In honor of Mother’s Day this Sunday, the Black Lives Matter movement is giving the gift of freedom to several black women in dozens of jails across the country. At least 30 women will be bailed out just in time to spend the holiday with their children, for what they’re calling National Mama’s Bail Out Day.

This year, give the gift of freedom for Mother’s Day #EndMoneyBail #FreeBlackMamas https://t.co/7YhBtmHkAi

— NationalBailOut (@NationalBailOut) April 27, 2017

According to The Nation, many of these women are in jail for low-level offenses such as loitering or small-scale drug possession. These women haven’t been convicted, but remain jailed because they can’t afford bail.

A coalition of 25 black-led organizations, including organizers with Southerners on New Ground (SONG), the Movement for Black Lives, and ColorOfChange, raised more than $250,000 toward the release of women in Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles, and several other cities.

Sixty-two percent of people in jail can’t afford to post bail. This coordinated bail-out is meant to underscore not only that issue, but other major problems with the criminal justice system–especially those affecting poor black women. Women in local jails make up the fastest growing demographic in the U.S. incarceration system, and black women make up 44 percent of women in jails.

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service, about 70 percent of female offenders are mothers. The majority of these women are single mothers with at least two young children; therefore, an extended jail stay is often significantly more devastating for their home life than, let’s say, the incarceration of a male without children.

Once arrested, defendants face a litany of fees, which could add up to thousands of dollars–whether they can afford them or not–aside from just bail. These include public defender application fees; reimbursement fees for representation; and supervision, programming, and electronic monitoring fees for those released on pretrial supervision.

“The National Black Mama’s Bail Out Day Action is part of the growing movement to end mass criminalization and modern bondage,” the SONG website states.

It is rooted in the history of Black liberation, inspired by the enslaved Africans and Black people who used their collective resources to purchase each other’s freedom. Through this action, we will support birth mothers, trans mothers, and other women who [are] mothers and are entangled in the criminal legal system.

Arissa Hall, a national Mama’s Bail Out Day organizer and project manager at the Brooklyn Community Bail Fund told The Nation that “it’s a myth that folks don’t come back to court” when released on their own recognizance.

According to her, upwards of 95 percent of people helped by bail funds return to court for their scheduled appearances. “People will come back to court regardless of whether or not bail is set.”

The bailouts are scheduled to happen on Thursday and Friday, with Mother’s Day celebrations scheduled for Sunday. The coalition is continuing to raise money for more bailouts, and is even considering a potential Father’s Day effort.

Alexis Evans

Alexis Evans is an Assistant Editor at Law Street and a Buckeye State native. She has a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and a minor in Business from Ohio University. Contact Alexis at aevans@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Black Lives Matter Activists to Bail Out at Least 30 Women for Mother’s Day appeared first on Law Street.

With the United States locking up more people every year, prison reform is a topic of national concern. The impacts of mass incarceration on communities and families have become an epidemic, one with lasting consequences. Jails are overcrowded–filled to the brim with non-violent offenders–even as rates for more serious crimes have declined. The number of women in jail is growing at a faster rate than men, according to a new report published by the Vera Institute for Justice and the Safety and Justice Challenge. Entitled “Overlooked: Women and Jail in an Era of Reform,” the research is unique and necessary, as most of the existing information on the criminal justice system focuses specifically on men.

HISTORY OF WOMEN BEHIND BARS

Jails are confinement facilities, run by counties or municipalities that hold people accused of a crime while they await case resolution. Over the past forty years, the number of people behind bars in the U.S. has increased five-fold. On any given day in 1970, there were 157,000 people in jail; in 2014, that number rose to 745,000. Now there are more than 11 million admissions annually. Jails have been transformed from housing extremely dangerous individuals to keeping those too poor to post bail or too sick for assistance in the jail system. Life challenges such as unemployment, extreme poverty, physical and behavioral struggles, substance abuse, and mental health issues plague many women in jail.

