Free Talk Live

The population of aging and elderly prisoners in U.S. prisons exploded over the past three decades, with nearly 125,000 inmates aged 55 or older now behind bars, according to a report published Wednesday by the American Civil Liberties Union. This represents an increase of over 1,300 percent since the early 1980s. More than $16 billion is spent annually by states and the federal government to incarcerate elderly prisoners, despite ample evidence that most prisoners over age 50 pose little or no threat to public safety, the report said.

http://RevolutionNews.US - In recent decades the prison industry has become a booming business in the US - with only 5% of the world's population, 25% of all the prisoners of the world are in American jails. However now it looks like one state has a problem with that business model.

Lori Harfenist of the Resident has more. Find out more at www.TheResident.net

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Florida inmates convicted of non-violent drug crimes spent 194 percent more time behind bars in 2009 than they did in 1990, costing the state billions of dollars but providing little public safety benefit, a new study found. The study, by the Pew Center on the States, examined trends in 35 states that provided data on incarceration for inmates convicted of violent crimes, property crimes and drug offenses. It found that nationally, state inmates across all categories of offenses served an average of nine additional months in custody, a rise of 36 percent since 1990.

"When everything is illegal, everyone is a criminal." The United States incarcerates more people than any other country in the world—more even than China or Russia. Prof. Daniel J. D'Amico explains that as of 2010 more than 1.6 million people were serving jail sentences in America. Professor D'Amico suggests that "prisons are not what we think about when we think of America, and they shouldn't have to be." According to D'Amico, a free country should not have 1.6 million people in prison, and a fiscally responsible country cannot afford to. As Prof.

SOPA replacement uses child porn as excuse to spy on 99.7 percent of Americans SOPA author Lamar Smith pushing bill to make web sites track every user's every move

The SOPA and PIPA bills that went down in flames earlier this year for their unbearable intrusiveness, used content piracy as an excuse to give the government powerful tools with which to censor Internet content.

[Infographic] Combating Mass Incarceration - The Facts

The war on drugs has helped make the U.S. the world's largest incarcerator.

America’s criminal justice system should keep communities safe, treat people fairly, and use fiscal resources wisely. But more Americans are deprived of their liberty than ever before - unfairly and unnecessarily, with no benefit to public safety. Especially in the face of economic crisis, our government should invest in alternatives to incarceration and make prisons options of last – not first – resort.

But CCA, to borrow a trope from journalism, buried the "lede" in the governors' letter. The real head-snapping revelation appeared in the third-to-last paragraph: in exchange for buying a state's prison, CCA required that the state prison agency ensure that the prison remained at least 90% full. Translation: We'll buy your prisons and keep 'em orderly and clean, so as long you keep the prisoners coming in.

WASHINGTON — Conditions in California’s overcrowded prisons are so bad that they violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday, ordering the state to reduce its prison population by more than 30,000 inmates.

More proof that they can't put all of us in jail. CA. wants to reduce the prison population, currently 170k. "We simply can't afford the punishment that we've had in California," Petersilia said.(prison expert)
The jailers say they must adhere to court ordered population caps. Must be nice to decide which court orders to follow. In CA., parole violations account for 70,000 prison admissions each year.