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The incalculable cost of mass incarceration

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Like I said, the report was confusing, but on more careful examination the numbers are actually worse than the headlines would have you believe.

 

The worrisome factor here is not why inmates 20 or 30 years were put away, it is what has caused non-criminals to be slowly tortured to death right now. Comparing the number of all-time inmates and the more recent number shows you is that the trend is showing things getting a lot worse (although its hard to imagine it getting much worse than it is now).

 

Not really, the ACLU report highlights some things wrong, the first big highlight especially. It's misleading and they are not a totally unbiased source. At least they have citations, so it's better to use the "hard" stats straight from the source. Because the worst stats are more limited, things aren't worse than the report shows. What is shown is a VERY bad trend that many people ARE being given LWOP for drug crimes. I'll try to look up stats for ALL prisons - maybe it's just as bad.

 

Nicky's 50,000 stat isn't wrong, but the number of people on LWOP for drug crimes on a national level is more than 5%. Federal level alone for only the past 14 years is about 5%. Add in all states, you increase that percent. Add in all years, you increase the percent again.

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I'm happy the ACLU did this report. I wish they were more clear about the various numbers not because they mean much in the bigger picture, but as we can see, this lack of clarity allows detractors (supporters of LWOP for drug offenses, or those who wish to whitewash the whole issue) to divert attention from the key point, which is that travesties of justice are occurring every single day in the USA right now, and its making all of us less safe because of it.

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... unbiased source. At least they have citations, so it's better to use the "hard" stats straight from the source.

I'm surprised at how difficult it is to get a really clear picture with a bit of googling. I'd like to see at least an annual report that says how many people the governments at all levels have in jail, along with some basic break-down by crime and length of sentence.

Doing a bit more research, I found that two sources that might have more info: the National Criminal Justice Reference System (NCJRS), and the National Institute of Corrections (NIC). The former seems to produce some type of annual report. Not checked this out, but here is one titled "Prisoners in 2010".

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Nicky's 50,000 stat isn't wrong, but the number of people on LWOP for drug crimes on a national level is more than 5%. Federal level alone for only the past 14 years is about 5%. Add in all states, you increase that percent.

The ACLU claims to have counted prisoners on LWOP for "non-violent" offenses. Here it is, from their website:

The federal courts account for 63 percent of the 3,278 life-without-parole sentences for nonviolent offenses. The remaining prisoners are in Louisiana (429 prisoners), Florida (270), Alabama (244), Mississippi (93), South Carolina (88), Oklahoma (49), Georgia (20), Illinois (10), and Missouri (1). 

 

 

Again, the total, across the US, both federal and state, is 3,278 serving LWOP for what the ACLU considers "non-violent" offenses. That's it. That's 6% of the estimated 50.000 prisoners serving LWOP in American prisons. Most of the 6% are drug related, making that number 5%. So, the number OPs article claimed to be 79% is 5%. Not a single percent more.

 

It is also important to note that, even for the 3,278 counted as non-violent, there appears to be no description of the standards the ACLU used to determine that their crimes were non-violent. Are they for instance counting some convictions under the RICO Act as "non-violent"? In other words, do they consider proven members of crime syndicates (the Mafia, drug cartels, gangs) non-violent offenders, even though the only purpose of those organizations is intimidation through violence?

Edited by Nicky
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I'm happy the ACLU did this report. I wish they were more clear about the various numbers not because they mean much in the bigger picture

And there it is. The guy who's been accusing me of ignoring the numbers. 

 

Numbers ARE the big picture. That's the whole purpose for the invention of large numbers: they give people the ability to represent the big picture. The numbers are the ONLY things that mean anything, in this whole conversation. 

 

Your whole opening post consists of blatantly false numbers and an emotional appeal. There's nothing else in it. What else could possibly mean anything in the big picture, except the overall numbers?

Edited by Nicky
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Well like it or not, ACLU numbers or not, many states agree on the "incalculable costs"

 

"California must now release upon the public nearly 10,000 inmates convicted of serious crimes," Alito wrote, "about 1,000 for every city larger than Santa Ana."

The case dates back several years to a federal court panel's decision that required the state to shed about 30,000 prisoners. Even that reduction would have left 110,000 people in state prisons, still 37% above capacity.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/08/02/supreme-court-california-10000-prisoners-release/2613283/

This is because many states are going bankrupt. Theres 27 or so that are actually allowed to declare bankruptcy/insolvency...I think you'd see a lot more of this if they all could. Along with early-prison release, they're also shutting off street lights to save money in certain places (rockford, Illinois, Sante Fe). I know Christie is trying to reduce government pensions in NJ. As ridiculous as it is, it's something they're forced to do,  because states can't just print more money, like the Fed.

