Asymmetrical Information

There's another option for reducing prison rape, but it won't be adopted: separate prisoners by race. One of the great unspoken truths about prison rape is the high frequency of black-on-white rape. Whites in prison are less likely than any of the other racial groups to band together tightly for self-protection, and are thus much more vulnerable. In addition, there are larger populations of non-white criminals, which skew the numbers even more.

An article detailing the racial aspect of prison rape is available at http://www.amren.com/hardtime.htm

I was thinking of large polymer containers each inmate could be placed it, with an air hole at the top (nowhere near the rectum though) and some sort of allowance for self-propulsion (maybe giant hamster globes?) That way they could socialize while also being isolated!

"Some kid who retailed an ounce of Oaxaca ditch weed" wouldn't be in prison. He'd be in diversion programs, on probation, "getting treatment", etc. Legalizing drugs wouldn't do a thing to decrease the prison population because drug dealers and addicts are in prison for the myriad of felonies they commit, including robbery, carjacking, territorial shootings (otherwise known as drive-bys), burglaries, and homicides, not because they smoked some dope or snorted a line. Legalizing drugs is a big pipe dream - people in the drug world are criminals - they are not nice people who just happen to enjoy getting high. As for rape, it's an ugly fact of prison life. Every cell block has a "punk" and short of hiring enough correctional officers to keep track of every cell, it will continue. The solution is higher surveillance capabilities, not decriminalizing crimes so that more criminals can enjoy freedom on the streets where they can victimize innocent people.

"Legalizing drugs is a big pipe dream - people in the drug world are criminals"

Thank god you I read the comments section or I would never have known!!! I have a pharmacist and a marketing analyst for Eli Lilly coming to dinner tonight. I will be sure to put away the valuables and wear my pancake holster. Thank you, Lynb, you may have saved my, or another guest's, life tonight!

Or did you mean the "illegal" drug world? If so, wouldn't legalizing these drugs put them in the hands of pharmacists and Eli Lilly Marketing execs? Of course. the criminals attracted to the artificially high profits of street drugs would have to find new lines of work. Luckily, the decrease in cost which follows legalization would mean that their former customers wouldn't have to follow them. They could do the honest work currently being done by illegal immigrants at the same wages and support their habits.

"Legalize Drugs, End Illegal Immigration"

I think we have a new bumpersticker!

Was prison rape a widespread problem before, say, 1950?

Mr. Jennings:
I think one can surmise by the contents of the original post that my comments had to do with illegal drugs and the crimes committed by those who dwell in that world, thus ending up in prison. Your sarcasm is nasty and uncalled for.
Do you think the cartels from South America, China, Japan, etc. are going to quietly let Ely Lilly, Bristol-Myers, Merck, etc take over their very lucrative businesses without bloodshed? Do you think there won't be a black market, thereby rendering the whole point of legalizing drugs pointless? Unless these drug companies expect to give their products away for free, people who use on a regular basis are still going to have to get money to buy the stuff. Therein lies the problem - they're addicts, they have no job, they have no money. They steal to get it and that means robbery, burglary, whatever they need to do to get that money. That's how they end up in prison. The underlying problems will not go away because we suddenly turn the Columbian cartel into legitimate businessmen. And do you really want that? You going to invite them to dinner? Ask them to join the Chamber of Commerce? Let your daughter date their sons? You want an opium den next to the hot dog stand at the ballpark? The drug world (yes, the illegal one)is an ugly, murderous world. Have you spent time there? I have, as a correctional officer, and I do not want these people to lose their criminal status because some people think it would be just great to light one up in public without worrying about getting busted. It isn't worth it.

"Am I willing to take my hard earned dollars and give them to the government to build more prisons and hire more guards?"

False dilemma. Why not fund the program through deficit spending without raising taxes?

"Do you think the cartels from South America, China, Japan, etc. are going to quietly let Ely Lilly, Bristol-Myers, Merck, etc take over their very lucrative businesses without bloodshed?"

Of course not. They'll sell their coca leaves and poppy plants to legitimate businessmen for legitimate prices. Next question?

"Unless these drug companies expect to give their products away for free, people who use on a regular basis are still going to have to get money to buy the stuff. Therein lies the problem - they're addicts, they have no job, they have no money."

Ten yards for historical ignorance!

There is no reason to believe drug addicts can't hold jobs, assuming drugs aren't illegal. One need look no further than the Chinamen who built America's railroads. Or heroin culture in the 1920's. For some reason, when you outlaw drugs, drug users cease being contributors and become parasites. Wonder why that is?

"You want an opium den next to the hot dog stand at the ballpark? "

There's already two bars and a stripjoint near Turner Feild. What's an opium den gonna do, drive down property values? I live near the airport, so HA!

Ultimately, your simpleminded arguments in favor of continuing this drug war have been picked apart by brilliant minds. Like William F. Buckley, no pot-addled hippie that one, no sir!

My sarcasm is very called for, and never nasty.

Lynb:

Do you think the cartels from South America, China, Japan, etc. are going to quietly let Ely Lilly, Bristol-Myers, Merck, etc take over their very lucrative businesses without bloodshed?

I think a lot of the production will happen domestically. Furthermore, the margins on the product will drop so much that the "cartels" will have less incentive to protect their suddenly less valuable assets. Last, there's already plenty of drug related violence in South and Central America, caused by US policies.

