What's truly pathetic is that his proposal won't work anyhow.

Some crimes are committed intentionally, by people who simply do not believe they will get caught or be punished. Other crimes are committed by people who are desperate, primarily due to brutalization by our socio-economic system. Neither type of crime will be significantly deterred by letting state violence loose on them for a day a year.

"Crime" as we know it is a consequence of our social and economic systems. It will not change in any significant way until we acknowledge how those systems generate crime, and change them accordingly.