Let the Punishment Fit the Crime story
Geraldine Ferrett, a shameless and unscrupulous ambulance-chasing lawyer, is arrested for having an illegal license plate in the remote town of Stueksville. She discovers that the town's court system is nightmarishly backwards, presided over by three identical judges who sentence people to torture and even capital punishment for petty crimes. Her public defender, Austin Haggard, tries to get each of the judges to assign Geraldine to public service, but he may have ulterior motives. Directed by: Russell Mulcahy. Story by: Ron Finley.
12 total · 1 choice · 6 major · 4 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| punishment in the afterlife | choice | The story features the popular notion of a hell-like environment in which sinners are punished in a ironical manner that supposedly befit the crime. Specifically: Geraldine and Austin had, in life, been unscrupulous lawyers. They were therefore made to function, eternally, as lowly defense attorneys in a Kafkaesque courthouse full of perverse laws and sadistic judges. The experience drove Austin to jump at the opportunity to commit suicide. |
| corporal punishment | major | Geraldine objected on legal grounds to the corporal punishments, such as lashings, maimings, and the stocks, that were meted out by the judges in Stueksville. |
| crime and punishment | major | The Stueksville justice system meted out draconian punishments for petty criminal offenses. |
| cruelty | major | The three identical looking judges were notorious for handing down harsh sentences for petty criminal offenses. They appeared to have a sadistic streak. |
| legal occupation | major | Geraldine was an ambulance chasing lawyer. Austin was a defense attorney. |
| the good of the many vs. the needs of the few | major | A man couldn't get a pacemaker because Geraldine sued the manufacturer into bankruptcy. This illustrates that the law should not be too quick to take the individual's side in lawsuits, because the wrongful conviction of an innocent company can also cause harm to society. A point of the story was to feature lawyers, such as Geraldine and Austin, who unscrupulously yet within the confines of the law exploit people who have found themselves in legal predicaments of one sort or another. The viewer is made to ponder whether unscrupulous ambulance-chasing lawyers simply parasites on society or do they have a role to fill? |
| what it is like in a legal proceeding | major | Geraldine, an ambulance-chasing lawyer, was thrice hauled in before a judge. |
| capital punishment | minor | Geraldine was eventually sentenced to the electric chair, only to be beaten to it by her meek defense attorney who rushed at it to strap himself in. |
| living corpse | minor | The story is presented by the Crypt Keeper, a cackling, wisecracking cadaver. |
| mercy vs. justice | minor | The three justices differed in their opinion regarding the propriety of administering justice with some degrees of leniency. |