Edited by Ben Archer
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The ACLU claims to have counted prisoners on LWOP for "non-violent" offenses. Here it is, from their website:

 

Again, the total, across the US, both federal and state, is 3,278 serving LWOP for what the ACLU considers "non-violent" offenses. That's it. That's 6% of the estimated 50.000 prisoners serving LWOP in American prisons. Most of the 6% are drug related, making that number 5%. So, the number OPs article claimed to be 79% is 5%. Not a single percent more.

Now, you need to add in all years. By the way, I checked, that is 8.96%, so it is more.

Edited by Eiuol
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And there it is. The guy who's been accusing me of ignoring the numbers. 

 

Numbers ARE the big picture. That's the whole purpose for the invention of large numbers: they give people the ability to represent the big picture. The numbers are the ONLY things that mean anything, in this whole conversation. 

 

Your whole opening post consists of blatantly false numbers and an emotional appeal. There's nothing else in it. What else could possibly mean anything in the big picture, except the overall numbers?

 

 

So a travesty of justice for 5% is okay, and 10% is not. Is that your "big picture"?

 

For me the big picture is that we're using the very worst punishment we possibly can besides death on a lot on non-violent offenders. And yes, it was an appeal to emotion: this fact makes me sad. I wasn't trying to prove anything in the OP except to say that I'm sad (and perhaps angry) about it. It clearly makes some people here sad, and Nicky very happy or indifferent. To each his own sense of life...

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Both. If the first (unfree because so many actual criminals) then this shows how much violence is happening in the US (violence is not conducive to freedom). 

In that case, I have great news. Inside prisons, there's barely any violent crime, and no one is allowed to own any guns. So, by your idea of freedom, the prisoners are exceptionally free.

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This fact? What fact? There were no facts in that Al-Jazeera article. Only a monumental lie. You went to a source written by known liars, read an epic lie, and it made you sad.

 

Now that's a fact that should make you sad. 

It's not a lie, it's just bad reporting. Anyway, does it bother you that the EXISTING trend is that more than half the people in the past 14 years sentenced to LWOP are non-violent offenders? "Non-violent" is defined, and so is the methodology. The numbers are all valid, except the 79% wasn't clearly stated because it didn't mention range of years. So no, it's not a monumental lie, somebody just failed to proofread a sentence, and then no one proofread the ACLU's report. Really, it's one sentence in the report that's horribly misleading. Everywhere else the context is clearly a limited range of time.

 

edit: found stats for the whole LWOP prison population. See page 22. It's 12.3%. 12.3% is what I should've said before (the 8% was a miscalculation, 6.5% would be correct). 2948 sentenced for LWOP for nonviolent crimes from 1999 to 2011. 3278 people altogether in 2012. So at most 330 are from before 1999. Those numbers the ACLU got from the site Nicky linked to earlier. That's just very bad.

Edited by Eiuol
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It's not a lie, it's just bad reporting. Anyway, does it bother you that the EXISTING trend is that more than half the people in the past 14 years sentenced to LWOP are non-violent offenders?

That's false too. Nothing either you or Crow have posted in this thread has come anywhere near the facts yet. 

Edited by Nicky
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Here's another bunch of communists who have been bamboozled by this misleading report (since as we know there's actually no problem here and they are making it all up):

 

http://reason.com/archives/2013/11/20/the-punishment-is-the-crime

How were they "bamboozled"? As expected from Reason Magazine, that article is the embodiment of accuracy. It's a careful presentation of facts and the correct numbers, and it doesn't repeat a single one of the lies you've been peddling in this thread.

 

It's not an example of being bamboozled, it's an example of a source you should've gone to in the first place, instead of trusting Al-Jazeera and having an emotional reaction to obviously false claims.

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That's false too. Nothing either you or Crow have posted in this thread has come anywhere near the facts yet. 

Huh? The stats for that are IN the report as shown from the source, and I even did the math, and checked it. It's more than half... Not only that, their source is the same source you yourself cited earlier! Why are you accusing me of not coming anywhere near the facts? I mean, if the facts are from the same place as you, I'm as close as I can get.  

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How were they "bamboozled"? As expected from Reason Magazine, that article is the embodiment of accuracy. It's a careful presentation of facts and the correct numbers, and it doesn't repeat a single one of the lies you've been peddling in this thread.

Fortunately, they didn't say anything misleading, and stated the exact number. The Reason Magazine article is fine because it focuses on the ~3200 people, the number from the ACLU. Hence the sarcastic "bamboozled".  The article is good for arguing why it should bother anyone concerned with justice.

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How were they "bamboozled"? As expected from Reason Magazine, that article is the embodiment of accuracy. It's a careful presentation of facts and the correct numbers, and it doesn't repeat a single one of the lies you've been peddling in this thread.

 

It's not an example of being bamboozled, it's an example of a source you should've gone to in the first place, instead of trusting Al-Jazeera and having an emotional reaction to obviously false claims.

 

The Reason article cites the same ACLU study as the AJ article did. They both reported on the same thing.

 

Good thing I read Al Jazeera (along with a dozen other news sources).

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