Idiots make me angry
Tags: Mass Incarceration, Crime, Idiots, Criminal Justice Reform, Prison Reform

Good morning, I am writing to inform you how utterly appalled I was at your Opinion Piece, Truth in Sentencing. First of all, I find it absolutely ridiculous to use one offender's case as the basis on which to judge all inmates. Second, you clearly have never had a loved one incarcerated, and honestly hope you never have to experience that hell. Third, you are calling for less drug abuse, less recidivism and less crime in general (to be achieved by reducing drug abuse). You don't even realize that the longer sentences your insisting upon are directly leading to the outcomes you oppose. I'm not sure where you go your stats for this piece, but I'm going to include some studies in this email to (hopefully) enlighten your point of view. Throwing drug users in jail just doesn't work. It has been proven time and time again, over and over.

Drug offenders in American prisons: The critical distinction between stock and flow

Drug Offenders in Federal Prison: Estimates of Characteristics Based on Linked Data

Next, you seem to think that sending drug offenders to prison for longer will reduce drug use. The problem with prison sentences for drug users is that the addiction never gets treated. The causes of it are still present when the offender is released, often leading to relapse and recidivism of crimes. If you REALLY want to lower drug use, advocate for alternative sentences for drug offenders. Offenders sent to treatment are far less likely to relapse than those sent to prison.

More Imprisonment Does Not Reduce State Drug Problems Data show no relationship between prison terms and drug misuse

Findings suggest that participation in Baltimore City’s Drug Treatment Court resulted in significantly fewer arrests, charges, and convictions across the 15-year follow-up period, to include several crime-specific differences in arrests and convictions. Originating court was shown to moderate the effect of drug court participation for convictions, such that those participating in the Circuit drug court had significantly better outcomes than those participating in the District drug court. Drug court participants also had significantly lower rates of growth over time in both arrests and convictions. While differences were sustained across the 15-year period, differences in the rate of growth did not appear to increase over time as hypothesized. Participation in Baltimore City’s Drug Treatment Court did not have a significant effect on total days of sentenced incarceration, nor did it have an impact on mortality risk.

Assessing the effectiveness of drug courts on recidivism: A meta-analytic review of traditional and non-traditional drug courts

This study in in Florida found The recidivism rate among individuals who had completed a drug court sentence was half that of their criminal justice counterparts.

Drug Courts, Not More Jail Time, Can Help Reduce Criminal Recidivism

Finally, my last point to you is regarding the explosion of mass incarceration and the spread of private prisons. From 2000 to 2016 the number of people housed in private prisons increased five times faster than the total prison population. Over a similar timeframe, the proportion of people detained in private immigration facilities increased by 442 percent.

Here are a few stats:

Of the total U.S. prison population, one in 12 people (128,063) was incarcerated in private prisons in 2016; an increase of 47 percent since 2000. 26,249 people were also confined in privately-run immigration detention facilities in fiscal year 2017; a 442 percent increase since 2002. Federal prisons incarcerated the largest number of people in private prisons, 34,159, marking a 120 percent increase since 2000.

Capitalizing on Mass Incarceration: U.S. Growth in Private Prisons

In Arizona, which also has cost-saving requirements for private prisons, research conducted by the state’s Department of Corrections in 2010 found that the state had not saved money by contracting out minimum security beds, and that more money is actually spent on private medium security beds than would be spent in a publicly operated institution.

Private prisons also increase recidivism.

Several studies have found that incarceration in private prisons increases the risk of recidivism by almost 20 percent. ... Lower numbers of staff in private facilities, of course, increases the profit margin for private prison operators.

Report Says Private Prison Companies Increase Recidivism

This study found The results of the female adult offenders indicated that 1 of the 12 measures of public versus private prison exposure resulted in a significant reduction in recidivism among this group of offenders. Overall, only 1 in 36 comparisons resulted in a significant finding of lower recidivism rates among inmates released from private versus public prisons. Future analyses should focus on more cases that fit the one comparison that demonstrated a reduction in recidivism for private prisons.

