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The Prison-Industrial Complex

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Title: The Prison-Industrial Complex


1
The Prison-Industrial Complex
  • Social Policy and Correctional Health Care
  • Martin Donohoe

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  • The mood and temper of the public in regard to
    the treatment of crime and criminals is one of
    the most unfailing tests of any country. A calm,
    dispassionate recognition of the rights of the
    accused and even of the convicted criminal, ...
    and the treatment of crime and the criminal
    mark and measure the stored-up strength of a
    nation, and are the sign and proof of the living
    virtue within it.
  • Winston Churchill

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LockdownUS Incarceration Rates
  • World prison population 8.75 million
  • US 6.5 million under correctional supervision
    (behind bars, on parole, or on probation) - 1/31
    adults (vs. 1/77 in 1982)
  • 2 million behind bars (jail prison)
  • 1.25 million in jail 0.75 million in prison
  • Includes 180,000 women

7
LockdownUS Incarceration Rates
  • 6-fold increase in of people behind bars from
    1972-2000
  • And rising
  • of women behind bars up 750 from 1980
  • 3100 local jails, 1200 state and federal prisons
    in U.S.

8
LockdownUS Incarceration Rates and Costs
  • US incarceration rate highest in world
  • Russia close second
  • 6X gt Britain, Canada, France
  • Costs 30,000/yr for prison spot 70,000/yr for
    jail spot

9
Race and Detention Rates
  • African-Americans 1815/100,000
  • More black men behind bars than in college
  • Latino-Americans 609/100,000
  • Caucasian-Americans 235/100,000
  • Asian-Americans 99/100,000

10
Jail and Prison Overcrowding
  • 22 states and federal prison system at 100
    capacity in 2000
  • 1/11 prisoners serving life sentence
  • ¼ of these without possibility of parole

11
Reasons for Overcrowding
  • War on Drugs
  • Mandatory Minimums
  • Repeat Offender laws
  • 13 states have three strikes laws
  • Truth in Sentencing regulations
  • Decreased judicial independence

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Corporate CrimeSilent but Deadly
  • 200 billion/yr. (vs. 4 billion for burglary and
    robbery)
  • Fines for corporate environmental and social
    abuses minimal/cost of doing business
  • Some corporations linked to human rights abuses
    in US and abroad
  • Most lobby Congress to weaken environmental and
    occupational health and safety laws

14
Corporate Crime
  • The only social responsibility of business is
    to increase its profits.
  • Milton Friedman
  • Corporations have no moral conscience. They
    are designed by law, to be concerned only for
    their stockholders, and not, say, what are
    sometimes called their stakeholders, like the
    community or the work force
  • Noam Chomsky

15
Corporate Crime
  • Corporation An ingenious device for obtaining
    individual profit without individual
    responsibility.
  • Ambrose Bierce
  • A criminal is a person with predatory instincts
    who has not sufficient capital to form a
    corporation.
  • Howard Scott

16
The Prison-Industrial Complex
  • Private prisons currently hold just under 10 of
    US prisoners
  • Only UK has higher proportion of private
    prisoners than US
  • 18 corporations guard 10,000 prisoners in 27
    states

17
Private prison boom over past 15 years
  • Reasons
  • Prevailing political philosophy which disparages
    the effectiveness of (and even need for)
    government social programs
  • Often-illusory promises of free-market
    effectiveness
  • Despite evidence to contrary (e.g.,
    Medicare/Medicaid, water privatization, etc.)
  • Increasing demand from ICE and USMS

18
The Prison-Industrial Complex
  • Leading trade group
  • American Correctional Association
  • For-profit companies involved
  • Corrections Corporation of America
  • GEO Group (formerly Wackenhut)
  • Together these two companies control 75 of
    market
  • Correctional Medical Services
  • Others (Westinghouse, ATT, Sprint, MCI, Smith
    Barney, American Express, Merrill Lynch,
    Shearson-Lehman, Allstate, and GE)

19
The Prison-Industrial Complex
  • Aggressive marketing to state and local
    governments
  • Promise jobs, new income
  • Rural areas targeted
  • Face declines in farming, manufacturing, logging,
    and mining
  • Companies offered tax breaks, subsidies, and
    infrastructure assistance

20
The Prison-Industrial Complex2001 Bureau of
Justice Study
  • Average savings to community 1
  • Does not take into account
  • Hidden monetary subsidies
  • Private prisons selecting least costly inmates
  • c.f., cherry picking by health insurers
  • Private prisons attract large national chain
    stores like Wal-Mart, which
  • leads to demise of local businesses
  • Shifts locally-generated tax revenues to distant
    corporate coffers

21
The Prison-Industrial ComplexPolitically
Well-Connected
  • Private prison industry donated 1.2 million to
    830 candidates in 2000 elections
  • 100,000 from CCA to indicted former House
    Speaker Tom Delays (R-TX) Foundation for Kids
  • Delays brother Randy lobbied TX Bureau of
    Prisons on behalf of GEO

22
The Prison-Industrial ComplexPolitically
Well-Connected
  • 3.3 million donated in 44 states between 200 and
    2004
  • 2/3 to candidates, 1/3 to parties (2/3 of this to
    Republicans
  • More given to states with tougher sentencing laws

23
The Prison-Industrial ComplexAbuses
  • Some paid for non-existent prisoners, due to
    inmate census guarantees
  • 2009 Two judges in PA convicted of jailing 2000
    children in exchange for bribes from private
    prison companies

24
Jails for JesusFaith-Based Initiatives
  • Increasing presence
  • Politically powerful
  • Most evangelical Christian
  • Supported financially by George W Bushs
    Faith-Based Initiatives Program
  • e.g., Prison Fellowship Ministries founded by
    Watergate felon Charles Colson in 1976