Around 1970, there were only 8,000 women in the jail system. Now, with nearly 110,000 women behind bars, they are the fastest-growing incarcerated population in the U.S. Women are now held in jails in nearly every county in the country, in stark contrast to 1970 when roughly three-quarters of counties held not a single woman in jail. Women can find themselves involved with the criminal justice system because of poverty, mental and behavioral health issues, substance abuse, or a history of trauma.

The majority of women behind bars are there for non-violent crimes, which amounts to roughly 82 percent according to the last batch of national data from nearly a decade ago. A survey from Davidson County, Tennessee revealed that 77 percent of women in the jails were charged with a misdemeanor. Moreover, women are not necessarily committing new offenses. More recent research has found that women are more likely to be in jail for breaking a condition of supervision in the community, like failing a drug test or missing an appointment with a probation or parole officer.

GEOGRAPHIC INCREASES

Small counties, with less than 250,000 people, are seeing the largest increase in jailed women. In 1970, these same counties had just 1,700 incarcerated women compared to 51,600 by 2014. Sparsely populated counties see an incarceration rate of 140 per 100,000 women. Using 2014 data, the Vera Institute found that on a typical day large counties had an average of 271 inmates per 100,000 people versus 446 inmates in rural counties. 

This is in stark contrast to another trend, which shows a declining rate of incarcerated women in the nation’s largest counties. The trend is illustrated in counties like Stokes County, North Carolina, where women made up 32 percent of the jailed population in 2013, far beyond the national average. Data is still unclear as to why jail populations have increased so significantly in rural areas. Research notes that it could be the demographics of rural and suburban areas, which tend to house poorer populations.

“Handcuffs” Courtesy of [davitydave via Flickr]

PREVALENCE OF HEALTH ISSUES IN INCARCERATED WOMEN

Research has also noted that a number of women behind bars suffer from health issues, particularly mental illness. Thirty-two percent of women in U.S. jails have a serious mental illness, including major depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 75 percent of women in jails stated they had symptoms of a mental health disorder in the past year. This high percentage of serious mental illnesses among incarcerated women is intimately tied to the high rates of victimization reported: sexual assault, intimate partner violence, and childhood sexual abuse. The numbers are startling. Based on the research among women in jail, 86 percent report experiencing sexual violence, 77 percent report partner violence, and 60 percent report caregiver violence.

The complexity of mental illness means many incarcerated women are unable to receive effective assistance. One in five women in U.S. jails has experienced a serious mental illness, post-traumatic stress disorder, and substance abuse disorder. This staggering number is met only with limited mental health care professionals and resources in the jail system. With a distinct lack of proper tools and support systems, many incarcerated women never have their severe mental health issues addressed.

WOMEN OF COLOR IN JAIL

For both men and women, people of color are disproportionately incarcerated. According to the most recent national data, roughly two-thirds of women currently behind bars are women of color. Forty-four percent were black, 15 percent were Hispanic, and five percent were of other racial and ethnic backgrounds, with only 36 percent of incarcerated women identifying as white. At a county level, the racial and ethnic disparities are even larger. In Cook County, Illinois, approximately 81 percent of women admitted in the jails were women of color.

Women of color are far more likely to experience financial instability and crisis, even before they enter a jail. Nearly half of all single black and Hispanic women have zero or negative net wealth, with black women five times more likely to live in poverty and receive public assistance. Staying in jail for even a short period of time can severely impact their basic survival needs, like suspension or even termination of public assistance.

INCARCERATION IMPACTS ON WOMEN

Women are heavily affected by jail, as the environment is often not designed for their specific needs and experiences. Women are assessed with the same assessment tools for men to determine where and how they are housed within facilities. Using a gender-neutral or male-focused tool ignores the research that shows women tend to pose less risk than men. As a result, the tools can classify women at a higher risk than they actually are, with over-classification barring them from educational, vocational, and rehabilitative programs.

