Word: prisoner
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...truth probably lies in a mix of these factors, plus one more: the steep rise in the number of Americans in prison. As local, state and federal governments face an era of diminished resources, they will need a better understanding of how and why crime rates tumbled. A sour economy need not mean a return to lawless streets, but continued success in fighting crime will require more brains, especially in those neighborhoods where violence is still rampant and public safety is a tattered dream...
...Lockup Factor In his book Why Crime Rates Fell, Tufts University sociologist John Conklin concluded that up to half of the improvement was due to a single factor: more people in prison. The U.S. prison population grew by more than half a million during the 1990s and continued to grow, although more slowly, in the next decade. Go back half a century: as sentencing became more lenient in the 1960s and '70s, the crime rate started to rise. When lawmakers responded to the crime wave by building prisons and mandating tough sentences, the number of prisoners increased and the number...
...There is a tendency, perhaps for ideological reasons, not to want to see the connection," he says. Incarceration is to crime what amputation is to gangrene - it can work, but a humane physician would rather find a way to prevent wounds and cure infections before the saw is necessary. Prison is expensive, demoralizing and deadening. "Increased sentencing in some communities has removed entire generations of young men" from some minority communities, says San Francisco police chief George Gascón. "Has that been a factor in lowering crime? I think it probably has. I think it also probably...
...Prisoners leave saddened parents, abandoned mates, fatherless children. Of course, in many cases, those families are better off with their violent relatives behind bars. But a court system that clobbers first-time offenders with mandatory sentences - sometimes for nonviolent crimes - will inevitably lock up thousands of not-so-bad guys alongside the hardened criminals. Not everyone agrees on the definition of a nonviolent criminal, but studies have estimated that as many as one-third of all U.S. prison inmates are in that category, most of them locked up on drug charges. (See the top 10 crime duos...
...Dwayne Betts may be one of those not-so-bad guys, sentenced to nine years in an adult prison on a first offense at age 16. It's hard to know if a less severe punishment would have worked. Betts hijacked a stranger's car at gunpoint, which is a dangerous and depraved thing to do. But he also showed signs of promise, having earned his high school diploma a year ahead of schedule. Betts gradually learned to navigate the violence and boredom of prison and emerged in 2006 ready to launch a respectable life, enrolling in college, getting married...