ENGLISH
FOR
CONGRESS POSITION PAPER (Revised February 2022)
There
are now over 2,200,000 persons incarcerated in the United
States, a number which has doubled in the past 25 years.
The United States has 25% of the world's prison population and
only 6% of the world's inhabitants. Almost half of the nation's
prison population consists of black males. The cost of
incarceration can run from $15,000 to over $40,000 per prisoner
annually. For every inmate in state prisons, at
least one potential student is denied the opportunity to attend
state colleges or universities because of declining state
support for higher education programs. About half of the inmates
are incarcerated for non-violent crimes: about one-third of the
total have mental illness or other psychological
conditions. A substantial number of non-violent prisoners
are incarcerated for drug use or drug-related offenses. It
is ironic that states are willing to spend more than twice as
much to incarcerate offenders than to implement preventive
programs such as housing, work training, job placement, and
mental health treatment programs to alleviate the adverse
consequences of human deprivation and degradation. Judges
in Ohio and possibly elsewhere have deliberately incarcerated
mentally ill offenders because there are no adequate government
treatment programs outside of prisons for treatment of their
illnesses. Unfortunately, many of the mentally ill offenders
return again and again to prison after they are released because
of the lack of outpatient mental health and other remedial
social services where they live.
Many states now spend substantially more for their prisons than
for their colleges and universities. Furthermore, many
prisoners initially incarcerated for non-violent crimes are
transformed into violent repeat criminals as the result of the
brutal treatment experienced during their first prison
terms. The simple facts are that prisons are not achieving
correction and rehabilitation, require extraordinary levels of
funding to the detriment of other state programs, and often
produce more violent criminals than were initially admitted into
the prison environment. They have become universities of crime,
not of correction. Supermax prisons are horrors of
bestiality, where prisoners are confined in their cells for 23
hours daily with little or no human contact except during the
daily hour exercise period. If not mentally ill before
confinement, such treatment in Supermax and maximum security
prisons is likely to make its victims permanently mentally ill
as its consequence. Fortunately, there is at last overdue
recognition of the horrors of solitary confinement and reforms
are being made to greatly restrict or end this abusive and
inhumane treatment in some states. It must be rapidly
adopted everywhere in the USA without further delay.
As a nominally mostly Christian nation, the failure to address
and rectify the problems with the criminal justice,
incarceration, and social support systems for released prisoners
in the United States is our most heinous national
disgrace. Not only is it immoral, it is just plain stupid:
if the prisons in Port Arthur, Tasmania, Australia, could
achieve an 80% success (non-recidivism) rate 200 years ago, why
can't this United States do as well now? We know what
works: rehabilitation, job training, guaranteed employment,
support during reentry into society, etc are not new concepts.
Work camps for non-violent offenders such as described for
illegal entrants in the Border Security issue should be
seriously considered as an alternative to prison confinement and
exposure to violent criminals. Post-release employment,
social, and health support programs are critical to the
successful reentry of released prisoners and must be given the
same level of attention and funding as incarceration. For
Supermax and other prisoners with life sentences, voluntary
permanent exile to designated islands in the Pacific Ocean under
U. S. jurisdiction should be considered where they could live
their lives until reaching age 80 in an open air environment
secluded from mainland society or the nonviolent should be
paroled to live in appropriate housing. Finally,
decriminalization and legalization of small quantities of
marijuana under strict control such as alcohol and cigarettes
are now regulated will greatly reduce prosecution and
incarceration of users. Colorado,
Washington, and other states have now undertaken this long
overdue legislation and other states are now considering this
reform. A joint Congressional commission to investigate,
identify, and recommend major changes to our criminal justice
system is urgently needed to consider these ideas and other
proposals for prison reform.
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Designed by Imad-ad-Dean,
Inc.