Do you think there won't be a black market, thereby rendering the whole point of legalizing drugs pointless?

Are you serious? When you write such ridiculous things you ought to expect nasty sarcasm. Black markets are a response to prohibition, not the alternative. Find any serious economist who argues otherwise!

People who use on a regular basis are still going to have to get money to buy the stuff. Therein lies the problem - they're addicts, they have no job, they have no money. They steal to get it and that means robbery, burglary, whatever they need to do to get that money

First, drugs would be markedly cheaper, meaning the level of theft required to support a habit would drop substantially. Second, I would posit that the vast majority of drug-related violence comes from turf wars rather than desperate junkies.

The underlying problems will not go away because we suddenly turn the Columbian cartel into legitimate businessmen.

Just like Columbian coffee growers or the dairy farmer down the pike-- a producer of a commodity.

And do you really want that? You going to invite them to dinner? Ask them to join the Chamber of Commerce? Let your daughter date their sons? You want an opium den next to the hot dog stand at the ballpark?

I'm not going to invite you to dinner. When my daughter is an adult, she's free to date whomever she chooses. If they want to join the Chamber, sure-- that's the Chamber's decision, not mine. And we could certainly enforce age restrictions for the sale of opium, just like we do for other drugs.

The drug world (yes, the illegal one)is an ugly, murderous world. Have you spent time there? I have, as a correctional officer, and I do not want these people to lose their criminal status because some people think it would be just great to light one up in public without worrying about getting busted. It isn't worth it.

See, Lynb, no one here is advocating that thieves and murderers go free. In fact, if we could free all the prison space taken up by nonviolent dealers and users, we could sentence murderers and thieves for far longer. And that way, those who harm innocent people can be punished, and those who engage in victimless crime can have their lives back.

Your kneejerk reaction is entirely void of perspective and reason. Maybe you could spend some time thinking about the issue?

per rape: Let prisoners choose isolation if they want. Allow same sex relationships. Prosecute rape.

judson:
"per rape: Let prisoners choose isolation if they want. Allow same sex relationships. Prosecute rape."

If only it were that simple. First, there's no way the cell block punk is going to testify, not if he wants to live.

Second, how do you threaten with prosecution for rape those inmates who are already doing life for multiple murder. Whaddayagonna do? Send 'em to prison?

Third, isolation is expensive and there's a limit to how much taxpayers are willing to spend.

I hate to be a nitpicker but Jane's got a real point. Stopping prison rape would be expensive. The only real reason to spend the money is because we feel sorry for the prisoners, and if we took steps to separate the non-violent offenders, we probably wouldn't feel sorry for those that remained.

Once you remove a person's ability to remove themselves from a dangerous situation, you become responsible for the harm they suffer. Even the worst prisoners were not sentenced to be raped, and we have a collective duty to protect prisoners from that risk - otherwise we are all panderers.

And even if we don't care about the violent criminals, we should care enough about our own moral values not knowingly to put people into environments where the risk is so high.

Having chosen a high incaceration approach to social control, the costs will be high. Perhaps rather than letting out the non-violent criminals so that we can stop worrying about the ones left inside, we should let the non-violent criminals out so that we can afford a basic level of decency and security for those left inside.

Jason,

My understanding is that prison rape tends to be underreported and we don't have reliable statistics on it. I would imagine though that this isn't a recent problem. I get the feeling though your question may have been rhetorical, do you have any statistics showing that this has been a fairly recent problem?

Jason McCullough,
I don't have the numbers, but it's been my impression that prison rape has ALWAYS been a problem. Why?

Dean wrote:

I hate to be a nitpicker but Jane's got a real point. Stopping prison rape would be expensive. The only real reason to spend the money is because we feel sorry for the prisoners, and if we took steps to separate the non-violent offenders, we probably wouldn't feel sorry for those that remained.

I cannot say that I feel particularly sorry for the offenders however, despite my minimalist views of government, I believe strongly that it is in my own rational self interest not to allow certain actions to be tolerated. While there is a certain argument to be made that prison rape (while not an official punishment which IMNHO removes it from the "cruel and unusual punishment" category) provides a deterrent to crime, I tend to think allowing (knowingly or unkowingly) it has the effect of making rape more socially acceptable even incrementally. What happens when some of these offenders are released either those who were raped or those who did the raping?

Also I tend to think that if we were serious about stopping this crime and did more to protect prisoners from being victimized, it might help to bring more order to the prisons in the process and reduce the incidences of violence including that directed against guards as well as giving those prisoners who might otherwise be victimized a better chance at rehabilitation.

Just a thought.

