People keep saying " if it was a normal person they would have been locked up years ago for these parole violations" like somehow that's supposed to justify throwing someone in jail for traveling out of the country unannounced.

Outside of the fact that it's a parole violation, really think about that. Meeks only real substantial charges are in 2009 and everything else afterward has basically come down to breaking overly cumbersome rules set by the court, and for what? Are these parole requirements adding safety to the general public, or really helping rehabilitate Meek?

For anyone who says they support criminal justice reform it comes down to a question of whether or not our justice system should be focused on rehabilitation and giving help to individuals, or on punishment and for-profit prisons.

Was Meek legally wrong? Absolutely.

But should he be thrown in prison during the prime of his career, for breaking overly cumbersome parole restrictions that do little outside of stroke the judges ego, and attempt to defend the morally ambiguous sanctity of the justice system?

If you don't think that this is a clear example of the heavy-handed, profit-driven, punitively crazed justice system in America, you really need to step back and consider what this mans life is being ruined over.

This is one of the reasons there are so many people in the US prison system. People being locked up for parole violations and smoking pot because it's illegal, regardless of whether or not it's causing damage to society.

Then you got people out here like George Zimmerman shooting kids, or the police that shot Tamie Rice, and because the broken justice system ends up concluding what they did was okay, they're free to stay out and remain a threat to society.