Prison Crisis: Going Private Is Not The Answer

The state government is Sacramento and interested parties are waiting to see if two federal judges will impanel a court that will impose a cap on the state's prison population. And it looks increasingly likely that they will do so, after years spent trying to improve a broken system have all failed. Despite a $7.4 billion-dollar program to build its way out of the crisis, the judges appeared not to be persuaded last week by the government's argument that THIS TIME everything will be better. Said US Judge Lawrence Karlton, "I actually had the delusion that we would someday get out of this system and it's clear that in the last year and a half, two years, with all of the work, with all of the effort, there's been a backsliding that's perceptible." You can read a lot more about that hearing here.

In the meantime, the number of inmates continues to expand, both in California and nationwide, where incarceration rates rose at their second-highest rate ever. Congress may step in where California can't by passing the Second Chance Act, which seeks to reduce recidivism by offering more and better services to inmates in four areas (jobs, housing, mental health and substance abuse treatment, and strengthening families). But given the gridlock that currently exists in Congress, and their inability to move forward on big issues, I wouldn't expect them to bail out the states, even though federal support is sorely needed to help get our runaway prison system on track. To those free-market conservative know-nothings who would claim that everything the federal government can do can be improved by private enterprise, I would take you over to this article, and mention that in California, a state desperate to find beds to house prisoners, the only facility that has had to be shut down... is the privately run one.

SEAL BEACH, Calif.—The city dropped the firm managing its for-profit jailhouse because it's been a money loser.

The contract with Texas-based Correctional Systems Inc. was terminated and the 30-bed jail housing pay-to-stay prisoners for $70 a night as well as federal prisoners closed June 15, police Chief Jeffrey Kirkpatrick said.

While long-term inmates will no longer be in the jail, those arrested by Seal Beach police will still be booked and held at the jail for short periods.

When an unprofitable restaurant closes down, people find other places to eat. When an unprofitable prison shutters, an already-strained system just grows worse. And the kind of graft and corruption and inefficiency that conservative ideologues always claim that government automatically provides was fully on display here.

The Orange County Register said former Correctional Systems Inc. employees had been accused in recent years of stealing from jail inmates and conspiring with a former inmate to murder a Newport Beach couple.

An ex-jailer is currently awaiting trial on conspiracy murder charges and three other ex-jailers are charged with stealing an inmate's Sony PlayStation and forging documents to cover up the crime [...]

Onetime Correctional Systems jailer Alonso Machain allegedly conspired with inmate Skylar Deleon to steal a $440,000 yacht in November 2004 and kill the Newport Beach couple who owned it. Machain and Deleon were each charged with two counts of murder for the killings of Thomas and Jackie Hawks and are awaiting trial.

Anytime Republicans want to sing the praises of the free market as a panacea to relieve the burdens of just about anything, tell them about the jail in Seal Beach.