Category: prison reform

Banning Books in Prison

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By Chaka Holley

Many were shocked when Gary Indiana, a decaying city with a population of 100,000, announced the closing of the city’s main library. Due to budget cuts, the library board voted 4-3 to close the bankrupted city’s main branch. The public response was not in favor of this decision.  For many, the public library was their only access to books and other resources.

Gary is not alone; prisons are also limiting access to reading materials. These limits are not due to budget cuts however, but to prohibition.  The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is suing South Carolina’s Berkeley County Jail for prohibiting all books outside of the Bible. In Connecticut, the department of corrections is following suit. Similarly, other prisons around the country are also under scrutiny for banning books. (more…)

The Drug War’s Latest Victim

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By Alec Goodwin

The War on Drugs has claimed yet another victim: the California prison system.

The United States Supreme Court has ruled in a narrow 5-4 decision that the prisons in California are so overcrowded that it violates the constitutional right against cruel and unusual punishment, and that at least 33,000 prisoners must be put somewhere else.

Medical conditions were so bad that an inmate died every week. Mental health services were so poor that suicide was frequent. Quarantines due to virus outbreaks, moldy walls, broken pipes, and human waste smeared over the walls have also been frequent problems. Nowhere else in the entire country are conditions this poor. (more…)

Supreme Court tells California to cut prison population by 33,000

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Prison overcrowdingBy Alan Bean

A Supreme Court ruling will soon force the state of California to reduce its prison population by at least 33,000.  Noting that the state prison system was built for an inmate population of 80,000, the five justices in favor of this move noted that, at one point, the Golden State was housing 160,000 prisoners.

The big question, of course, is how the state will comply with this ruling.  Dissenting justices like Antonin Scalia and Samuel Alito predict that the streets will run with blood if 33,000 offenders are suddenly returned to the streets.  Apparently, conservative justices feel it is okay for  California to stack human beings like cord wood. (more…)

“Only a movement built on love”: Michelle Alexander at Riverside Church

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“Now I want to be clear that when I’m talking about love, I’m not just talking about love for people who have committed crimes like we may have committed, crimes that we think are not so bad; I’m talking about the kind of care and love that keeps on loving no matter who you are or what you have done. It’s that kind of love that is needed to build this movement.”  (Michelle Alexander)

In the 1920s, with the fundamentalist-modernist controversy raging within his own Northern Baptist Convention, John D. Rockefeller built an architecturally imposing church in the heart of one of New York’s most prestigious neighborhoods, opened it to people of all Christian denominations and called an American Baptist preacher named Harry Emerson Fosdick to be his pastor.  Through the years, Riverside Church has become associated with prophetic preaching, dramatic worship and ecumenical mission.

In 1992, Riverside Church adopted a statement of faith proclaiming:  “the worship of God, known in Jesus, the Christ, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit … to serve God through word and witness, to treat all human beings as sisters and brothers; and to foster responsible stewardship of God’s creation … The church pledges itself to education, reflection, and action for peace and justice and the realization of the vision of the heavenly banquet where all are loved and blessed.”

This statement of faith nicely captures the conclusion of Michelle Alexander’s address at Riverside this past weekend.  Calling for “A great awakening” Alexander re-stated her firm belief that only a new social movement can end mass incarceration in America.  As her closing remarks make clear, this movement must be built on a solid moral foundation and, for those of us who follow Jesus, that means taking our Savior at his word.  (more…)

The National Parent Caucus; Meeting the Needs of Forgotten Families

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By Grace Bauer

Beginning in 1998, with my son’s first arrest at the age of 12, I embarked on a journey that I was ill equipped to handle. When I gave birth to my children I had high hopes and dreams for them, this arrest and the succeeding problems that lay ahead for him were never apart of those hopes and dreams. I, as most families that find themselves involved in the juvenile and criminal justice systems, was incredibly naive and made decisions based on what system professionals told me, never considering that it wasn’t their job to help my son. Those decisions set a predictable course, for those with knowledge and understanding, for my son that would leave him emotionally and physically scarred for the rest of his life. I made those decisions without an understanding of what they meant for him or a conception of what it meant to have a “system-involved” child. For the next three years, I walked this path alone in confusion and isolation I sat quietly:

. . . in meetings where professionals talked about my son and didn’t say anything because they presented themselves as the experts and seldom asked me anything

. . . in court rooms in front of a judge without an attorney or advocate because I was told an attorney would only slow down my son getting the help he needed and I believed this lie to be the truth

. . . outside the court house, on the day my son was adjudicated delinquent and sent to a far-off facility because my legs would not carry me away from my baby and I still believed I had done what was right

. . . by the phone for days awaiting a call from the facility to inform me of where my son would be placed and when I would be able to visit

. . . through 2 1/2 hour drives, and then 5 1/2 hour drives, to visit my son in prison, and sometimes be turned away upon arrival because he was in the infirmary or in isolation

. . . in the car on the long drives back home with tears running down my cheeks and my heart in misery, the images of my son’s battered body swirling through my mind, feeling sickened by my powerlessness and stupidity

. . .  I sat through a visit with an attorney, nearly 3 months into what I believed would be a 90 day stay in an excellent program, only to be told by the attorney that my son would not be coming home until his 18th birthday and that, when he left that prison, I should buy him a ticket to Angola State Penitentiary because that is where most of these kids ended up

. . . on the phone with one of the first teachers permitted inside the Tallulah Correctional Center for Youth in Northeast Louisiana while she explained she had assessed my son and found him in isolation where he appeared to be on the brink of a nervous breakdown.

. . . as I heard the diagnosis of my son with severe depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

. . . when the “New York Times” named the Tallulah prison, where my son was housed, “one of the worst in the nation”

But a new day would come when I no longer sat quietly. (more…)

Narcotics: Attack Capital, Not People

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Mark Osler, a law professor at the University of St. Thomas, believes we should stop arresting scores of low-level drug dealers and start interdicting drug money in high places.  This concise form of his unique take on drug policy appeared in the Huffington Post.  If you are intrigued by Professor Osler’s thesis but aren’t sure about the details, an in-depth statement of his argument can be found here.  Highly recommended. 

Narcotics: Attack Capital, Not People

By Mark Osler

The war on drugs is over. Drugs won.

There seem to be two common answers as to what to do next. The political establishment (including the Obama administration) largely supports doing the same things we always have — locking up lots of people who are selling, making or carrying drugs. Meanwhile, increasingly vocal groups of reformers on both the right and left support the legalization of narcotics.

They are all wrong. Supporters of the same tactics we have pursued for decades need to recognize the failure of that enterprise. Many drugs are cheaper, purer, and more widely available now than they were twenty years ago. Legalization proponents, meanwhile, ignore the dire social consequences of narcotics like crack cocaine and methamphetamine (they have a stronger argument in relation to marijuana). There simply is no ignoring the way hard drugs can rip apart the social fabric of a family or community — especially in areas that are already economically vulnerable. (more…)

Call in to support the National Criminal Justice Commission Act

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Friends of Justice is pleased to pass along this announcement from Laura Markle, Criminal Justice Reform Grassroots Coordinator with the General Board of Church and Society of the United Methodist Church

Wednesday, April 27th

TEXAS call-in day to support passage of the NATIONAL CRIMINAL JUSTICE COMMISSION ACT . . . please spread the word!

BACKGROUND on the NCJCA:

In early 2011, Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) and bipartisan cosponsors re-introduced the National Criminal Justice Commission Act (S. 306), legislation that would create a bipartisan Commission to review and identify effective criminal justice policies and make recommendations for reform. Currently, the Senate bill is awaiting House introduction and passage. Please help to urge House Judiciary Chairman Lamar Smith (R-21st/TX) to prioritize and pass this important legislation as soon as possible!

ACTION NEEDED: (more…)

Is house arrest an alternative to prison?