Reproductive health needs are also a crucial issue for incarcerated women. Many jails fail to even meet basic hygiene needs for women. Muskegon County Jail was sued in 2014 by the ACLU of Michigan for failing to provide women menstrual hygiene products, toilet paper, and clean underwear. Other women in jails have reported being unable to receive hygiene products on a certain day because they are unavailable or only provided selectively. The health risks and emotional humiliation these policies create have caused some positive policy changes, like efforts to make free supplies readily available to incarcerated women.

WHAT DRIVES THIS GROWTH?

Shifts in police policy and enforcement over the decades contributed to a rising number of arrests of women. One particular policy departments embraced was “broken windows” policing; this policing theory focuses on low-level offenses like petty theft, loitering, and intoxication as a way to prevent more serious crimes. Moreover, in the 1980’s and 1990’s, policing priorities were expanded with the national “War on Drugs,” which escalated the enforcement and criminalization of drug offenses. These policies worked in conjunction to widen police power and entrap more citizens in the jail system.

The increase in these practices, however, had significant impacts on women specifically. Women are more likely than men to be involved in minor offenses like drug possession. Between 1980 and 2009, the arrest rate for women tripled while the arrest rate for men only doubled. Currently, women are arrested more frequently for “other-except-traffic” offenses, which includes activity such as criminal mischief and local ordinance violations, substance use, minor property crimes, and simple assault.

Another example of certain policies increasing the number of women in jail are prostitution diversion programs, which are present in many of the largest U.S. districts. These services may end up bringing more women into contact with the criminal justice system, particularly women of color and transgender women. Many jurisdictions use practices similar to drug stings to curb prostitution. Officers do targeted sweeps of specific neighborhoods and communities that may have high rates of prostitution. Police then may make arrests based on subjective characteristics or observations, such as walking or standing in a particular area or carrying condoms. This practice may be treating prostitution defendants as both victims and offenders, and creating an arrest record for women that can make life outside of the justice system and sex trade difficult to achieve.

CONCLUSION

Incarceration has become common practice in the U.S. for even the smallest, most non-violent of offenses. Considering the profound consequences staying in jail for even a few days can have, time in jail may be more effective when used only for dangerous offenders. Women, particularly women of color, have been a rising target of the criminal justice system for decades now. With current practices and rehabilitative efforts, it is clear that substantive change is needed.

Many questions remain about women in jail. The lack of current, comprehensive research on female incarceration impacts demonstrates a gap in addressing the rising number of jailed women. Reforming the U.S. jail system is within our grasp, if we take the reins and embrace positive, meaningful policy changes.

RESOURCES

Primary

Safety Justice and Challenge: Overlooked: Women and Jail in the Era of Reform

Bureau of Justice Statistics: Mental Health Problems of Prison and Jail Inmates

Additional

New York Times: Number of Women in Jail Has Grown Faster Than That of Men, Study Says

Washington Post: How Mass Incarceration is Spreading to Rural Counties and the Suburbs

NPR: Study: The Growing, Disproportionate Number Of Women Of Color in U.S. Jails

ACLU: Facts about the Over-Incarceration of Women in the United States

The Sentencing Project: Incarcerated Women and Girls

Center for Court Innovation: Prostitution Diversion Programs

Nicole Zub

Nicole is a third-year law student at the University of Kentucky College of Law. She graduated in 2011 from Northeastern University with Bachelor’s in Environmental Science. When she isn’t imbibing copious amounts of caffeine, you can find her with her nose in a book or experimenting in the kitchen. Contact Nicole at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Mass Incarceration: Why Are There So Many Women Behind Bars? appeared first on Law Street.