Perhaps there is a misunderstanding regarding the difference between "jail" and "prison". Take the theoretical kid selling an ounce of dope. He might well end up in jail, spend a few days or get out on his own recognizance, get sentenced to probation, a diversion program or be given credit for time served. For those believing there are hordes of similar poor kids rotting away in San Quentin or Pelican Bay who should be set free so they don't get raped, you are basing your beliefs on a false assumption. A person who is sentenced to prison on strictly a drug-related charge is there more than likely on a possession (of a large amount) with intent to sell charge. These are career criminals, no different than a career bank robber. They are not otherwise law abiding citizens heeding the call to a noble profession in drug dealing. And their crimes are not victimless. You cannot separate crime from drugs. If we're going to decriminalize all nonviolent crimes, you do know that also includes most burglars, forgers, identity thieves, embezzlers. Do none of these people deserve prison time? Nonviolent prisoners are segregated from the violent ones. There are all kinds of cell blocks which house specific kinds of prisoners, white from black, Mexican from other Mexicans, gays from straights, molesters from everyone else. Inmates are not just thrown in to big cells and left to their own devices. It's a dangerous place simply by virtue that these people are dangerous people and they vastly outnumber the unarmed correctional officers. (And yes, when mingling with the inmate population C.O's are unarmed. Only in secured towers, etc. do C.O's have weapons) Having constant surveillance on every inch of a facility is the only way to prevent attacks.
Cartels are organized businesses with presidents, CEO's, distributors, labs, chemists right on down the line to workers in the fields. They earn billions. They do not have to abide by federal regulations, employment laws, worker' comp. Thus, they can manufacture and sell their product for a great deal less than the drug companies and still earn a very nice profit. They are not going to go gently into the night. If there is nothing wrong with manufacturing and selling drugs, there will be nothing to prevent these people from becoming legitimate drug companies. Except these people kill their competition, not just undersell them.
As for the black market. There is a black market in everything from cigarettes, to diamonds, to trash collection to getting tickets to the A's game. Every commodity has someone willing to sell that commodity outside mainstream commerce.
As to the rest of your snarky comments about how inviting a member of the Columbian cartel to dinner would be better than having me to dinner, as well as the lovely thought of sniveling heroin addicts stumbling out of opium dens while Junior buys his hot dogs, all I can say is if drugs are that important to you and if your moral compass is so skewed that you think the drug world is a wonderful place full of people who would otherwise be credits to society, I have absolutely nothing else to say to you. You are ignorant and naive.

For those who have a hard time feeling sorry about prisoners being raped, I submit the following excerpt from a review of Human Rights Watch's book on the subject (www.amren.com/hardtime.htm):

"As one Indiana prisoner explains, repeated rape takes a staggering physical and psychological toll:
"I've been sentenced for a D.U.I. offense. My 3rd one. I'm a tall white male, who unfortunately has a small amount of feminine characteristics. And very shy. These characteristics have got me raped so many times I have no more feelings physically. I have been raped by up to 5 black men at a time. . . . I probably have AIDS now. I have great difficulty raising food to my mouth from shaking after nightmares or thinking so hard on all this. . . . I've laid down without a physical fight to be sodomized. To prevent so much damage in struggles, ripping and tearing. Though in not fighting, it caused my heart and spirit to be raped as well. Something I don't know if I'll ever forgive myself for."

Or this:

"You will clean the house, he said, have my clothes clean, and when I'm ready to get my 'freak' [sex] no arguments or there will be a punishment! I will, he said, let my homeboys have you or I'll just sale you off. Do we have an understanding? With fear, misery, and confusion inside me . . . I said yes."
Once a man "owns" another-and it is almost always a black "owning" a white-he is property in every sense. He can be rented out, sold or auctioned, told how to dress and talk, and given a woman's name. That this can happen is essentially unknown outside the prison world. "It would amaze you (as it did me) to see human beings bought & sold like shoes," writes a Texan prisoner. "You can buy a kid for 20 or 30 dollars on most wings!!" writes another. "They sell them like cattle."

Does that sound like something to be casually indifferent to?

Nope, I'm all for the death penalty for rapists of both the prison and non-prison variety.

It's simple enough -- cameras, tape, and the death penalty for commiting serious violent felonies while incarcerated.

Anyone -- whether the punk or just a guy who had an argument with the rapist -- will be able to give an anonymous tip as to what happened. The tape will show the crime. The rapist will be executed. Anybody who retaliates against the tipster will have his retaliation show up on tape, and wind up executed.

The prison population will be reduced to those who do not act violently against their fellows in prison, who are the only reformable ones anyway.

I agree with Warden that taping and prosecuting (by death if necessary, but probably permanent isolation would be sufficient) would solve the problem. It would cost something but not too much.

The real reason nothing is done is because there is almost no will to do it. The comedians find rape funny, and most of the public agrees. The "civil rights" people have an agenda about gender and race, and don't really care about crime or rape. Legalizing drugs is a good idea, but has nothing to do with this problem.

As long as we say that there is no way to stop abuses by police we will have arbitrarily much abuse by police; as long as we say that nothing can be done about crime by Blacks, Black communities will be plagued by crime. The moment we care about rape in prison, it will stop.

I know all about teaching pigs to sing but this is more fun than I would ever imagine...

"There will be nothing to prevent these people from becoming legitimate drug companies. Except these people kill their competition, not just undersell them."

Yes, but why do they kill their competition rather than undersell them? For some it is because they do not have recourse to courts to settle disputes, as legitimate business men do. For others, it is because the obscene profits involved attract miscreants who do not wish to sully themselves with honest work. The former group now have recourse. The latter group has lost their profit incentive, considering that profit incentive is derived directly from the danger inherent to their trade. If it were not so, why wouldn't we find a lot of real-estate speculators in Manhattan willing to kill the competition? Those who do mot wish to go legit (that means no killing, Paco) will move into other lines like prostitution and slavery. Those who do will enjoy the benefits of a free market. This really is simple.

"As for the black market. There is a black market in everything from cigarettes, to diamonds, to trash collection to getting tickets to the A's game."

