Home, Sweet Home
Yesterday afternoon a 63 year-old woman named Josefa had to leave the island of Fuerteventura in the Canaries to go to prison on the island of Lanzarote. She couldn't because, after three days of being on a hunger strike protesting her prison sentence, she fell down in a dead faint before being led onto the ferry and was sent to the hospital. So what? Well, she was being sent to prison for six months because she hadn't demolished the house where she and her two children and three grandchildren live.
Yes, only in Spain. Her story began almost twenty years ago when she found herself divorced with two children and nowhere to go. So she built a small shack on a piece of property she had inherited from her parents. Over time her daughter added three children to the family. They lived off sporadic jobs they could find, and at the moment the grandmother, Josefa, is receiving an unemployment check of 320 euros a month until September, and her daughter 400. Her son isn't receiving anything and has only found odd jobs on the side. The problem is the property is inside a public park, in a protected area where it is now illegal to build any type of building, even a bird house. So, when she repaired the roof and added a small room to accomodate her grandchildren in 2012, someone denounced her. She was ordered to pay a 700 euro fine, demolish the house, and spend six months in jail. Well, she paid the fine but she didn't demolish the house and now the judge is sending her to jail.
It doesn't matter that the house was there before the area was declared a protected area. It doesn't matter that Social Services would have taken the children away if Josefa hadn't repaired the roof. It doesn't matter that they have nowhere to go. According to the sentence, Josefa had to have demolished her house. If she had done so she would have had her jail sentence suspended. If she had done so, she and her two children would have been sleeping in doorways and her grandchildren sent into the foster care system. All she wanted was to keep her family together under a safe roof. On land that was hers. Now that her story has gone viral, the town hall is looking for alternative housing for the family. Perhaps that should have been part of the sentence all along. After all, the town hall permitted her to fix the roof, and thereby also broke the zoning law.
Some will say justice is blind. But is it justice when a wrong is righted with another, different wrong? True justice is not only the punishment of wrong, but also the correction of a condition that can lead to a wrong being committed. But it's always easier to condemn than to help solve a problem.
Yes, only in Spain. Her story began almost twenty years ago when she found herself divorced with two children and nowhere to go. So she built a small shack on a piece of property she had inherited from her parents. Over time her daughter added three children to the family. They lived off sporadic jobs they could find, and at the moment the grandmother, Josefa, is receiving an unemployment check of 320 euros a month until September, and her daughter 400. Her son isn't receiving anything and has only found odd jobs on the side. The problem is the property is inside a public park, in a protected area where it is now illegal to build any type of building, even a bird house. So, when she repaired the roof and added a small room to accomodate her grandchildren in 2012, someone denounced her. She was ordered to pay a 700 euro fine, demolish the house, and spend six months in jail. Well, she paid the fine but she didn't demolish the house and now the judge is sending her to jail.
It doesn't matter that the house was there before the area was declared a protected area. It doesn't matter that Social Services would have taken the children away if Josefa hadn't repaired the roof. It doesn't matter that they have nowhere to go. According to the sentence, Josefa had to have demolished her house. If she had done so she would have had her jail sentence suspended. If she had done so, she and her two children would have been sleeping in doorways and her grandchildren sent into the foster care system. All she wanted was to keep her family together under a safe roof. On land that was hers. Now that her story has gone viral, the town hall is looking for alternative housing for the family. Perhaps that should have been part of the sentence all along. After all, the town hall permitted her to fix the roof, and thereby also broke the zoning law.
Some will say justice is blind. But is it justice when a wrong is righted with another, different wrong? True justice is not only the punishment of wrong, but also the correction of a condition that can lead to a wrong being committed. But it's always easier to condemn than to help solve a problem.
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