Columbia University made history last week when it became the first U.S. university to divest its endowment from the private prison industry. A student-led activist campaign has put pressure on the Board of Trustees to divest since early 2014 when a small group of Columbia students discovered that the school was investing in G4S, the world’s largest private security firm, and the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), the largest private prison company in the United States. After a vote last week, Columbia’s $9 billion endowment will now be void of its shares in CCA and its estimated 220,000 shares in G4S. Divesting from an industry that makes its money by breeding human suffering is a move that should be loudly applauded.

The divestment vote occurred within the larger discussion of mass incarceration and the tribulations that stem from the systemic injustices that American prisons propagate. While local jails and state and federal prisons all seem to value a punitive rather than rehabilitative approach, private prisons are by far the cruelest. There is an inherent conflict between the supposed goal of the criminal justice system–rehabilitation–and companies’ profit motives. For-profit, private prisons make up a multibillion-dollar per year industry. The U.S. Department of Justice reports that as of 2013, there were 133,000 prisoners in private prisons, or 8.4 percent of the U.S. prison population. These numbers break down to 19.1 percent of the federal prison population being detained in privately owned prisons, and 6.8 percent of the state prison population.

Since 1990, violent crime in America has dropped 51 percent, property crime has fallen 43 percent, and homicides are down 54 percent. But incarceration rates since 1990 have increased by 50 percent. If crime is down, why do we have so many more people in prison? Due to the war on drugs and the increase of harsher sentencing laws, more low-level and non-violent offenders are sent to prison. Almost half of state prisoners are serving time for non-violent crimes, and more than half of federal inmates are imprisoned for drug offenses. Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz wrote, “This prodigious rate of incarceration is not only inhumane, it is economic folly.” The United States has 5 percent of the world’s population but 25 percent of the world’s prison population. We incarcerate a greater percentage of our population than any other country on Earth, and our compulsion to incarcerate costs taxpayers $63.4 billon per year.

The overcrowding of jails and prisons across the country and a reluctance to adequately finance these correctional facilities precipitated the movement toward private prisons, which proponents claimed could result in overall prison cost reductions of 20 percent. However, allowing the facilities to be operated by the private sector has resulted in a meager 1 percent cost decrease. With crime rates on the decline, private prisons began doing everything they could to increase imprisonment rates so that they could stay in business and continue to make money. From 2002 to 2012, CCA, GEO Group, and Management & Training Corporation (MTC), a contractor that manages private prisons, spent around 45 million dollars lobbying state and federal governments, arguing for harsher laws and more arrests. These corporations also poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into the election campaigns of governors, state legislators, and judges in order to ensure that their plans become laws that guarantee more people will be incarcerated, so they can continue to make money.

Some people try to justify this system with the thought that people who are in prison are there for a reason. But this wishful thinking is untrue. About 50 percent of immigrants who are in prison are detained in privately owned prisons, and the majority of these people are simply being detained while waiting for their cases to be decided in court. In other words, immigrants who have not been convicted of any crime are being housed in violent, corrupt, dangerous private prisons while they wait for months for courts—that are often illegally being paid off by corrupt companies like CCA to keep people in prison—to decide their fate. The private prison industry has an incentive to keep people in jail. If their business plans included imprisoning to rehabilitate and treating people for mental health or drug addiction issues that may have contributed to their arrests, the industry would collapse. Instead, private prisons are rampant with abuse, neglect, and misconduct; private prisons understaff their facilities to save money, ignore pleas for help and prisoner-on-prisoner violence within the prison, and even refuse healthcare to inmates. In order to make the most profit, the private prison industry wants harsher drug laws, longer sentencing, and wants to increase recidivism rates.

In New York, about $60,000 of government money is spent per year to keep just one inmate imprisoned, while just under $20,000 is spent to educate an elementary or secondary school student. This trend extends nationally: no state in the country invests more—or even an equal amount—on educating an individual student than on housing a prisoner. Maybe if we relaxed drug laws and unreasonable sentencing, focused more on rehabilitation than punishment, did not allow prejudiced and ill-intentioned companies like CCA to spend millions on lobbyists, and we invested more on education than on our corrupt criminal justice system, the United States would be a happier, healthier place.