In the case of cigs, that is due to onerous taxes which have the effect of outlawing cigarettes by imposing an unconscienable excise burden on the purchaser. Thats why a cig bootlegger will buy in a Sam's club in Va, and drive them to New Jersey to sell. Even when you subtract the cost of the rental van to transport them, the profits are nice. But, even in New Jersey, what percentage of the cig trade is black and what percent is legit?

In the case of diamonds, they are hot, duh. Are we concerned about the trade in stolen drugs? Really? maybe I overestimated you for sure. Anyway, what percentage of diamonds are sold on the black market?

Trash collection (I assume you mean in toxic and hazardous waste) is also due to extraordinary gov't regulation. Again, how much waste...?

A's tickets, well, there's no accounting for taste. This one results froma limited supply which is speculated by a few at the outset. Drugs are not such a limited commodity. Even then, what percentage of the seats at an As game are dealt on the black market?

Now what percentage of recreational drugs are dealt on the black market now? Might there be a marked decrease? Every example you cite is a result of onerous regulation, graft or limited supply. None are good examples.

As for your last rant, I am a Roman Catholic with an affinity for the Tridentine Rite (that's ultra-traditionalist for you protestants ;-) My moral compass is just fine, I have found, being neither lax nor scrupulous. Outside of a glass of wine now and again, and a Coca-Cola every morning, I'm clean as the morning dew. I don't care to have much, if any, contact with drug abusers, seeing firsthand what that stuff does people in the case of some old friends from high school. Bill Buckley's credentials in such an area are also impeccable.

That you think any objection to the war on (some) drugs is based in a love for drugs, or naivete, just shows you're a small-minded ignoramus who hasn't given the topic the thought it truly deserves.

I'd say we've found the prime example of that goon who likes twirling a stick around career criminals for minimum pay, folks.

We have a winner!!!

OK, these are horrible stories. However, since apparently none of the other posters thus far have worked in a prison, I would like to add a few points from the point of view of someone who has been there. For four months, I have worked in two prisons, one in Susanville, CA, and one in San Quentin, CA (yes, that San Quentin). Here's a few points (limited to those two prisons, but applicable, I believe, to most California institutions).

(1) The first post about racial segregation is already largely followed for violent criminals. Blacks are separated from whites. Northern hispanics are separated from Soutern hispanics, and those two groups are separated from everyone else. Prison officials are honestly, unambiguously race-consious, and they keep the races apart to a large extent. There is a lot of mixing, and racial segregation is by no means complete, but racial segregation is practiced to a large extent, particularly among the violent inmates.

(2) Every prisoner has the opportunity to be segregated if he or she so wishes. There's all sorts of ways to get yourself segregated: threaten suicide, make it clear that you have enemies and demand isolation, get into a fight that lands you in administrative segregation. The easiest way is simply to demand to be isolated. That seems to work pretty well at San Quentin, at least.

(3) The next part is really hard for me to type, because I DO NOT want to minimize the horror experienced by people who have actually been raped. However, it is worth noting that more prisoners than free people tend to be inveterate liars. I wish that wasn't true, but it is. I know from personal experience that prisoners seem more likely to lie about any topic, at any time, than the general public (and I don't think the general public is all that honest to start with). To be more blunt about what I am saying: it is possible that some prisoners who claim to have been raped are simply lying. That does not minimize the horrible experiences of those who are telling the truth, but ... well, not all the horrible stories are neccesarily true.

(4) Prisoners have regular access to lawyers, should they choose to seek that access. Beyond thier own attorneys, prisoners in California have access to the Prison Law Organization, a nonprofit law firm that looks out for the interests of prisoners. The PLO has been very effective in ensuring that CA prisons are closely, and humanely, monitored by the CA courts. PLO telephone numbers and contact information are plastered in many places in the prisons (apparently by court order). It's my guess (and I recognize that it's only a guess) that, were rapes widespread in the CA prison system, that the PLO would have already convinced a judge to order whatever it takes to minimize the possibility of future rapes.

Just a bit of info that might be interesting to you all.

Why should anyone care about what criminals do to criminals? If they had the chance they would do it to us thats why we have prisons and why these animals should be there.

"I don't have the numbers, but it's been my impression that prison rape has ALWAYS been a problem. Why?"

Well, my half-assed theory is that real-dollar spending per prisoner has gone up, but the entire increase has gone to "retaliation & control" (guns, guards, searchlights), while real-dollar spending per prisoner on basically everything else has gone way, way done. Combine this with the huge influx of revolving-door drug offenders, and maybe it destroyed the "social institutions" built up inside prison among the prisoners. Now it's just sheer anarchy.

Just extrapolating out from the spending data, drug incarceration history (shot way up in the 1970s), and that prison rape didn't seem to become a "business as usual" phenomenon until the 1980s.

The seriously disturbing "they deserve it" opinions expressed here sure don't help, though.

Well, we sure pay our prison guards a lot here in California! I wonder if we get less prison rape for all that extra dough?

On a serious note, I remember reading once that one of the big problems is that the courts have ruled that prisoners cannot be monitored at all times -- something about privacy rights. I don't know if that was a constitutional ruling or not, but it seems like a place to start. From what I've heard, it sure seems like keeping an eye on prisoners at all times and in all places would be a fine idea.

Yaaaay, Panopticon!

"On a serious note, I remember reading once that one of the big problems is that the courts have ruled that prisoners cannot be monitored at all times -- something about privacy rights."

