This device has been a favorite tool of criminal judges who force jail detainees to wear the belt during court proceedings. With the return of this long-discredited practice, our society has taken a step backwards that human rights groups like Amnesty International could no longer ignore. I was shipped around through the Alabama Department of Youth Services like a piece of trash. With all the conditions I had to put up with, the chance of me surviving once I was released into the streets in 1988 were slim. At the same time as there is growing juvenile incarceration, the number of women prisoners is mushrooming.
Women are the fastest growing sector of the U.S. prison population.
The number of women prisoners is already over 100,000. Reports of sexual abuse of women prisoners is growing dramatically. This includes a record 3.9 million men and women on probation or parole, another 600,000 in jail facilities and 1.2 million in prison. More Blacks are now in prison than whites. Black people are incarcerated at a rate eight times higher than whites.