Columbia University’s divestment from the private prison industry will not solve the issue of mass incarceration. It will not redesign the broken system that we call criminal “justice” in America. It won’t even put CCA or G4S out of business or make a sizeable dent in their net worth. But what divestment will do is beyond economic comprehension. Refusing to reap benefits from companies founded upon violence forced on people by virtue of their race, class, or citizenship status is a social stance that proves a complete rejection of everything private prisons stand for. When you stop investing in something, you’ve stopped believing in it. And no one should believe in the private prison industry.

Emily Dalgo

Emily Dalgo is a member of the American University Class of 2017 and a Law Street Media Fellow during the Summer of 2015. Contact Emily at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Columbia University Backs Away From Private Prisons: We Should Follow Its Lead appeared first on Law Street.

Time and time again, celebrities have evaded prison sentences because they claimed to be too fragile for life behind bars. In the case of recently tried and convicted Olympian Oscar Pistorius, he may be able to serve just ten months of his five-year maximum for shooting and killing his then-girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp. After those ten months, he can request to be moved to house arrest in his mansion. That’s a rough life right there.

In Pistorious’ case, it’s a bit tricky. He is a double-amputee, and because of this, many claim that prison is simply not suitable for him. Nooshin Erfani-Ghadimi, project coordinator for the Wits Justice Project, a civil society group, said before the sentencing that she believed Pistorius would probably receive far better treatment than the average prisoner and has throughout the entire judicial process thus far. However, she also noted “I don’t think anyone with a disability necessarily will be able to be provided for at the moment in a way that ensures that they would have the correct medical treatment, that they have the correct physical structures.”

Pistorius’ prosthetic limbs are not the only issue. Health risks such as tuberculosis are often cited as a problem in South African prisons due to poor air circulation, and many fear that he will be susceptible to contracting the illness. Some believe that his celebrity status will make him a target for gang violence.

While defending his client, Pistorius’ attorney, Barry Roux, argued that there is extreme overcrowding in South African prisons. This point is irrelevant, however, as his celebrity status would easily prevent him from sharing a cell. The other health fears such as inmates not receiving their medication because of the inadequate number of health workers in prisons are unlikely to be of valid concern. He is a celebrity. History shows that celebrities receive special treatment in prison.

Efraini-Ghadimi conceded that South African law has policies for accommodating physically disabled inmates. Zach Modise, acting National Commissioner of Correctional Services, pointed out that there are 128 disabled inmates currently doing time and therefore prisons are properly equipped with the appropriate facilities.

Currently, Pistorius is living in a single cell with everything he needs along with access to the medical care for any ailments both physical and psychological. In ten months, he will likely be permitted to move to his home in the Silver Woods Estate in Pretoria.

This case is undoubtedly tricky. If Pistorius did not have his celebrity status, his prison sentence would be of greater concerned because it would mean less special treatment behind bars. For example, a paraplegic man, Ronnie Fakude, struggled with very real concerns while serving a prison sentence; however, he did not enjoy the status as a famous individual the way that Pistorius does.

Just because you are in the media spotlight doesn’t make it okay to commit crimes, and hopefully this case will shed light on that fact, even though he is getting off relatively easily. Even Arnold Pistorius, Oscar’s uncle, said that the family accepted Oscar’s sentence and viewed it as a way for his nephew to pay back society. Perhaps in ten short months Mr. Pistorius can relax in the comfort of his own home again. Only time will tell…

Marisa Mostek

Marisa Mostek loves globetrotting and writing, so she is living the dream by writing while living abroad in Japan and working as an English teacher. Marisa received her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in Boulder and a certificate in journalism from UCLA. Contact Marisa at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Pistorius Can Opt for House Arrest in Just 10 Months appeared first on Law Street.