Yup, this may very be another example of stupid utopian liberalism. When will Liberals learn? Oh well, at least Kevin Drum isn't running away from this harsh fact.

"Yup, this may very be another...."

Should read: Yup, this may very well be another...

“The seriously disturbing "they deserve it" opinions expressed here sure don't help, though.”

Neither the Democrats nor the Republicans want to deal with this outrageously evil situation. Those of a more conservative bent wrongly believe that the raped prisoners “deserve it.” The politically correct Liberals prefer ignoring this tragedy because most of the rapists are black.

I simply had no idea until reading Kevin Drum’s post that utopian Liberals significantly made things far worse. A right of privacy in a prison setting should not be anywhere near equal to that expected on the outside world. Is it fair to say that these idiot utopians will do everything they can to supposedly preserve the alleged rights of convicted criminals to rape weaker prisoners.

Utopian Liberalism threatens civilization. These are the same clowns who inadvertently brought us World War II, Communism, and other horrors. They simply fail to comprehend that the at least metaphorical reality of Original Sin is alive and well on planet Earth.

Of course the problem is one of incentives. What incentive does a prisoner with no chance of parole haveto behave? I can see only 3 deterrents that you have with criminals. first you can threaten them with isolation, but this comes back to a cost issue. 2nd you can threaten the death penalty, but as we can all see with our current justice system this would likely be far too inefficient to work. 3rd you can take away their food. Make them live on vitamin fortified slop that will keep them nourished. I don't know whether this would fall under cruel and unusual punnishment though.

Anyone else have ideas for what would serve as a deterrent for prisoners with no chance of parole?

"Anyone else have ideas for what would serve as a deterrent for prisoners with no chance of parole?"

Such prisoners should be separated from the rest of the prison population. The recent murder of the child molesting priest by an another inmate is a reminder of the seriousness of the problem. Still, why aren’t you demanding the taking to task the goofy Liberals responsible for worsening an already bad situation? When are you going to dare confronting the ACLU? Perhaps Kevin Drum can further explain about how the ACLU and its ilk have made our prisons so hellishly awful. This was news to me and I would like to learn more.

Lastly, we simply must cease our absurd war on drugs. Many of those in prison often are guilty of relatively minor violations. They are not violent offenders! The very recent flap over Rush Limbaugh’s alleged illegal drug use may do a lot of good. Has he been a hypocrite on this issue?

full monitoring, and castrate all rapists.

Speaking of castration, why is the death penalty acceptable for murderers, but not castration for rapists? Neither seems more cruel or unusual than the other, and they're both particularly fitting to their crimes.

"..and castrate all rapists"

Castration is a secondary remedy. The prisoner "privacy rights" nonsense is of far greater importance. I use to wonder why Liberals said little about prison rape. It never dawned upon me that they are mostly responsible for this evil! The ACLU is similar to the Ku Klux Klan---they are both very vile and despicable groups.

"I think a lot of the production will happen domestically. "

Lynb's point that legalizing drugs isn't an effective answer is absolutely correct, although my reasons are different. Take the above point, for instance, along with the earlier comment that Eli Whitney among others will take over the drug trade.

Our ridiculous legal system cannot handle fatty food production and some think that major drug companies are going to risk their livlihoods on narcotics for recreational use? Are you serious? Please review the tobacco legislation for a primer. The primary producers of legal drugs will be the same people who currently produce illegal drugs. They already have the production facilities and the customers. No established domestic company is going to enter a market where the likely outcome is a lawsuit. Others seeking to form companies will be made an offer they can't refuse by current manufacturers.

What are the real effects of drug legalization? Drug use will no longer be a legal disqualifier for employment, despite its rather obvious link to undependability. Drug users will now arguably fall under the ADA. Drug users will now have even less incentive to clean up and become productive.

I consider myself a libertarian, and I believe that people should be able to make their own decisions about virtually anything. But that they should also bear the costs for those decisions. But they won't. We will bear the costs for their choices, especially if the damn socialists push through government paid health care, whether it's single payer or nationalized.

As to the standard argument that the drug prices will be reduced and lessen attendant crime, this is mostly mythical. Drug producers will charge as much as the users are willing to pay, as producers of all other goods do. Given that their products are addictive, why would they sell them at bargain proces? I can just imagine the "Introductory Low Prices" on crack and heroin.

I believe that the best society we could develop would include legal drugs. But so many things would have to change for it to work that it is a virtual impossibility. Legalizing drugs in the current environment will only make things worse.

If we stipulate that a giant step toward reducing the incidence of prison rape is to increase and improve prisoner oversight, then doing so will require an increase in the ratio of guards to prisoners.

There are two ways to do this:

1. Increase the number of guards
2. Reduce the number of prisoners.

Assuming we don't change the law (i.e.; decriminalize drug use and possession) then we are left with modifying the punishment that we apply so as to reduce the prison population. Jane suggests separating violent and non-violent offenders.

This idea is a good one but will have a cost too. The cost would be for some new type of "penalty" infrastructure. But, perhaps, this could include some sort of work program that would allow the offender to both repay society (and the victim) for his crime AND learn some sort of skill.

In the end I think the more interesting question is this: who in the general population really cares about this issue? And is that group a majority or minority. I suspect that few people, other than the family members of incarcerated criminals, care very much at all.

“In the end I think the more interesting question is this: who in the general population really cares about this issue?”

