[lbo-talk] Abolition of prisons (Was: Angela...)

[John Thornton]

Doug Henwood wrote:
>
> On Apr 6, 2009, at 2:29 PM, Dennis Claxton wrote:
>
>> At 07:53 PM 4/4/2009, Joanna wrote:
>>
>>> I never said that people ought to be in prison because of drug use. 
>>> And that covers at least half of the people who are in prison in the 
>>> U.S. right now.
>>
>>
>> This is incorrect.  In state facilities the percentage hovers around 
>> 20.  In federal it's higher and I believe did reach 50% in the past 
>> but has gone down.  The federal system, with fewer than 200,000 
>> inmates is far smaller than the state, with well over a million in 
>> custody.
>
> <http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glance/corrtyp.htm>
>
> Over 50% are in state prisons for "violent" offenses, defined as: 
> "Violent offenses include murder, negligent and nonnegligent 
> manslaughter, rape, sexual assault, robbery, assault, extortion, 
> intimidation, criminal endangerment, and other violent offenses."
>
> American society produces a lot of people who perform violent acts. 
> But most of the people in prison did commit those violent acts.
>
> I was at an event many years ago at which an audience member tried to 
> assert to Christian Parenti - who, remember, wrote a great book on the 
> prison system, Lockdown America - that most of the people behind bars 
> were innocent. He dismissed her with scorn.
>
> Doug 

In state prisons new court commitments are: 29% are for violent crimes, 
29% for property offenses, 30% for drug offenses, and 10% for public 
order offenses.
Robbery is the #1 violent offense (~30% of total violent crime) in spite 
of the fact that the majority of robberies involve no physical assault 
to anyone.
~9% of violent crimes are murder/manslaughter, rape, sexual assault 
(2.7% murder/manslaughter and 6% rape/sexual assault) meaning ~9% of 
people in prison have actually killed or raped someone.
Certainly the wrongly convicted constitute an immeasurably small 
percentage. You generally commit more than one crime before you are 
incarcerated as well.
However the majority of people in prison would not be a threat to public 
safety if a decent social safety net existed.
Crime is generally going down but incarcerations per arrest are going 
up. A rather odd trend in my opinion.

John Thornton