From the faux outrage over President Obama’s “latte salute,” to every worker’s fantasy coming true in Germany with a possible ban on after-hours work emails, to people getting arrested for buying cold meds — for an actual cold — there was a ton of interesting news last week. ICYMI, here are Law Street’s top three stories from last week.

#1 The “Latte Salute” is a Latte of Crap

Earlier this week President of the United States Barack Obama made a fatal error. He drank a cup of coffee and saluted our troops…with the same hand. This incited media coverage somewhere on par with a natural disaster, or maybe an assassination attempt. In fact, some members of the media covered what has now been dubbed the “latte salute” scandal as though it actually was an assassination — namely the assassination of American patriotism. (Read full article here.)

#2 Germany Considers Bans on After Hours Work Emails

I’m sort of a walking stereotype. I have my phone in my hand at all times, I sleep with it in my bed even though I know that’s bad, and I’m constantly checking my texts, social media, and email. And that’s never really bothered me — it seems normal to me. I am used to being accessible essentially 24/7. I think that’s a norm that a lot of us Americans have gotten used to, and I doubt that that’s going to change, but apparently some of our European friends have started rejecting the concept of 24/7 connectivity. (Read full article here.)

#3 Careful When Buying Water and Cold Meds, You Might Just Get Arrested

Every time I see a law enforcement officer in public — mall cop, fashion police, regular 5-0 — I have the irrational fear that they are out to get me. (This is especially true of the fashion police, but my fear of them might not be that irrational as anyone who has seen my clothing choices could attest.) I’m never doing anything I’m not supposed to be doing (or at the very least, I’m never doing anything I’m going to admit to you), but that doesn’t matter: I am sure I am about to be thrown in handcuffs and taken downtown. Little did I know, instead of fearing this, I should have been hoping for it. Just ask Elizabeth Daly or Mickey Lynn Goodson. (Read full article here.)

Chelsey D. Goff

Chelsey D. Goff was formerly Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State Native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post ICYMI: Best of the Week appeared first on Law Street.

A slew of recent crimes committed by minors has prompted debate over whether or not they should be tried as adults in court. Earlier this year in Wisconsin, two preteen girls brutally stabbed their classmate in the name of a mythical being known as Slenderman. Due to the severity and the premeditated nature of their heinous act, the girls have been charged as adults. In a case this month, three Albuquerque teenagers brutally attacked and killed homeless men. Two of the perpetrators, aged 15 and 16, will likely be charged as adults.

The process by which a minor’s case is transferred to adult criminal court is called a waiver, because the judge “waives” the typical protections provided by juvenile court. Many protections afforded to juveniles are the same as those offered to adults. As held by the Supreme Court, these protections include advance notice of the charges, the right to counsel, the right to confront and cross-examine adverse witnesses, and the right to remain silent. Perhaps the most significant difference between juvenile and adult courts is that minors in court do not have the right to trial by a jury. This is in order to provide a more intimate and diagnostic experience for juveniles.

When Can Minors be Tried as Adults?

A multitude of factors can lead a minor to be tried in adult court. Most states do not have any age limit for charging minors as adults if they have committed a particularly serious crime such as murder. However, to be handed the death penalty, a juvenile must be 16 years old in 18 states, 17 in 5 states, and 18 in 15 states. According to fairsentencingofyouth.org, the cost to keep one minor in prison for life could educate 169 children for a year.

According to a report by the U.S. Department of Justice, it is estimated that as many as 250,000 youth annually are prosecuted as adults. The United States is the only country in which minors can receive life in prison. Currently, there are 2,570 minors serving life sentences without parole. Twenty-two juveniles, all aged 17, have received the death penalty in the United States since 1973. In Iraq, 46 minors received the death penalty between 1990 and 2009; however, Iraq’s numbers are a vast outlier, as only 17 juveniles in total were sentenced to death in every country besides the United States and Iraq.