I wish to slightly rephrase this question:

In the end---who in the Liberal community really cares to confront the ACLU? Nothing realistic can be done concerning this issue until the ACLU “privacy rights” nonsense is resolved. Who dares to go against the ACLU?

So... if we are looking at prison rape as a "punishment" for some, does that mean we agree it's a reward for others? Your "punishment" in the justice system depends, in part, on your size and strength?

Prison doctors, although often not licenses, do have records of injury and disease unlikely to have been caused by accidentally sitting on a broom handle. Prison rape states don't depend on reports from the incarcerated.

As Thomas Sowell said, (paraphrase) if liberals were concerned about the welfare of criminals they would support private cells so prisoners could live without threat of rape.

IMHO, our society could easily afford it.

A lot of statists probably are not upset about prison rape because it enhances the power of the State; the same reason horrors are found in the prison system of every autocratic state. A principled man might suffer deprivation of liberty if he believes a law is unjust - but the stakes age higher when it is a sentence of repeated rape perhaps daily over a term of years.

Combine the threat of horrifying punishment with the fact that today every citizen is breaking numerous laws, and it enhances the power of the authorities considerably. I discovered how pervasive lawlessness was when I worked for a major airline attorney who represented several foreign airlines in financing deals. When the Pickle rule (helps lower foreign airlines taxes) was under legislative attack, he wrote his congressman suggesting keeping the rule. The domestic airlines didn't like the rule or his support of it. Pretty soon he got a lettter from the NY Attorney General advising him that he was breaking the law by acting as an unregistered lobbyist for foreign companies. He thought he was petitioning his representative for policies which would preserve his job. If you came in our firm and asked for a memo of what you have to do so as not to be breaking the law it would take weeks to write the memo (even if we excluded the income, sales and use tax laws and all laws which could not lead to prison time) and by the time you could read it it would require updating. Actually no law firm would agree to write such a memo - it would be impossible.

I think the Plame affair has driven David into lunacy.

"I think the Plame affair has driven David into lunacy."

I am only going by what Kevin Drum says. It is not my problem if you (or even Kevin) may not wish to take his argument to its logical conclusion. It appears that the ACLU's so-called privacy concerns regarding incarcerated prisoners is greatly responsible for the rape crisis.

David, take a deep breath and calm down. The ACLU is not Satan. And Kevin's post didn't even mention them.

Jason, I think David does have a point, if you overlook the hyperventilating. Wouldn't it reduce the incidence of prison rape if there were cameras in every cell? I agree that it's a privacy issue, but surely getting spied on is better than getting raped.

Oh, he might have point on that (though it'd only be as effective as the watchers and distribution of cameras).

I was just chuckling at his head-snapping turnaround on who's to blame. "Hey, this guy mentioned that they can't 24/7 watch prisoners - therefore liberals are 100% responsible for prison rape! What's more, they really perfer it because they hate blacks!"

it'd only be as effective as the watchers and distribution of cameras

True. Hey, maybe we should put the ACLU in charge of that!

The real problem is: what are you going to do about a prison rapist? Put him in prison?

"The real problem is: what are you going to do about a prison rapist? Put him in prison?"

This is one of the problems created by the "get tough, no parole, etc." school of thought on prisons. It greatly reduces the tools we have to control the behavior of prisoners.

I suppose David is going to blame that on the ACLU.

If we can't prevent thousands of violent sexual assaults a year in a population whose movements are very severely restricted and who are surrounded by cameras and armed guards, is there anything we can do?

I strongly suspect that prison rape isn't being stopped because prison authorities find it useful — maybe in keeping the most violent prisoners' energies directed somewhere other than at their captors, maybe in breaking the population up into something other than a unified mob, whatever.

[Jonathan Swift mode]

Maybe what we need are gender-integrated prisons. If several thousand imprisoned women are raped by fellow-prisoners annually, perhaps someone would take notice.

[/Jonathan Swift mode]

The camera in every cell solution is prohibited by the Constitutional right to privacy. I should have been more clear on my earlier posts on that. The facility at which I worked had individual cells which opened onto a common room. The common area was under surveillance, but the individual cells were not. Any inmate caught in another inmate's cell, whether invited or not, was subject to sanctions including lockdown. The facility was a county facility housing a majority of inmates who had not yet been sentenced so they had more of an incentive to behave.
As to state prison inmates, if they're charged with rape, they're tried and convicted and their sentence is increased accordingly. If they are inside for life or on death row, increasing a sentence will of course not do any good, but death row inmates are not generally a part of the general population so I don't think they would be responsible for a great many rapes.
The get tough, no parole approach by the penal system has reduced the crime rate to the lowest it's been in decades and there are ways to keep inmates in line other than dangling parole in front of them. There are punishments such as isolation or the taking away of privileges. Inmates are granted any number of privileges, which they hold dear, including visitation rights (including conjugal visits), television, games, computers, exercise, working in various industries, etc. Taking these things away are tools to keep inmates in line. There is also the aforementioned segregation of violent and nonviolent prisoners, although just because someone has been convicted of a nonviolent crime does not necessarily mean that person is nonviolent.
I know some people have advocated other, harsher punishments and I can sympathize, but prisoners have to be treated humanely, first because they are human beings and secondly because treating them like animals only results in jacked up, pissed off inmates who are a great deal more dangerous to the correctional officers than they would be otherwise.

