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packman

(16,296 posts)

22. Jean Valjean - for a loaf of bread

Thu Nov 14, 2013, 09:26 AM

Nov 2013

Victor Hugo a few decades back got it right. If you're poor the law has a whole different perspective of you and your circumstances.
Time to review the Three-strike, Four-strike, and drug laws and empty out some cells. But, the criminal justice system is now, for most part, a privatized system whose corporate bosses demand that cells be filled and quotas met to meet their bottom line of profits. States are making unholy pacts with companies to handle their prisons and those companies are telling states that they must have a certain amount of investment (prisoners) to be viable and the states are accommodating them by supplying bodies to fill those cells.

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Man Was Sentenced to Die in Prison for Shoplifting a $159 Jacket: This Happens More Than You Think [View all] xchrom Nov 2013 OP

Mandatory sentence? - WTF? liberal N proud Nov 2013 #1

+1 xchrom Nov 2013 #3

It's not just the south. ET Awful Nov 2013 #5

There is a reason that shoplifting and crimes like this are classified as felonies... cascadiance Nov 2013 #16

Great informative post ! Thanks ! BlueJazz Nov 2013 #19

Or we need to rewrite the "citizen's arrest" laws Pab Sungenis Nov 2013 #21

the private prison industrial complex also benefits plenty from laws like this phantom power Nov 2013 #28

NY state has an "E felony" KamaAina Nov 2013 #31

What kind of system is this? A very corrupt and unjust one. myrna minx Nov 2013 #2

+1 Blue_Tires Nov 2013 #46

That's so wrong! B Calm Nov 2013 #4

All in the name of PROFIT tecelote Nov 2013 #6

It's not just privatized prisons ... TBF Nov 2013 #13

Angola is not privatized. subterranean Nov 2013 #27

Less than 4% of all convicts in this nation are incarcerated in a privately held for-profit prison. Ikonoklast Nov 2013 #32

Since when is Angola a privatized prison? Recursion Nov 2013 #40

OK, so what corporation is making big bucks off this prison? fasttense Nov 2013 #7

It's state-run and state-operated Recursion Nov 2013 #39

Everyone in the system likes these laws AngryAmish Nov 2013 #44

Where is the rest of his story? seveneyes Nov 2013 #8

Yep pipoman Nov 2013 #9

Those 3-Strike laws are the exact sort of laws that led to the American Revolution. ieoeja Nov 2013 #25

I have somewhat mixed feelings about that.. pipoman Nov 2013 #29

Most career criminals quit in their 30s. The best remedy for speeding that up was rehabilitation. ieoeja Nov 2013 #45

Meanwhile the bankers walk the street and continue robbing malaise Nov 2013 #10

All The While The Corporations Proifit From His Incarceration cantbeserious Nov 2013 #11

Angola is owned by the state of Louisiana. Ikonoklast Nov 2013 #33

Then Why Is Prison Enterprises Part Of The Picture cantbeserious Nov 2013 #47

Land of the free? Home of the brave? Madmiddle Nov 2013 #12

Undoubtedly. dotymed Nov 2013 #23

What percentage of the 3281 prisoners are white? AAO Nov 2013 #14

Need we ask. I bet its at most 20%. marble falls Nov 2013 #15

You're gonna love this: Brigid Nov 2013 #34

I think we need a jailbreak. That is about what I'd imagined, though. Ruining peoples lives because AAO Nov 2013 #41

meanwhile a rapist coach that served TorchTheWitch Nov 2013 #17

+1 n/t Gormy Cuss Nov 2013 #24

k/r marmar Nov 2013 #18

This, and the fact minor offences can lead to life imprisonment in the USA ConcernedCanuk Nov 2013 #20

Jean Valjean - for a loaf of bread packman Nov 2013 #22

this is disgusting gopiscrap Nov 2013 #26

"You have to realize / What is a form of slavery organized / under a swarm of devils..." alcibiades_mystery Nov 2013 #30

Jail for shoplifters is bullshit. Chuck Smythe Nov 2013 #35

And the bankers and rapists walk freely. City Lights Nov 2013 #36

And so do George W. Bush, Cheney and Condi Rice. avaistheone1 Nov 2013 #37

Silly me for forgetting America's War Criminals! City Lights Nov 2013 #42

Give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. Chuck Smythe Nov 2013 #38

Hiya, Chuck Smythe! City Lights Nov 2013 #43

kick. (nt) Nine Nov 2013 #48