...Prison Overcrowding in the United States First, we need to discuss the causes of prison overcrowding before we dive into potential solutions. The main obvious cause is fluctuating crime rates, the increase in the crime rates, in the United States leads more people to being locked up in prison, causing prison populations to sky rocket. Another main cause is changes to the laws, when changes are made, making the penalties higher, it causes people who might just go to jail for their crime, to end up in the prison system. Another serious issue that the United States prison system has is its return rate, with high lapses of criminals in today’s society the U.S has a 60% return rate. This rate cannot be tolerated, we as a society need to do something...
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...The Problem of Prison Overcrowding in the United States "The Land of the Free has 5% of the world’s population, but 25% of its prisoners. In all, about 2.2m Americans fester behind bars: one in every 107 adults" (ALEC.Org).With that many Americans in prison, providing enough space for each individual in becoming quite a difficult situation. The amount of space that is available for each inmate, the amount of time each inmate is incarcerated for, and the living arrangements, as well as many other factors, are all involved with the problem of overcrowding. Many people think that if a person commits a crime, then they should be locked up for good and the world would be a better place. Tougher laws are one idea that people come up with to create a safer world. It is true that we would all probably be safer, but then we would have an even bigger problem with our prison system being overloaded. The United States prison system is already crowded and creating tougher laws would just increase the problem. The states are constantly making changes to their approach concerning prosecution. They are lengthening the confinement time for some crimes and shortening the time for others. This also is a huge addition to the overcrowding problem, as well as the seesawing of crime rates. Sometimes the crime rates are going through the roof, while at other times a violation is at its lowest. When rates are high, overpopulation becomes more of an issue. (Portland) The U.S. has to find ways to...
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...The United States in number one is prison population, because the prison system is broken, and the only way it can be repaired is for it to be torn down. The broken nature comes from racial bias, and life sentences for non-violent crimes, while certain violent crimes occur with impunity. Then, the prison system breeds those inside for recidivism, rather than prolonged freedom. In 1993, South Africa under the apartheid system imprisoned 851 black men, while in 2010, the United States, imprisoned 4,347 black men; that means black men are imprisoned at about five times the rate they were imprisoned under an apartheid system. Due to this, the America is an apartheid state, where guilt is deemed by the coloration of skin, rather than the true culpability. There is the issue of people serving life sentences for non-violent crimes, and many of them are also black. There are over 3,000 people in prison for non-violent crimes, and some of the crimes are as simple as shoplifting a jacket, and selling marijuana....
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...Prison labor is a form of legal slavery or involuntary servitude among prisoners in state penitentiaries. Prison labor is explicitly permitted by the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution that serves as a punishment for the action of committing a crime (U.S. Const. amend. XIII). Prison labor is the re-enslavement of Americans, that has largely discriminated against African Americans and other minorities. There is legislation associated with the increase of prison populations that has mainly targeted African Americans, including but not limited to mass incarceration through the War on Drugs and the use mandatory minimums. The War on Drugs, implemented by Richard Nixon’s administration, expedited the disproportionate mass incarceration of African Americans and Latinos for mandatory minimums relating to drug-related crimes (drugpolicy.com)....
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...The prison systems in the US are filled with issues which have created a lot of debates. The amount of money spent the violence and crimes inside the prison, the safety of inmates and guards.One major issue that has brought a lot of attention is solitary confinement. This punishment is when the inmate is placed in a cell by themselves for 23 hours a day for a period of time even years sometimes. Although experts believe that solitary confinement is good for the prison system, because it causes mentally, physical damage and it's too costly, this punishment should be abolished in all states. In the entire world, there are only three developed nations that still use solitary confinement and the United States are one of them. In the USA this is usually used for a type of punishment for violent infractions, this is not always used judiciously (Lee 100). They say that this punishment does more harm than good. For example, experts say a number of prisoners that have illness before they are placed in confinement only finds that their illness seems to exacerbate (Lee 100). People who are held in there for years usually have a hard time reintegrating into the prison population (Lee 100). Adjusting back to the outside world also is hard because they...
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...the same as the United States and then there are some who do just the opposite. The American correctional system is designed to incarcerate and try to rehabilitate offenders, if possible. I chose to compare the American correctional system with that of the Iraqi correctional systems. This paper will show the differences in the two. It will also show how the American correctional system is run in comparison to that of the Iraqi correctional system. The American correctional system is set up with different types of prisons. Most prisons are run by the state government although the United States does have federal prisons. The federal prisons are run by the federal government. In the United States, prisons are operated at various levels of security, ranging from minimum-security prisons that mainly house non-violent offenders to Supermax facilities that house well-known criminals and terrorists (DeMaille, 2007). In the United States, prisons house more than two million prisoners. The majority of criminals in the prison system are because of drugs and violent crimes. As of the end of August 2010, there were approximately 210,000 prisoners in federal prisons with about half of those for drug related crimes (BOP, 2010). In the United States there are two well-known federal penitentiaries. They are Alcatraz, which is closed, and the Leavenworth Penitentiary in Kansas. The biggest drug related crimes is transporting illegal drugs across state lines. Prior...