An offhand question: What do you suppose the chances are of one prisoner raping another at Guantanamo? (I don't mean whether he'd want to, but whether he physically could given the layout and routine of the place.)

I'm not offering Guantanamo as The New Model Prison here, just suggesting that there's got to be some sort of via media between stuffing every prisoner permanently into his own little windowless oubliette and leaving them together unsupervised to torture one another. What's wrong with individual cells, but group meals, exercise, &c.? Leave prisoners in private when they're alone; watch them at all times when they're together.

Why not? Don't tell me it's the expense. Can the most expensive thing about a prison possibly be building and heating it?

Lynb: Just to be clear, I wrote my last post before I saw yours. The physical setup you describe is just the sort of thing I was talking about.

Let me get this straight. We should not prevent rape in prison where we have total physical control of the people and their environment because it is impossible to prevent. We should prevent rape on the streets of cities and in homes, where many greater restrictions are placed on the activities of the authorities.

"The real problem is: what are you going to do about a prison rapist? Put him in prison?"

Make life diffuicult. If the prision administration is not able to make life more difficult for their charges in any way - the game is over - it is anarchy and bloodbath because if you have no incentive available to prevent rape you have no incentive to prevent murder.

"Our ridiculous legal system cannot handle fatty food production and some think that major drug companies are going to risk their livlihoods on narcotics for recreational use? Are you serious? Please review the tobacco legislation for a primer."

OK. Tobacco legislation makes a good model - the government shakes down the legal producers, gets a cut of the action, and has a vested interest in keeping the industry going.

Not ideal, but certainly better than the status quo with respect to drugs.

"The primary producers of legal drugs will be the same people who currently produce illegal drugs. They already have the production facilities and the customers. No established domestic company is going to enter a market where the likely outcome is a lawsuit. Others seeking to form companies will be made an offer they can't refuse by current manufacturers."

Current manufacturers get targeted by the government if they try their accustomed tactic. Legitimate manufacturers who don't do such things get to use the court system instead of their guns to settle disputes. That preferential treatment should help matters.

In any rate, the situation can hardly get worse.

"What are the real effects of drug legalization? Drug use will no longer be a legal disqualifier for employment, despite its rather obvious link to undependability. Drug users will now arguably fall under the ADA. Drug users will now have even less incentive to clean up and become productive."

Why the hell do we need a legal disqualifier for employment? And how would a legal disqualifier for employment help someone become productive?

"I consider myself a libertarian, and I believe that people should be able to make their own decisions about virtually anything. But that they should also bear the costs for those decisions. But they won't. We will bear the costs for their choices, especially if the damn socialists push through government paid health care, whether it's single payer or nationalized."

If they do that, no one will bear the costs of their own choices.

"I believe that the best society we could develop would include legal drugs. But so many things would have to change for it to work that it is a virtual impossibility. Legalizing drugs in the current environment will only make things worse."

I don't see how. Legalizing drugs, even if everything you say is true, is not going to increase the profit from "cutthroat" competitive tactics, attract additional thugs to the market, or increase the black market prices of the products.

"I'm not offering Guantanamo as The New Model Prison here, just suggesting that there's got to be some sort of via media between stuffing every prisoner permanently into his own little windowless oubliette and leaving them together unsupervised to torture one another."

How about stuffing them into an "oubliette" with windows? Or lots of reading material? There's got to be some way to put people by themselves without driving them nuts.

(Although being left alone with plenty to read might not strike some offenders as a punishment...)

"The camera in every cell solution is prohibited by the Constitutional right to privacy."

Says who, the ACLU? This line of reasoning is absurd. A convict loses many rights, and a reasonable loss of privacy should be the norm for a prison environment.

Utopians make the tragic mistake of demanding perfection. In this harsh and imperfect world, we often must be pragmatic. The ACLU stands in the way of realistic prison reform---and this naive yuppie organization should not continue getting away with its nonsense.

Ken: I think I could happily spend eternity in solitary confinement had I enough to read. But some people really aren't built that way.

The difficulty is confining prisoners long-term without building a pressure cooker. I suspect that letting the prisoners build up their own social hierarchy (of which rape is very much a part) is a handy prison management tool. So something as common-sensical as giving each prisoner an individual cell and monitoring prisoners when they're not alone not only hasn't occurred to a lot of people, but likely wouldn't be tried in many places even if it had.

Katherine wrote:

The real problem is: what are you going to do about a prison rapist? Put him in prison?

Someone mentioned either execution or castration as a possible penalty. I have no problem with either.

"I suspect that letting the prisoners build up their own social hierarchy (of which rape is very much a part) is a handy prison management tool."

I suspect the same thing, but it's an utterly boneheaded way to run things. Remember, most of them are going to get out some day. Letting them build a social heirarchy led by the toughest sociopath and enforced by rape is the opposite of rehabilitation.

And if you allow this only for those sentenced to death or life without parole? It's less objectionable, but some of the worst would be having entirely too much fun...

"Letting them build a social heirarchy led by the toughest sociopath and enforced by rape is the opposite of rehabilitation."

Since when have prisons been about rehabiliation?

"Why the hell do we need a legal disqualifier for employment? And how would a legal disqualifier for employment help someone become productive?"

Two separate issues. Employers generally don't want to hire drug users. Legalizing drugs could make such a policy illegal.

Legalizing drugs prevents people from becoming productive because there is no longer a legal sanction against drug use. Now drug users are sentenced to rehab. Mandatory rehab will not be possible once drugs are legal. Social stigma is reduced. The result is that there is less pressure to quit, and much less not to start at all.