Due to the rising crime rate among youths and the recent violent crimes committed by children, many states are working to lower the age at which juveniles can be tried as adults. Generally, there are five factors that can cause a minor to be charged as an adult. If the perpetrator has committed a serious crime, has a lengthy prior record, is an older teenager, did not improve with prior attempts at rehabilitation, or if future rehab attempts seem unrealistic, he or she may be tried as an adult.

If a judge or prosecutor in a juvenile case wishes to try the offender as an adult, the first step is to hold a waiver hearing. In this situation, the prosecutor must argue his or her case as to why the juvenile should be tried as an adult by providing probable cause that the minor committed the crime. Afterwards, the judge considers if the minor has a good chance to succeed at rehabilitation.

Occasionally, minors who are tried as adults receive greater sympathy from juries in adult criminal courts, which may seem favorable. However, a trial in adult court can lead to far more severe sentences, and even the death penalty or life in prison. Juveniles charged as adults can also end up in prisons as opposed to juvenile detention centers.

The Debate

Does doling out adult sentences to juveniles make a difference, though? Some studies claim that there is no evidence to date that doing so reduces criminal activity among minors.

Those in favor of trying minors as adults argue that a crime is a crime, and just because a child commits it does not impact the victim’s suffering. There is also the claim that sentencing minors to less-severe punishments for their actions will not deter them from future criminal activity. Not treating minors who commit serious crimes as responsible for their actions will, arguably, turn them into irresponsible adults as well.

Those against minors being tried in adult court believe that they lack the ability to fully comprehend the nature of their crimes. Yet while many argue that children cannot mentally plan and execute a crime and understand its consequences, the case of the Wisconsin teens disproves this thought. The two preteens spent substantial time plotting the murder and how to hide the evidence of their crime.

Of course, children are capable of committing very serious and violent offenses that can cause tremendous suffering,” she continued. “But children are also uniquely capable of growth and change, and a sentence that gives them no opportunity to show their capacity to change is a sentence that denies the differences between children and adults.

-Alison Parker, the U.S. director for the advocacy group Human Rights Watch

It is difficult to know how to properly punish underage criminals for their sometimes heinous crimes. At the moment, the trend leans in the direction of ensuring that they take responsibility for their actions by trying juveniles as adults.

—

Marisa Mostek (@MarisaJ44) loves globetrotting and writing, so she is living the dream by writing while living abroad in Japan and working as an English teacher. Marisa received her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in Boulder and a certificate in journalism from UCLA. Contact Marisa at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured Image Courtesy of [Rawle C. Jackman via Flickr]

Marisa Mostek

Marisa Mostek loves globetrotting and writing, so she is living the dream by writing while living abroad in Japan and working as an English teacher. Marisa received her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in Boulder and a certificate in journalism from UCLA. Contact Marisa at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post “Minor” Offenses? Trying Juveniles as Adults is on the Rise in the US appeared first on Law Street.

Prison officials are struggling to stop the violence that plagues Georgia’s state prisons, and the deplorable conditions that Georgian prisoners are experiencing have begun to creep beyond the cell walls. The numbers alone are shocking. Since 2010, 33 prisoners and one officer have been killed by prisoners in Georgia, according to a report released by the Southern Center for Human Rights (SCHR). The number of homicides committed by prisoners in Georgia’s state prisons has tripled since 2004. Georgia has seen more homicides in its state prisons in one year than other states such as Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Kentucky have each had in the last 10 years. Who’s to say that kind of behavior will cease when these perpetrators are released?

Victims of these often-fatal attacks are considered lucky if they survive. CNN recently reported that Georgia’s prisoners regularly face being stabbed, burned, raped, and dismembered. When a prisoner under attack shouts for help, the victim’s pleas usually fall on deaf ears. For the most part, sympathy is lacking for those prisoners subject to violence while serving time, so advocacy for change is hard to muster. But what the public needs to understand is the lasting effects this violence has on society once the prisoners are released. The report highlights this point:

Prisons are supposed to provide rehabilitation. But violent prisons teach and breed violence. Further, since about one third of people in the GDC [Georgia Department of Corrections] are incarcerated for nonviolent crimes, the dangerous conditions in Georgia prisons threaten those who have committed violent crimes and those with no history of violence alike.

