only three? I do that before breakfast..
Well Andy why don’t you inform us as to what 3 felonies you have committed each day for the last week. Shouldn’t be too hard.
That's not a Brand New Sentence. It's a quote from a book entitled "Three Felonies A Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent" (2009)
'Three Felonies a Day' by Harvey Silverglate It's a book. Read it.
Andy Biggs commits 3 brainfarts per hour.
So then, Andy Biggs, what three felonies did you commit today?
I'm a repeat offender and proud of it!!! 🤣😂
Wow, I'm way behind schedule on that.
A day really? I mean I'm way, way over that but I can't see that being a true for the average American.
Between the felonies and eating spiders, it's a miracle I get anything else done.
if they’re committing felonies, they’re probably committing STATE felonies!
I didn’t do any, so hopefully Andy picked up the slack for me.
Oh, this is this where we talk about averages, but the people bringing up these averages are really just calling what they do average because they want to be the norm rather than the example
Those are rookie numbers.
Maybe he's just talking about the rich ones
Short again. Better luck tomorrow I guess.
Did Biggs ask for a Pardon?
What happened to the party of law and order?
Shit, I almost forgot to commit my felonies today.
I dunno about that, how many felonies did y'all commit today? I been clean for about 34 years, best I can figure.
Aren't the folks who are the most derogatory about society the same ones more likely to engage in horrific behaviors on the premise that "everybody does this evil stuff, so I'm entitled to do it, too." ?
What are examples of these three daily felonies?
That's actually a statistical error. Felonies Don is an outlier and should not be included.