There will be more drug use with legalized drugs. This is not seriously at issue even among most people who advocate legalizing drugs.

The tobacco comparison doesn't yield quite the result you imply. Major companies will not be involved since they can plainly see the threat of activist and legal groups. The manufacturers will remain foreign for that reason, outside of our governments direct jurisdiction. Same with distribution systems. You're not going to be able to get drugs at Starbucks (unless the government legislates some sort of blanket immunity, which I cannot see happening). Current street pushers will open specialty shops.

Tobacco style lawsuits will simply return the trade underground.

"Mandatory rehab will not be possible once drugs are legal." So we can't sentence drunk drivers or alcoholics guys who get into fights to alcohol rehab? Gee, someone better tell the judge here, and every other lower court in the country... If the dopers commit real crimes (harming others or their property), they'll still be going to rehab. (Not that it will do much good, nor does forced rehab do much good now - they aren't going to change until they want to change.) If they are not committing antisocial acts, why hassle them?

"Social stigma is reduced. The result is that there is less pressure to quit, and much less not to start at all." Wrong again. Tobacco is and always has been a perfectly legal product, but over the last 40 years it has acquired a social stigma that has nearly driven it from public places. For you who are too young to remember: In the 1960's only an extremely old-fashioned gentleman would ask "mind if I smoke?" - and this was probably someone who smoked a pipe or cigar once a day. The cigarette addicts would light up anywhere at anytime, and think anyone who objected was weird. Smoking at my highschool was both against the rules and against the law for most of the students, yet the bathrooms were continually hazy with smoke. Little kids could buy cigarettes a block from school, from an unattended vending machine under a plaque stating, "Minors under 18 are not permitted to operate this machine". Now, if anything things are going too far, and I say this as someone who gets a sore throat and splitting headache from a mere whiff of smoke. I'm glad to be able to find a smoke-free restaurant. I don't insist that every restaurant in New York has to be smoke-free.

"Employers generally don't want to hire drug users. Legalizing drugs could make such a policy illegal." But even now, we still get ADA lawsuits claiming that addiction to illegal drugs is a "disability", so you can't fire the dopers. The ADA needs amended or repealed whether or not drugs are legalized.

"There will be more drug use with legalized drugs." You are probably correct there - but the laws against drugs have caused far more problems than the drugs themselves ever did.

Do you work at someplace that does random urine tests? Do you realize what that implies? Managers cannot tell which employees are on dope. Either your boss is blind, or drugs don't necessarily have such severe effects, eh?

Finally, the bottom line is that Americans are supposed to be a free people, making their own decisions and being responsible for the consequences. The War On Some Drugs has undermined this.

I guess we have to realize the reason WHY there are so many so called drug offenders period. We have a real problem that our govenment has created for us by thier introduction of crack cocain into "undesirable" communities of people.

If it was the other way around white people would be damn mad about this. And I guess they will be, cause the whole scene is turning on them.

Crack is the cause of these drug related violent crimes.
When is the American government going to get a back bone and start taking RESPONSIBILITY for their ill actions twards specific races of people?

When you lock these people up who have been ushered by white folks into this system, you best beleive their is going to be a huge mess between races. And the ones sticking together are going to be the ones that have had their down fall sought after, before birth, by their own country in which they were born into.

Little white boys 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 ,20, 21 ,22, 23, 24 years of age are smoking marijuana right now. The decendants of those white folks that put these african americans in jail. Maybe not directly but this is the mentality of our nation period. Throw a few in the prison system with these angry people that have had it hard since thier birth, and you best believe some of thier tensions are not just let out sexually in this act but mentally and emotionally by violating the man-hood of the race that has held him , his relatives and ancestors in a captive state to this very day.

We MUST get our government out of this state, otherwise as it is now we are going to reap what we have sowen. The writing is on the wall, its pay back time and not just at this prison system level.

We've got to do right by these people whos lives have been violated from birth. They will never teach their children to love this country including the people in it, if this country has never done them right and stood up for their rights.

And so we are here in the state that we are discussing the fact that African American males attack white offeneders more than any other combination of races attacking one another. I guess we are reaping what we have sown. And another race other that black or white wouldn't care at all about a white person either for the same reason a black man doesn't.

Now the white boy who was gang banged by these rightfully angry people, gets out because he has a lesser non violent charge, and spreads the virus in which he has contracted from people who were deliberately infected with the virus, to his own race of people. And so it comes back around again.

*I would say that our government and prison system have and are condoning in the spread of the HIV disease to mass populations, based on the fact that there has never been any control over this matter.*

Too many people black white hispanic have had to deal with the out comes and atrosities that our government has inflicted upon its own people. WHEN IS THIS GOING TO END? When will we take the steps needed to end the unnecessary suffering of our peoples? This matter cuts through all of our problems of unemployment, homlessness, health care, the question of prison systems period. This gets to the heart of, "what are humans rights in this day in age?" when all of our technologies that exhist today have been created from the sweat and tears of slaves all the way to every person who has worked period. Have not all our ancestors created the exhistence of what we have today? Have we all not inhereted the rights to the life style and technologies of today? Should any one of us suffer to just put a roof over their head? food on the table?

You are much mistaking and not seeing the whole pictue if you believe that his has nothing to do with prison rape.

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