Impacts of Private Prison Contracting on Inmate Time Served and Recidivism

The IV estimate shows that private prison inmates serve about 90 extra days, alternatively measured as 4.8 addi- tional percent of their sentences. ... By contrast, estimates in Kuziemko (2013), Bhuller et al. (2018), and Zapryanova (2014) suggest a three percent reduction in recidivism risk for 90 additional days.

Private prisons hurt families, communities and the economy.

They send their lobbyists to donate to political campaigns in exchange for longer sentences and tougher laws. Why? Because keeping their beds full is good business. The state isn't paying for empty beds, so the more inmates you can get and the longer you can get them to be sentenced for is good for the bottom line . Not to mention the slave labor! Are you aware that inmates in private prisons routinely make commercial products for big companies? They do this because the companies can pay the prisons far less than their employees for making their products... and the prisons get away with paying the inmates actually doing the work $0.05 - $0.15 per HOUR & pocket the rest. So, private prisons get lots of our tax dollars AND corporate payouts, you'd expect better results for their inmates, right? Wrong. Check out their political contributions in the 2020 election cycle : Total contributions: $3,245,500 Total Spent on Correctional facilities constr & mgmt/for-profit, 2020

Number of Clients : 5 49 (73.47%) Number of Lobbyists/Percent of Former Government Employees

In the 2016 election cycle, private prisons gave a record $1.6 million to candidates, parties and outside spending groups. That was nearly triple what they'd given in 2014 and more than double their contributions in the 2012 presidential cycle. Most of the increase came in the form of donations to outside groups, and Geo Group was responsible for most of that: It gave $300,000 to super PACs backing various Republican presidential candidates, including one backing now-President Donald Trump. [Read more Background]

Here’s a list of 13 products that are still handmade by convicts. And who knows, you might even be sitting on, or wearing, some of them right now.

So... to sum up, your main points were all criminals should have to carry out their full sentences because you want to lower drug abuse, general crime and recidivism.

Do you see now how longer sentences lead to those problems? They’ve made them so much worse.

Ask yourself what these problems looked like 40 years ago before the mass incarceration boom in private prisons.

Were there just fewer drug users back then? I highly doubt it, being it was the 60’s.

Mass incarceration for profit has lead directly to these problems getting much worse.

Reagan’s War on Drugs is a failure. What’s worse .. it was never about keeping people away from drugs.

It was about creating draconian laws to sentence users to incarceration with lengthy mandatory sentences.... so they could profit off of them.

And here you come .... advocating to take away the one small thing inmates have working in their favor.. "good time".

Do you want to force them to carry out their full sentences?

Go right ahead.

Watch all these problems continue to get worse before they get better.

How long do you really think it will be before more and more companies source production out to prisons? It’s even cheaper than switching to automation!!

The more prisons are privatized, the more and more jobs will vanish.

Drug use and crime recidivism will continue to go up.

These drug charges are often felonies!! Many offenders can’t find decent employment once they're released because of their record, so they go back to doing criminal activities to earn a living.

There's a saying in prisons, that most people come in a petty thief, small-time drug dealer, or addict and leave a career criminal.

We’d be doing society a favor by not sending them to prison for low level or non-violent crimes. Sending them to prison creates life long offenders.

I hope you’ll reconsider your position.

Good day.

Jess Champignon

PS:

Here’s my one case to judge all inmates & criminal offenders with, to counter the intro case you used in your opinion piece.

You mentioned you were a young Prosecutor then... have you really learned nothing from being right in the thick of the Prison Industrial Complex? Have you not witnessed the unfairness of mandatory minimums?

For you to write this piece as an (I assume) now seasoned (or maybe even retired?) Prosecutor makes me lose hope we will ever achieve real and equal justice in America. Too many people like you use fear-mongering to control the masses. It’s truly sad.

Why Low-Level Offenders Can Get Longer Sentences Than Airplane Hijackers