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...Fyodor Dostoevsky stated that, “You can judge a society by how well it treats its prisoners”. Many prison systems in the world seem rather harsh. North America has received much criticism for having 76.6% of their ex-prisoners re-arrested within 5 years. Whereas Norway has a much superior rate, only 20% of ex-prisoners continue to be arrested within 5 years. This illustrates how the prison system of the United States is corrupt. For instance, the United States has nearly 5% of the world’s population, but nearly a quarter of that 5% is serving time in prison. The society of the United States can truly be judged, and blamed for many ex-prisoners being re-arrested, considering the annual wage of an American citizen drops an average of 40% after...
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...An Overview of Federal Prisons Stephen Hayden CRJ 101: Intro to Criminal Justice Post University 4/19/15 Abstract Federal Prisons in the United States have evolved since 1930. The United States Federal Prisons range in security levels to house inmates that have been incarcerated on a federal level. Based upon the security level in a facility, inmates are given more freedom and have lower staff to inmate ratios. Inmates are required to work so long as their health is cleared, and some prisons offer inmate labor that can contribute to them returning to society. Prisoners are required to have their basic needs met while housed in a federal correction facility, which includes education, health care, and religious demeanor. While federal prisons are trying to maintain standards they face issues such as overcrowding, which can largely effect how the facilities are ran. Recommendations to overcome overcrowding and better facilitate a prisoners release to society will be provided. History of Prisons in the United States “Pursuant to Pub. L. No. 71-218, 46 Stat. 325 (1930), the Bureau of Prisons was established within the Department of Justice and charged with the "management and regulation of all Federal penal and correctional institutions." This responsibility covered the administration of the 11 Federal prisons in operation at the time.” (Federal Bureau of Prisons, n.d.). Since correctional facilities were mandated they have grown and evolved to this current day, and still...
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...The Conditions of Prisons Worldwide Society usually does not concern themselves with people in prison but what they fail to realize is that they could be the ones incarcerated. Every day, there are people who state they do nothing wrong to be put in prison but anyone can watch the news, and it states how people were on vacation and something unexpected resulted in their incarceration while in a foreign country. The conditions in both American and Third World prisons have poor living conditions and deprive prisoners of health care that cause them to be susceptible to life threatening diseases. Society needs to be aware of these conditions and the possibility that it may happen to them; these conditions are not suitable for human beings. Prisons worldwide have poor living conditions. There are prisons in other parts of the world that conditions are unspeakable, and just inhumane. The living conditions in the majority of United States prisons can be very poor; there are not enough beds or cots because of the overpopulation. There was a new story on a prison in Arizona where the warden had the inmates sleeping outside under canopies. The inmates still had beds or cots, but they were outside in the natural elements with no protection from the weather. Those conditions are not nearly as bad as some of the prisons in the third world countries. In Syria, prisoners are treated like slaves and are even beaten with pipes, other weapons...
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...THE BUDGET COST AND EFFECTS OF PRISONS IN THE UNITED STATES Christina Adonia Turner June 15, 2013 Introduction to Public Administration TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. Table Of Contents…………………………………………………………2 2. Executive Summary………………………………………………………..3 3. Scope and Statement of the Problem………………………………………4 4. Literature Review………………………………………………………….5 5. Methodology………………………………………………………………7 6. Analytical Results………………………………………………………....8 7. Discussion………………………………………………………………...10 8. Bibliography………………………………………………………………16 9. Appendix………………………………………………………………....17 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In summary, the cost of housing an incarcerated inmate does affect the budget of the United States. Whether, the inmate is sentenced to life imprisonment or the death penalty. The facts in this research paper leans heavily in favor of life imprisonment as a cheaper form of punishment verses an inmate being sentenced to death row. The judicial system and politicians have formed several alternatives to assist our country with the ability to lower the cost of housing an inmate in our prison system. For example, the United States detaining systems are concentrating more on issuing a fair sentence to nonviolent offenders, such as, substance abusers and prostitutes. They realize that the majority of the inmates are in need of drug rehabilitation and have a mental illness. Also, the research shows that women offenders are the most affected with drug addiction...
