Dr. Richardson
LLS 1333
January 29, 2013
The U.S. Prison System The U.S. prison system was designed for a couple of reasons. First to keep cruel people off the streets and to punish people who have committed a crime. Next is Justice for the victims that have been violated, also revenge. Finally is to detest other crimes by setting sentence minimums and to rehabilitate people so they will come out a better person. It has changed a lot in the past 30 years due to the drug epidemic. 60% of people incarcerated are there for non-violent crimes. America is actually safer now then it was 30 years ago. For the first time more than one in 100 American adults are locked up. One in 36 Hispanic men are incarcerated along with one in 15 blacks. One in 355 white women along with one in 100 black women. The U.S. locks up more people than any other country in the world. The incarceration rate in the U.S. has sky rocketed since 1980 when it was 200,000, the rate in 2008 is almost 800,000. The U.S. incarceration rate is way higher than every other country. China is in second with 1.5 million people locked up. The rate is higher than even the most dangerous countries because of all the criminals that were arrested for committing nonviolent crimes. The U.S. incarceration rate is 3 times more than Poland’s. The system for rehabilitation works well for a lot of inmates. It helps keep them from being a statistic and returning to jail in 2 to 3 years. It prevents inmates from doing drugs when they get out; they sit and talk others that are going through something similar to them. They interact and learn from each other so when they get out they end up being a better person. Facts show that there should be more rehabilitation programs, many work and have positive turn outs. The lessons learned from police vs. jailing criminals are that police are really cracking down on people using and selling drugs. They are enforcing the three strike