A very disturbing pattern is becoming evident all across the nation. For a country that has 5% of the world’s population yet 25% of the entire planet’s prisoners, we sure do seem to eager to bump that figure up even higher. My guess is the trend has a lot to do with the private prison system in the country, which means higher levels of incarceration equals higher profits. I think it also has to do with a troubling move toward criminalizing speech and an attack on the First Amendment generally. This particular case occurred in Austin, Texas and nineteen year old Justin Carter now faces eight years in jail for an insensitive joke on Facebook. Thanks to the site Texas Prison Bid’ness, we can gain some perspective on the private prison industry in the Lone Star State:

Now, here’s the story from KHOU in Houston:

Justin Carter was 18 back in February when an online video game “League of Legends” took an ugly turn on Facebook.

Jack Carter says his son Justin and a friend got into an argument with someone on Facebook about the game and the teenager wrote a comment he now regrets.

“Someone had said something to the effect of ‘Oh you’re insane, you’re crazy, you’re messed up in the head,’ to which he replied ‘Oh yeah, I’m real messed up in the head, I’m going to go shoot up a school full of kids and eat their still, beating hearts,’ and the next two lines were lol and jk.,” said Carter.

“LOL” stands for “laughing out loud,” and “jk” means “just kidding,” but police didn’t think it was funny. Neither did a woman from Canada who saw the posting.

Justin’s dad says the woman did a Google search and found his son’s old address was near an elementary school and she called police.

Justin Carter was arrested the next month and has been jailed since March 27. He’s charged with making a terroristic threat and is facing eight years in prison, according to his dad.

Friends and family have started an online petition they’re hoping will garnish more attention for Justin’s plight. You can find it by clicking here.

This is almost incomprehensible. Were his comments insensitive and disturbing? Sure. Would a call from the police to his parents to discuss the matter have been warranted? Maybe. That said, I cannot think of a single reason why this kid would ever spend more than a night in jail for simply doing what many immature kids do every minute of every day. Expect many more cases such as these, as the U.S. fully transitions into a police state economy.

“LOL” stands for “laughing out loud,” and “jk” means “just kidding,” but police didn’t think it was funny. Neither did a woman from Canada who saw the posting.

Things aren’t getting any better for a 19-year-old video gamer who has been locked up since March for the remarks he made over Facebook. The father of the teen now says his son is being beaten up while he waits to stand trial.

In an interview with National Public Radio that aired Wednesday, Jack Carter said his son Justin has suffered countless injuries since being locked up in a Texas detention facility more than three months ago.

"Without getting into the really nasty details, he's had concussions, black eyes, moved four times from base for his own protection," Jack Carter told NPR. "He's been put in solitary confinement, nude, for days on end because he's depressed. All of this is extremely traumatic to this kid. This is a horrible experience."

Prisoner abuse isn’t anything new, but the so-called crime that’s left Justin Carter facing potentially eight years in prison could be unprecedented. He’s been locked up without trial since late March after authorities were alerted to a Facebook message that Carter says he made in jest.

Only 18 at the time, Carter had just wrapped up session on the online role-playing game “League of Legends” when he got into a spat with a friend over Facebook. Speaking to KVUE news last month, his father explained how what was supposed to be a sarcastic remark posted publically ended up with an unexpected jail stint.

“Someone had said something to the effect of 'Oh you're insane, you're crazy, you're messed up in the head,’” he called, “to which he replied 'Oh yeah, I'm real messed up in the head, I'm going to go shoot up a school full of kids and eat their still, beating hearts.’”

According to Carter, he ended the quip with “LOL” and “JK”— Internet shorthand for “laugh out loud” and “just kidding,” respectively. A witness to the conversation in Canada became worried nonetheless and alerted the authorities, who then arrested Carter and charged him with making a terroristic threat. His bond was set at half-a-million-dollars and he spent more than three months awaiting trial before hearings were scheduled to start up earlier this week. According to NPR, Carter’s attorney has had the start date moved back to July 16 to bring up abuse complaints to try to get bond lowered.

Meanwhile, it hasn’t been a cushy time at Comal County Jail near San Antonio. Speaking to CNN earlier this week, Jack Carter described his son as “very depressed” and said “he’s pretty much lost all hope.”

“He's very scared and he's very concerned that he's not going to get out," Carter said.

Adding to NPR this week, the defendant’s father said his son has been “suffering quite a bit of abuse” and is “really sorry” for making what they say was a sarcastic comment.

“He just got caught up in the moment of the game and didn't think about the implications," Jack Carter told NPR.

A petition demanding Texas release Justin Carter from custody on the website Change.org has so far accumulated more than 45,000 signatures.

This makes me feel sick, and even more so since it was instigated by the very people who have the blood of so many innocent children on their hands - the fucking government - the same ones who instigate the labeling, interrogation and expulsion from school of 5 year olds for saying, 'bang' while waving a bit of plastic or paper around. 'Terrorist' my arse!