Posted on 09/28/2007 7:56:15 AM PDT by Politics4Fun
What does the California prison system have in common with Harvard University? It costs precisely as much to house, feed and guard one prisoner for one year in a California state prison as tuition, meals and housing cost for a student enrolled for one academic year at Harvard. As far as California taxpayers are concerned, it gets even worse. Their prison system is so overcrowded that it’s reached a breaking point. Either the state finds a long-term solution, or the federal courts have warned that they’ll begin ordering the release of inmates, just to ease the crush.
In this two-hour broadcast, Ted Koppel examines how California got to this point and presents an inside view of the crisis through in-depth interviews with inmates, guards and prison officials at California State Prison Solano in Vacaville. KOPPEL ON DISCOVERY: BREAKING POINT premieres on Discovery Channel on Sunday, October 7 at 9 PM (ET/PT).
Designed to accommodate no more than 100,000 inmates, California’s prisons now hold 173,000, each at an annual cost of $43,000. How did things get so out of control? Mandatory sentencing is a big part of the answer. When California voters threw their support behind a get-tough-on-crime bill that came to be known as “three strikes and you’re out,” the state prison system filled up and is now overflowing.
While shooting this latest installment of KOPPEL ON DISCOVERY, Koppel spent a number of days among the general population at Solano. His reporting focuses on the inhabitants of H dorm, where inmates are stacked in triple-deck bunk beds on an old indoor basketball court. Correctional officers are so badly outnumbered that prison officials keep inmates segregated by race and gang affiliation in a desperate effort to avoid friction and maintain control. Even so, Solano still sees three to four race riots a year. Using smuggled cell phones, gang bosses continue running criminal operations on the street from behind prison walls. At the same time, they’re running drug and prostitution rings inside Solano.
Koppel will introduce viewers to many of Solano’s inmates, including Travis Tippets, Joseph Mason and Brian O’Neal. Having completed a 6-year sentence for assault with a deadly weapon, Tippets is being released from Solano and sits for a brief “exit interview” with Koppel. The last time he was paroled, it took Tippets less than a day to get arrested and sent back. Knowing that a third strike could land him back in prison for life, Tippets finds out how hard it is to get a job with no skills and a criminal record. Joseph Mason is a third-striker. He’s been arrested and convicted three times for non-violent burglaries, and he won’t be eligible for parole until 2019; the ultimate irony is that he voted for the Three Strikes Law. Brian O’Neal is also a non-violent repeat offender. He has been to prison 11 times, and nine of those sentences were for violating parole. Koppel’s cameras track O’Neal’s 11th release from prison as his pregnant girlfriend picks him up and the two drive out of Solano. Within weeks, O’Neal is arrested again for violating his parole.
I still don’t understand why it costs so much to house an inmate.
Easy solution: Desert. Barbed Wire. Tents. Blankets. Bologna sandwiches.
There I just the cut the cost of PRK prisons by 50% and made it possible to expand ‘em quickly and indefinitely.
You have varying degrees of criminality in a prison. Get the better men to build a new prison within a triple fenced area. That will cut the costs.
I know many of people are hard-assed about prisons, but if these guys are going to be released back into society we can’t keep making them worse.
Thank the Drug Warriors for locking up people whose only “crime” was to ingest substances not sanctioned by the nanny state and providing a lucrative market to the criminal element.
So take a lesson from Sheriff Joe Arpaio and quit whining.
sounds like the premise for a new reality show:
We asked 5 inmates and 5 college sophomores to trade places for a week. Can the inmates make the grade? Can these ivy leaguers make it on the inside? Find out tonight on “going straight: the college years.”
Just put 'em all in a pen, and let them go at.
Major savings as numbers are reduced, AND, space for more of them to be brought in.
(Of course, with the ACLU and ambulance-chasers taking full advantage of an income opportunity, this method would not work in today's environment).
They’re both full of people who don’t like conservatives?.................
I have to agree. No matter how harsh we make our laws, the vast majority of crimes do not merit a life sentence which means the vast majority of convicts will eventually be back on the street. We should do what we can to ensure that when they do get out they’ll be able to stay out.
