Thursday, August 18, 2016

Justice Department to stop using private prisons.

Courtesy of Time: 

The U.S. Justice Department will stop using private prisons after concluding that they do not have the same level of safety or quality as penitentiaries run by the Bureau of Prisons. 

Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates sent a memo on Thursday that said officials must not renew — or at least must significantly scale back — their contracts with private prisons. The move would cut back the country’s reliance on privately run prisons until they are out of service, the Washington Post reports. 

Yates’ announcement follows on the heels of last week’s report from the department’s Inspector General that private prisons score far worse than public facilities in areas of safety and quality of life. 

“[Private prisons] simply do not provide the same level of correctional services, programs, and resources; they do not save substantially on costs; and as noted in a recent report by the Department’s Office of Inspector General, they do not maintain the same level of safety and security,” wrote Yates in the Thursday memo.

There are currently 195,000 inmates in private prisons, down from 220,000 in 2013, according to Yates’ memo. Yates detailed how the Bureau of Prisons turned down renewing a private contract of 1,200 prison beds three weeks ago, and today reduced a pending contract from 10,800 beds to a maximum of 3,600 beds. Those reductions will lead to three private prisons closing during the next year, to cut the total number of private prisoners in 2013 by more than 50% by May 2017.

Well this is great news.

Prions for profit was never a good idea and it encouraged at least some judges to provide stricter sentences in return for kickbacks.

Hopefully with prisons no longer seen as profit centers there will be fewer incarcerations and a focus on rehabilitation instead of simply warehousing these people until their sentence is over or they die.

Gee I am so glad I don't own any stock in private prisons.

15 comments:

  1. Anonymous12:25 PM

    Good ridence to a very bad idea.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous12:29 PM

    Great news - and about time too !

    OT - Trump as a statue - naked !
    do not click this link !!!! the photo can not be unseen - you have been warned

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/naked-donald-trump-sculpture-indecline_us_57b5d9d0e4b034dc73260c94?section=&

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous12:55 PM

    FYI - the Trump statues are a hoot !!! you just know it will drive him insane - they popped up in a few locations LOL

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous1:19 PM

    unfortunately, on the map of prisons to close, none are in arizona. and they just opened another one there. dang. i was hoping this news would affect that asshole joe arpaio.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sharon2:23 PM

      Wow....and that is the first place I thought about. Gov Brewer has investments in the corp that built a ton of them. When I read about that during her re election I thought for sure someone would use it against her, but of course no. I wouldn't be surprised if McCain was invested too. The entire idea is just asking for corruption.

      Delete
  5. Anonymous1:32 PM

    This is great news... from a federal level. But what about from the state level? I'd really like to see ALL private prisons disintegrate, just like private hired killers, I mean contractors. But, as they say... wish in one hand and...

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous3:14 PM

    Let's just hope that the states and the federal governments step it up to provide more prisons, because really, we don't want these people walking amongst us simply because the private prisons in their area have been shut down.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous3:27 PM

      There will be plenty of room for all of the violent offenders if we let all those on pot charges out.

      Delete
  7. Anonymous3:25 PM

    Some things should never be privatized. This is at the top of the list with schools.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Anonymous4:21 PM

    "All of the young men were later exonerated by the city of New York after serving time in prison, and were recipients of a payout in the millions for their wrongful conviction."

    http://www.rawstory.com/2016/08/senator-praises-law-and-order-trump-for-demanding-death-penalty-for-innocent-teens/

    ReplyDelete
  9. Anonymous6:54 PM

    Unfortunately, I read earlier today that there are only about 15 Federal Private prisons. This is a good start and will make a difference, but the real money and shame is in State and local prisons. Those are the ones we really need to eliminate. Thus, keep up the pressure for good Dem candidates at the state level to correct the situation as soon as possible.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous11:01 PM

      The fed study is ammunition to eliminate them at the state level.

      Delete
  10. Anonymous10:01 PM

    This is great news! Now we need to pressure the states to do the same.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous10:58 PM

    Substitute the word schools in place of prisons and that is the situation with public versus for-profit schools.

    ReplyDelete

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