The report lists the legal standards against violence in prisons and tries to pinpoint the root causes:

• Supervision of prisoners is dangerously inadequate.
• Prisoners have access to lethal weapons that are either smuggled in, or fabricated using items found at the prison.
• Some cell door locks have been left broken for years.
• Gangs have filled a security vacuum and control many prison resources.
• Prisoners have access to a steady supply of cell phones and smart phones.
• Protective custody procedures are inadequate, and prison officials ignore threats to prisoners’ safety.

According to the SCHR report, prison officials are in violation of laws protecting prisoners if they knowingly disregard violence and make no attempts at halting imminent danger. Furthermore, some prison officials are directly involved in the smuggling of contraband inside prison walls. My colleague Alexandra Stembaugh wrote about similar problems in the war on drugs behind bars. It’s clear that we need tougher consequences for culprits to curb this kind of corruption.

Some of the most violent prisons in Georgia include Baldwin State Prison, Smith State Prison, and Hays State Prison. At Baldwin, countless attacks were carried out uninterrupted. One man was beaten, tied up, had scalding water poured on his groin, and a broom handle shoved up his rectum. No officer came to his rescue until he stumbled to the exit with both eyes swollen shut and his face covered in blood. This incident was neither a freak accident nor a rare occurrence. According to the SCHR report:

In case after case, attacks on men at Baldwin start and finish without anyone on the prison staff knowing they are happening. GDC reports have repeatedly documented incidents in which officers find out about an assault only after prisoner-witnesses report it, after the victim manages to escape, or when officers find a man injured on the ground.

Still lacking sympathy? Take into account the 33 percent of prisoners who were incarcerated for nonviolent crimes. Then take a look at your tax dollars, which are supposedly used for “maintaining” those prisons. The GDC Annual Report for 2013 showed the total funds spent in the fiscal year exceeded $1 billion, 97 percent of which came from state funding. Such a large amount of money is spent on this small percentage of the population, so why are violence and rape so prominent in Georgia’s jails?

Maybe it’s the serious lack of supervision in these prisons, which allowed locks to remain broken for several years. Maybe it’s the amount of influence gangs have–in some prisons the gang affiliates are able to choose the living assignments. Maybe prison officials fear their lives because so many prisoners have access to lethal weapons, drugs, and outside connections. But something must be done to stop this epidemic. The Pew Research Center reported that in Georgia prisons “the average offender released in 2009 served 3.2 years in custody, 75 percent more than the average offender released in 1990.” That means criminals serving longer sentences in deplorable conditions have more time to adopt violent tendencies.

Despite all the GDC’s efforts to rehabilitate their inmates, the constant violence plaguing Georgia prisons trumps their progress. I’m on board with the SCHR–the Supreme Court needs to investigate the GDC and get an inside look at Georgia prisons. Put an end to the senseless, brutal violence. Stop the torture. Do something to put those tax dollars to use. I’m not defending criminals–they landed themselves on a metal cot in an 8 by 10 cell. But I also don’t think they deserve having every last human right stripped from them. And the last thing Georgia’s citizens need is to fear their releases. Better regulations in prisons paired with successful rehabilitation programs could help break this horrible cycle.

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Natasha Paulmeno (@natashapaulmeno) 

Featured image courtesy of [Christian Senger via Flickr]

Natasha Paulmeno

Natasha Paulmeno is an aspiring PR professional studying at the University of Maryland. She is learning to speak Spanish fluently through travel, music, and school. In her spare time she enjoys Bachata music, playing with her dog, and exploring social media trends. Contact Natasha at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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