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By Marie Owens

Increasing the Use of House Arrest

While our federal and local governments teeter on the brink of financial collapse, lawmakers at every level are scrambling to bring their exploding budgets under control. According to Darrell Issa, Chairman of the House Committee of Oversight, fraud, waste and abuse account for around 7 percent of all government spending. Things are no different on local levels. Santa Clara County Supervisor George Shirakawa Jr. overspent his $1 million-plus office budget by $87,500. In fact, there isn’t a state in America that isn’t in debt. However, exasperated taxpayers are tired of funding such squandering, and are demanding spending cuts. So while they consider the obvious financial inequities of their spending, consider the potential savings that can be created by something a bit more obscure.

Beginning in the 1970s the federal government, and nearly every state legislative body, has enacted a variety of mandatory sentencing policies, which primarily targeted drug offenses and other non-violent crimes. Additionally, there was also the institution of such initiatives as the “three strikes and you’re out” laws. As anyone with a criminal justice degree will tell you, it is due to these tougher sentencing policies that the United States currently incarcerates a higher share of its population than any other country in the world.

According to data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the prison population rose 380 percent from 1980 to 2008. In the meantime, the United States Census data revealed that the nation’s population rose only 33 percent during the same period. Comparatively speaking, the number of people incarcerated in state and federal facilities has grown ten times faster than the rate of our entire population. In 2008, the U.S. correctional system held over 2.3 million inmates. Of those, 60 percent were non-violent offenders. With an incarceration rate of 753 prisoners per every 100,000 people in 2008, there has been about a 240 percent increase of the number of people in prison since 1980. Thus the fact that we have passed into our third decade of these mandatory sentencing policies and have seen incarceration levels raise rather than diminish, it is fair to conclude that these laws have failed. (more…)

Kellogg challenges the colorblind consensus

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By Alan Bean

The W.K. Kellogg Foundation recently launched a $75 million grant-making program dedicated to racial healing.  “We believe that all children should have equal access to opportunity,” the foundation’s website reads.  “To make this vision a reality, we direct our grants and resources to support racial healing and to remove systemic barriers that hold some children back. We invest in community and national organizations whose innovative and effective programs foster racial healing. And through action-oriented research and public policy work, we are helping translate insights into new strategies and sustainable solutions.”

In an article written for the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, Dr. Gail Christopher, Kellogg’s vice president for program strategy, addressed the issue squarely:

The vision that guides the work of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation is clear: we envision a nation that marshals its resources to assure that all children thrive.  What may be less self-evident to some is the pernicious and self-perpetuating way in which racism impedes many children’s opportunities to do so. (more…)

Rethinking Hell

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By Alan Bean

Hell has always been a hot topic in America.  Rob Bell’s Love Wins created such a pre-publication stir that the book debuted at number 2 on the New York Times best-seller list and remains on Amazon’s top 10. 

Bell’s take on heaven and hell rests on the recent scholarship of folks like NT Wright (on the evangelical side) and Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan (writing from a more liberal perspective).  (Brian McLaren offers a slightly more cerebral, and original, popularization of this new scholarship.)  The big idea is that salvation isn’t about going to heaven (or hell) when you die; eternal life (for better or worse) begins now. 

In a recent chat with Welton Gaddy, Rob Bell offered this typically folksy summary of his perspective.

I start with the first century world of Jesus. Jesus spoke very clearly and forthrightly about this world: that the scriptural story and the Jewish story that he was living in was about the reclaiming of this world, the restoration and the renewal of this world. So, Jesus comes, He teaches his disciples to pray “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” The action for Jesus was here on earth, about renewing this earth, about standing in solidarity with those who are suffering in this world. And he spoke of a kingdom of God, which is here and now: upon you, among you, around you, within you.

So in the book, I talk about this urgent, immediate invitation of Jesus to trust him, that God is good, that God is generous, that God is loving, that God is forgiving… And to enter into a new kind of quality of life with God right here, right now. So let’s bring some heaven to earth, let’s work to get rid of the hells on earth right now, let’s become the kind of people who love our neighbor… And that, for Him, it was immediate and urgent about this world. What happens when you die? He talks a little bit about that, but He’s mostly talking about this world. I think, for a lot of people, the Christian faith doesn’t have, for them, much to say about this world; that it seems to be all about what happens when you die. And so, the book, in some ways, flips it around and says: “I think this is actually what Jesus was doing.” (My emphasis, along with a few quick edits) (more…)