Leonard Hill relocated his company, Lockhart Technologies, Inc., from Austin to Wackenhut's prison, and he describes the benefits of prison labor in glowing terms. Hill says the state pays for workers' compensation and medical care. Wackenhut doesn't do too bad either. There is nothing far-fetched about the existence of the prison industrial complex. Indeed, many of the companies that manufactured arms as part of the military industrial complex are now building prisons and security equipment.
News services carry sensational stories that create a demand for tougher measures against criminals.
An example of politicians making political hay over crime is the way presidential candidates from both parties frequently appear in public with uniformed police officers as a backdrop. In the hysteria created by high profile violent crimes, laws were passed that determined specific sentences for drug offenses that are generally longer than when the judge was permitted to use his discretion. The old criminal justice paradigm is the model of first protecting the public from the offender, providing a deterrent through punishment, and then providing an environment for the rehabilitation of the offender. This was done at considerable cost, but with the understanding that there would be long- range collateral benefits to society. As the New World Order stepped into the open and the economies of the world merged into one globalized economy, the paradigm of crime and punishment evolved into a system so cruel and Orwellian as to defy the imagination of most of us.