LEO, 30+ years....I haven't been exposed personally to that saturation of a citizen incurring 288 arrests. At some point he should have been labeled a repeater, and his penalties, his jail time should have increased, to assure that he would have been locked up.
However, an increasing number of jurisdictions in the nation are suffering from some conditions when a defendant comes before a court with (more) charges. The defendant is demanding a 12 person jury trial, and either found a lawyer, or has a public defender. The defendant stalling and working the system as hard as they can, costing taxpayers money, even in the face of obvious, even admitted guilt, usually he gets a plea deal. A reduced sentence. A fine to pay, community service, and somebody who is a constant irritant to society walks out of the courthouse, confident the whole world is wrong.
This behavior then becomes reinforced; it gets worse, he gets bolder, he learns a few tricks. When he commits a more serious crime, he might see jail, but the state penn is full, very full, there haven't been any new prisons in 30 years in some cases. Judges will do anything but send him to prison. If he goes to prison, even for 6 months, he comes out hard, hating, and mean. With an overloaded parole supervision system, he does what he wants. He gets caught drinking, drugging, beating the crap out of some guy in a bar, he gets 2 weeks in jail. The parole officers's supervisor orders him released.
The victim won't testify.
Lather, rinse , repeat...
Until one fine day ...... either swinging a bat at an armed man seems like a good idea, or shooting somebody over a mattress dispute that escalated from...what really?