California spends more than $50,000 per prisoner. A few years ago, back when it only costs $49,000 to lock a person up for a year, Mother Jones did a breakdown of where that money goes: Security: $20,429 Medical services: $7,669 Parole operations: $4,436 Facility operations: $3,938 Administration: $2,871 Psychiatric services: $1,403 Food: $1,377 Education: $687…
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From CNN’s “In the Arena“: ONLY ON THE BLOG: Answering today’s OFF-SET questions is Peter Moskos. … Moskos’s new book is entitled, “In Defense of Flogging.” The Supreme Court has affirmed a federal order telling California to reduce its overflowing prison population, a situation the majority said “falls below the standard of decency.” California now…
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Homicides in Baltimore dropped from 238 to 223, giving the city its lowest homocide rate since the late 1980s. Baltimore is now fifth in murders, after New Orleans, Flint, St. Louis, and Detroit. The Baltimore Sunhas the story.
From over at The Agitator. It’s reached the point where these “drug war” police don’t even pretend to be anything but money-hungry mercenaries.
Louis Theroux visited a Miami “mega-jail.” (You can watch a bunch of his other shows on youtube–I’m quite fond of them.) For a bespectacled, peace-loving Englishman, there can be few places less congenial than a berth on the sixth floor of Miami main jail. The place has to be seen to be believed. Up to…
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When I re-posted those pics of a Baltimore crack house, I found one of the comments so interesting I asked the commenter to turn it into a guest post. Eddie Nadal, retired NYPD, graciously agreed. These are his words: I recently visited the Lower East Side in New York, the same LES where I was…
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By your second week, you’re unhappy that 90% of the crimes you’ve even seen up-close are just pathetic junkies buying crack from another pathetic junkie selling drugs to support his/her own habit. And nothing makes you feel LESS like Batman than scaring sad, homeless crackheads. You tried to chase down a kid when you saw…
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It’s in, hot, right off the presses! Amazon actually has nine copies of In Defense of Flogging in stock, for sale, ready to ship, to be in your grubby hands tomorrow! But I just bought eight of them. Still, that leaves one. The official release date is June 1. So your local bookstore should have…
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The cops smell weed and bust down a door. The Supreme Court, in Kentucky v. King, say no big deal. It’s a dumb decision, but it’s not such a big deal. This decision simply reaffirms the status-quo. As best, the Court’s decision can be described as yet another nail in the coffin of the 4th…
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No doubt you, like most others, think the professorial life is all glamor, fame, leisure, wine, and women. That’s just what I wantyou to think with my frequent vacations and the fact there’s a good chance I might still be in my bathrobe at 3pm (working at home, mind you). Such perks do have their…
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