“Easy solution: Desert. Barbed Wire. Tents. Blankets. Bologna sandwiches. There I just the cut the cost of PRK prisons by 50% and made it possible to expand ‘em quickly and indefinitely.”
Ah, you beat me to it.
Try ending the "War on drugs".....
Time to outsource the sentencing phase of our correctional system to the Chinese.
1) Let the inmates walk free
2) Pay the inmates to walk free and attend Harvard at no charge.
A conservative says "Easy solution: Desert. Barbed Wire. Tents. Blankets. Bologna sandwiches."
Well done!
I was going to suggest the same thing for the Harvard faculty.
I really don't have a problem with someone who's convicted of burgalry three times spending a lot of time behind bars. But I also thought about half of prisoners are there for drug related, or other moral turpitude related offences. For such offenders, what's wrong with a tent camp in the middle of the desert? It shouldn't cost more than Harvard or MIT.
It' not the state, it's liberal judges.
“I know many of people are hard-assed about prisons, but if these guys are going to be released back into society we can’t keep making them worse.”
Sheriff Arpaio has a very low recidivism rate in his county. No one wants to return to his jail.
His prison is a success economically and keeping thugs out of his county.
Cutting the taxpayer costs of prison is simple:
1. Stop illegal immigration by enforcing the laws against persona nd business who hire them, house them, and provide them credit and banking. Pay for it all through confiscation of proeprty and fines.
2. Hang rapists, murderers, and thieves.
3. Stop the badly executed war on drugs. There are better ways to reduce drug use without jailing 1% of the population. Prohibition didn’t work for alcohol and it isn’t working for the other drugs.
4. Stop making crimes out of everything. We’re not all felons who just happen to not have been caught yet.
Nope big labor have written state law so that can't happen.
Actually, I have a different perspective having done engineering projects in a number of correctional facilities.
My perspective is that litigation and fear of litigation have driven up the price of "supervising" inmates and protecting correction officers.
Color TV's, Internet, good food, etc. are ways to entertain the inmates and reduce stress on the Corrections officers. Personally the "crap" (literally) that Corrections officers have to put up with is beyond belief and has to wear on their mental health. The stress and danger they put up with when inmates are unhappy, is just not worth the money in my opinion. It is no surprise to me that Corrections officers push for more officers and for more pay.
On the the same side of the coin is the fear of lawsuits by Corrections officers if they are injured. Let's face it the kinds of injuries that can be sustained were just not envisioned when State workers compensation insurance programs were set up.
Speaking of litigation, the inmates have been given all kinds of rights and the ACLU is working hard to make it impossible to "restrain" or monitor an inmate. In Washington State we have had a convicted murder inmate who were too fat to be hanged as it would have been cruel and unusual punishment. In the Northwest, we have had inmates in for life get an organ medical transplant at the taxpayers expense. With Meth addition one of the side effects is loss of teeth. You wouldn't believe the dental expenses our correctional system is paying. And don't forget that if an inmate is "raped" he may be able to file a lawsuit claiming that there weren't enough correction officers to supervise him and protect him.
I am not surprised that to house an inmate and guard and monitor him 24/7 plus provide for all his needs costs as much as providing room, board and tuition at Harvard. We could change that if we backed off on the rights of prisoners and allowed for their harsher treatment, until then it will be very expensive, but worth it to society for all the other damage it prevents.
You DO need to address differing levels of criminality.
The prisons are full - so ignore the non-violent potheads who have no other offense - kick ‘em out. Don’t re-arrest for minor drug offenses. Don’t waste time with ‘em in courts either.
Non-violent, non “sexual-predator” offenders still have some hope. Keep ‘em away from the the scum and give ‘em real work to do. Let ‘em build stuff, farm stuff and otherwise get some work experience. Let ‘em live the prison with the TVs and ACs.