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...Prison Overcrowding in the US Name: Institutional Affiliation: Prison Overcrowding in the US Introduction Prison overcrowding in the US is a serious problem that has remained elusive for many decades. The problem of prison overcrowding emerged since the invention of prison as correctional facilities in the 19th century and until now; it is still troubling the authorities. Overcrowding in modern prisons is multidimensional problem. Various reasons are blamed for the challenge but they significantly differ from one nation to the other. Causes of prison overcrowding are not limited to the bounds of criminal justice but stretch to other facets of authorities including social welfare plans, availability and ease of access to health services, formal education and job opportunities. Debates on how to handle this issue on political platforms is an enough illustration of the problems political leaders undergo in looking for a lasting solution challenged by increased pressure from court orders and rigorous financial crisis. It is therefore evident that it is much easier to have overcrowded prisons than it is to develop and implement effective and efficient ways to manage overcrowding in prisons. Overcrowding in prisons is a broad problem that is centered on issues of policies and crime research. These issues involve criminal sentencing, the role of correctional facilities and sentences, accommodation of prisoners with access to health care and rehabilitation services and causes of crimes...
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...the u.s The United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population. But it has almost a quarter of the world’s prisoners. Indeed, the United States leads the world in producing prisoners, a reflection of a relatively recent and now entirely distinctive American approach to crime and punishment. Americans are locked up for crimes — from writing bad checks to using drugs — that would rarely produce prison sentences in other countries. And in particular they are kept incarcerated far longer than prisoners in other nations. Criminologists and legal scholars in other industrialized nations say they are mystified and appalled by the number and length of American prison sentences. The United States has, for instance, 2.3 million criminals behind bars, more than any other nation, according to data maintained by the International Center for Prison Studies at King’s College London. China, which is four times more populous than the United States, is a distant second, with 1.6 million people in prison. (That number excludes hundreds of thousands of people held in administrative detention, most of them in China’s extrajudicial system of re-education through labor, which often singles out political activists who have not committed crimes.) San Marino, with a population of about 30,000, is at the end of the long list of 218 countries compiled by the center. It has a single prisoner. The United States comes in first, too, on a more meaningful list from the prison studies center...
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...a symbol of death and torture. That same prison became a symbol of disgraceful conduct by a few American Troops” (Asser). With the fall of Saddam’s regime, the United States gained control of the prison because they needed a protected area to keep Iraqi’s who were suspected of assisting Saddam from hiding during the American occupation. Outside the walls of this prison, it seemed to have an acceptable reputation; however, many did not know what happened behind the walls. People that were put in charge of running the prison were not well prepared to serve that position which lead to many problems throughout the prison, including failure of leadership, failing to ensure that officers were properly...
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...Running head: PRISON COMPARISON PAPER Federal Prison Comparison Paper Jessica Cantu University of Phoenix Introduction to Corrections CJA 234 Jeffery Newton November 12, 2011 Federal Prison Comparison Paper There are different kinds of state prisons are: supermax, maximum security, close-high security, medium security, minimum security, and open security. Supermax prisons are permanent lockdown. Maximum security prisons are usually older, larger, walled facilities. They also have the most rigorous security procedures and the lowest inmate to guard ratio. Close-high security are a kind of maximum security but less restrictive and the inmate to guard ratio is a bit higher. Medium security prisons are smaller and newer, and have double fences instead of walls. These prisons also have dorm or pod housing rather than cells; however, the inmate to guard ratio is a bit higher. Minimum security prisons are also newer and smaller as well as minimal perimeter security and fewer internal controls. Again there is an even higher inmate to guard ratio and the inmates live in rooms or dorms and have more privacy and amenities than those in other prisons. Open security prisons are better known as nonsecure facilities; work release centers, prerelease centers, and halfway houses. These facilities have no armed guards and no fences (Foster, 2006). John Gotti John Gotti grew up in poverty but quickly rose in prominence, and was one of the crime family's biggest...
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...Why is the Incarceration Rate in the US so high? The United States has about 300 million residents, about 5 percent of the total world’s population, but the prisons in the United States account for 25 percent of the world’s inmates. This statistic gives the United States the highest incarceration rate in the world with 743 of every 100,000 people behind bars (Levin 2013). On the other hand, Canada, our northern neighbor only has 113 per 100,000 of its citizens in prison (Levin 2013). So the question is, what really is behind the high incarceration rate in the United States? The difference is substantial and cannot be ignored; the incarceration rate in the U.S. is nearly 6.5 times larger. This is a staggering statistic and begins to raise some valid concerns, could it be that the United States court system is structured in a way that unfairly treats criminals? Or could it be that people in the United States just commit more crimes per capita than the rest of the world? The latter doesn’t seem like a plausible explanation, the United States and Canada are so similar it almost seems unrealistic to assume that the crime disparity could be so wide. That leaves us with the idea that the United States court systems unfairly treats criminals or just treats criminals harsher than any other developed country in the world. This thought is certainly very frightening and should be a concern for every United States citizen. Even though most people are good, law-abiding citizens, sometimes...
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