25
Jails for JesusFaith-Based Initiatives
  • Offer perks in exchange for participation in
    prayer groups and courses
  • Perks better cell location, job training and
    post-release job placement
  • Courses Creationism, Intelligent Design,
    Conversion Therapy for homosexuals

26
Jails for JesusFaith-Based Initiatives
  • Some programs cure sex offenders through prayer
    and Bible study
  • Rather than evidence-based programs employing
    aversion therapy and normative counseling
  • Highly recidivist and dangerous criminals may be
    released back into society armed with little more
    than polemics about sin

27
Health Issues of Prisoners
  • At least 1/3 of state and ¼ of federal inmates
    have a physical impairment or mental condition
  • Mental illness
  • Dental caries and periodontal disease
  • Infectious diseases HIV, Hep B and C, STDs
    (including HPV?cervical CA)
  • Usual chronic illnesses seen in aging population

28
Crime and Substance Abuse
  • 52 of state and 34 of federal inmates under
    influence of alcohol or other drugs at time of
    offenses
  • Rates of alcohol and opiate dependency among
    arrestees at least 12 and 4, respectively
  • 28 of jails detoxify arrestees

29
Inmate Deaths
  • 12,129 inmates died in custody between 2001 and
    2004
  • 89 - medical conditions
  • 8 - suicide or homicide
  • 3 - alcohol/drug intoxication or accidental
    injury

30
Prison Health Care
  • Estelle v. Gamble (US Supreme Court, 1976)
    affirms inmates constitutional right to medical
    care (based on 8th Amendment prohibiting cruel
    and unusual punishment)
  • Amnesty International and AMA have commented upon
    poor overall quality of care

31
Prison Health Care
  • 60 provided by government entities
  • 40 (in 34 states) provided by private
    corporations
  • Private care often substandard

32
Prison Health Care
  • Some doctors unable to practice elsewhere have
    limited licenses to work in prisons
  • Some government and private institutions require
    co-pays
  • Discourages needed care increases costs

33
Examples of Substandard Prison Health Care
  • Correctional Medical Systems (largest/cheapest)
  • Numerous lawsuits/investigations for poor care,
    negligence, patient dumping opaque accounting of
    taxpayer dollars
  • Prison Health Services
  • Cited by NY state for negligence/deaths subject
    of gt1000 lawsuits

34
Examples of Substandard Prison Health Care
  • Californias state prison health care system
    placed into receivership
  • 1 unnecessary death/day
  • 5 co-pays limit access

35
Rehabilitation and Release
  • 600,000 prisoners released each year
  • 4-fold increase over 1980
  • High risk of death in first few weeks after
    release, mostly due to homicide, suicide, and
    drug overdose

36
Rehabilitation and Release
  • 1990s funding for rehab dramatically cut
  • Newly released and paroled convicts face
    restricted access to federally-subsidized
    housing, welfare, and health care

37
Ex-offenders have poor job prospects
  • Little education and job skills training occur
    behind bars
  • GED programs reduce recidivism, decrease costs
  • Limited resumés, background checks
  • 60 of employers would not knowingly hire an
    ex-offender
  • High rates of criminal recidivism

38
Summary
  • US worlds wealthiest nation
  • Incarcerates greater percentage of its citizens
    than any other country
  • Criminal justice system marred by racism
  • Prisoner health care substandard
  • Until recently, US executed juveniles and
    mentally handicapped

39
Summary
  • US continues to execute adults
  • Drug users confined with more hardened criminals
    in overcrowded institutions
  • Creates ideal conditions for nurturing and
    mentoring of more dangerous criminals
  • Punishment prioritized over rehabilitation

40
Summary
  • Convicts released without necessary skills to
    maintain abstinence and with few job skills
  • Poor financial and employment prospects of
    released criminals make return to crime an
    attractive or desperate survival option

41
Summary
  • US criminal justice system marked by injustices,
    fails to lower crime and increase public safety
  • Significant portions of system turned over to
    enterprises that value profit over human dignity,
    development and community improvement

42
Role of Health Professionals in Creating a Fair
Criminal Justice System
  • Address social ills that foster substance abuse
    and other crimes
  • Especially rising gap between rich and poor,
    haves and have nots
  • Increase focus on magnitude and consequences of
    corporate crime

43
Role of Health Professionals in Creating a Fair
Criminal Justice System
  • Speak out against injustice, racism, death
    penalty
  • Improve provider education re criminal justice
    system
  • Run for office

44
Health Professionals and Criminality
  • 2002 AAMC standard application includes
    questions about felony convictions
  • 2008 Questions about military discharge history
    and misdemeanor convictions added

45
Health Professionals and Criminality
  • Medical schools make final judgments
  • Previous offences one of the most robust
    predictors of future offenses
  • Including cheating
  • 2009 BU med student accused of stalking/murder

46
Conclusion
  • Hold government accountable for creating fair
    system that combines reasonable punishment with
    restitution and smooth re-entry of rehabilitated
    criminals into society

47
Prison Health Care
  • A society should be judged not by how it treats
    its outstanding citizens but by how it treats its
    criminals.
  • Fyodor Dostoevsky

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Reference
  • Donohoe MT. Incarceration Nation Health and
    Welfare in the Prison System in the United
    States. Medscape Ob/Gyn and Womens Health
    200611(1) posted 1/20/06. Available at
    http//www.medscape.com/viewarticle/520251

50
Contact Information
  • Public Health and Social Justice Website
  • http//www.phsj.org
  • martindonohoe_at_phsj.org
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