The people I’d put in desert camps behind the wire are violent offenders and sexual predators. No weights. Crummy (high-carb) diet. Just enough water. Porta-potties. Lots of picks and shovels. Towers with machine guns and water cannon. Guards with shotguns and truncheons and permission to use them. The cons get to build and maintain their camp.
Violent three-time losers don’t need prison - they need a bullet in the head before they kill somebody.
Remove all the students from Harvard and MIT and replace them with inmates put a wall around them. Force the professors to spend eight hours a day instructing them. See how long they remain liberal.
Thanks also to the flooding of the border. Unlimited immigration always leads to lawlessness. and gang violence. The “Know-Nothings of the 1850s have got a bad rap. because they were witnessing some bad stuff as the Irish poured off the ships and into the shantie districts. In term of cost, the problem is building prisons when POW-like camps would be better.
Crap. Guess I won't be sending my kid to Folsom.
So what do you think about the “non-violent, non ‘sexual predator’ offenders” who are multiple repeat offenders? Keep the three strikes law and lock them up for good or let them just keep moving in and out of prison indefinitely?
“So what do you think about the “non-violent, non ‘sexual predator’ offenders” who are multiple repeat offenders? “
Can you give an example of such a crime?
Also they should NOT separate the violent criminals from the others. One way to really deter repeat crime is for the hoods to know they are going to be thrown in with the gangbangers and serial rapists if they get caught doing that little house burglary. If criminals once again fear prison there will be a lot less crime.
A habitual burglar, for instance. Or a professional car thief.
Can you give an example of such a crime?
Sure. Grand Theft Auto.
From what I understand, a pretty large number of inmates caught by the three-strikes law are serial robbers, stealing stuff mostly to pay for drugs. These are the stupid street criminals who are most likely to be caught busting car windows to grab cameras, going into homes that were left unlocked, etc. They are criminals, for sure, but when you start throwing these guys into prison for life you fill up the prisons really fast.
In a liberal state like the People’s Republic of Kalifornia, what else would you expect?
I saw a special on Alcatraz (actually on Discovery, I believe) and the reason they shut it down was that it cost so much to operate. Since it is an island, every single thing needed for day to day operations (food, laundry, etc.) had to be shipped in and out, which apparently cost a not-so-small fortune.
I really don’t know. I was kinda hoping that work experience in prison would fix that problem. If they know what regular folks do for a living, maybe they’ll be less inclined to rob them.
Failing that, maybe they need a camp, too. Not for permanent residence, but just to know that their next stay will be very, very upleasant.
Best solution, of course, would be a penal colony, where they would have to work or starve, but we’ve sort run outta room for those...
Problem with that is that you really just end up making them worse criminals. Part the goal should be to keep criminals from teaching their trades to each other.
They don’t call prisons “Criminal U” for nothing...
Pretty soon going to Harvard will make as much economic sense as running for President.
The tragic part is that most everyone is released from Harvard back into society.
They would have had to “earthquake proof” it had they not shut it down.
“A habitual burglar, for instance. Or a professional car thief.
“
Hang horse thieves. Anyone who is a predator on society who think breaking into homes or stealing expensive vehicles is not a petty criminal and deserves to be removed from society forever. If you cannot feel safe in your home from invasion, then something is wrong.
P.S. Remember that there is all the difference in the world between petty crimes such as shoplifting an apple and stealing a car. Theft of property is theft of someone’s life as they spent their life earning that property.
If so, stopping illegals would, over time, significantly reduce the prison population.
Also, limit 3 strikes law to violent crimes (I prefer 2 strikes), force nonviolent prisoners to learn & work at a trade prior to release, & Stop the insane War on Drugs.
I don’t know that number but it would definitely be interesting to find out. I do know that America has more people in prison than any other country in the world. Not sure how it’s calculated (percentage of population or just pure number of people?) but Koppel mentions it in the video that’s on the original site.
Idea! Send the illegals back to jails in their home countries, & pay the local authorities somewhat less than $43k/yr per prisoner to jail them. I’ll bet they’ll take them for way less than $43k, & they wont be inclined to let them go as they will lose money. We, of course, will trust, but verify, before payment.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.