In February, a Flint, Michigan, mother who relies on federal food stamp assistance was arrested and fined $350 for the “crime” of stealing a $15 bottle of store-brand multi-vitamins from a Meijer supermarket. The judge had initially wanted to fine Samantha (we have changed her name to protect her privacy) $700 for the vitamins but cut the fine in half because she had no prior offenses. Flint has become known throughout the world as the city whose population was poisoned by lead-tainted drinking water in 2014. Nine years on, not one single official on a local, state or federal level has been arrested or convicted for this social crime which caused at least 100 deaths, miscarriages, emotional and mental developmental problems in children and countless lifelong illnesses.
Samantha’s situation brings to mind a familiar story from that period, the novel Les Miserables, published in 1862, by the French author Victor Hugo.
— source wsws.org | 10 Mar 2023