What Rights Should Prisoners Have?

[syrenn]

The first thing I want from a prison housing violent offenders is safety -- I want to feel they are not among us, and won't harm anyone else. Everything else after that is secondary.

I dunno why prisons have to allow television (and apparently cable?). Seems like a luxury to me. So does smoking....if I cannot smoke in a public place, why should they?

But the question remains, what do we do with violent offenders who will one day be released again? Do we give them therapy, trade school, etc.? If we don't, aren't we the ones who pay eventually?

Safety would be alone in locked cell that they never leave. Safety would require racial segregation.

While you are all at getting rid of the smoking and television, get rid of the weights in the yard. I don't want them coming out as strong or stronger then they went in.

 

[MizMolly]

Pedophiles should be given the death penalty. There is no such thing as a reformed pedophile.

 

[Zoom-boing]

The first thing I want from a prison housing violent offenders is safety -- I want to feel they are not among us, and won't harm anyone else. Everything else after that is secondary.

I dunno why prisons have to allow television (and apparently cable?). Seems like a luxury to me. So does smoking....if I cannot smoke in a public place, why should they?

But the question remains, what do we do with violent offenders who will one day be released again? Do we give them therapy, trade school, etc.? If we don't, aren't we the ones who pay eventually?

Shoot them, problem solved.

 

[George Costanza]

syrenn, nobody hates pedophiles more than me, but rape is a crime. It's a terrible crime. And we both know it isn't dealt out in some just fashion....we can stop it from happening and prosecute those who commit it. I say we should make prisons safer.

A number of years ago I was talking to a man who was in his mid fifties. He had spent the majority of his adult life in various state prisons. I asked him, how prevalent was homosexual rape in the state prison system. He said that he had never heard of it happening in any prison he was in. He said that he had heard of three instances of it in other institutions during the entire time he had been in state prisons, which was over thirty years.

The movies seem to go to homosexual rape like flies on dog poop whenever they are making a movie about prison life. "American Me" and "Shawshank" come immediately to mind. I'll bet there have been half a dozen more. To watch these flicks, one would think that's all that ever goes on in prisons. I suspect the reality isn't anywhere near as bad as Hollywood would have us believe.

 

[Madeline]

Thankies, George. That was good news.

 

[Yurt]

the same constitutional rights we all have, no more, no less.

inmates should have the right to bear arms?

 

[George Costanza]

The answer to the question of what rights should prisoners have is a very simple one: prisoners should be treated consistently with the standards of a civilized society. They have the right to be treated in that manner.

Now, does that mean a television and Internet access in every cell? Probably not.

I think, by in large, that prisoners in this country are afforded proper "care and lodging," if you will. The much larger problem is overcrowding - but that is another issue.

 

[Barb]

syrenn, nobody hates pedophiles more than me, but rape is a crime. It's a terrible crime. And we both know it isn't dealt out in some just fashion....we can stop it from happening and prosecute those who commit it. I say we should make prisons safer.

You asked. I have no sympathy for them at all. I would have pedophiles put in general populations, their crimes announced to the rest of the prisoners...and let justice be handed out. I don't relay care if a crime being committed against them...to fucking bad.

Sweetie, that's torture, and we are supposed to be against that here. Cruel and unusual punishment, at least officially, is off limits.
If you want them dead, as long as there was a TRULY fair trial with incontrovertible evidence (you ARE aware of how many death row and life sentences have been overturned due to new technologies proving innocence?), then lobby to have children protected under the same capital punishment laws our police (who enter the job knowing the risks) are.
If alleged pedophiles aren't protected from heinous acts within our prison walls, neither is your (or my, or our sister's) seventeen year old who fit a description and was at the wrong place at the wrong time with a public defender.

 

[lawbuff]

All of us have heard goofy stories about law suits won by prisoners that garnered them some right that either comprised the safety of the prison or just added to the expense of housing them. What rights do you think they should have, and which would you take away?

Some have been deemed vexatious litigators too, and the complaint needs to be approved before the court will entertain it.

They learn inside from "Jailhouse Lawyers" which the US SC has affixed thier hand to as Constitutional.

They have given up certain rights while incarcerated, even those awaiting trial.

"Shakedowns" are Constitutional, no warrant needed, mail is monitored, etc.

BASIC needs are all they should be afforded.

On the other hand, I have very mixed feelings about gain time and the like. If a person is sentenced to ten years, I think he should serve at least 8. Most parole boards seem to me to do a terrible job....maybe that needs to end as well.

Parole was abolished on the federal level. Now for state parole boards, the reason they don't give a crap, some of them, is because they enjoy immunity from being sued for releasing a prisoner due to a I don't care what he does now attitude.

There is a current case in CA I believe where the CA lawmakers awarded 20 mill to a family when a released prisoner killed someone??

Remember the Dukakis fiasco. He pardoned someone and they raped when out?

 

[FA_Q2]

I will preface this reply by saying that it applies only to violent offenders. IMO we have too many people in prison for minor drug offenses.

A violent criminal has the right to sleep on a cement floor, to work 14 hours a day at hard labor, to three meals a day of nutritionally adequate but horrible tasting gruel, and he has the right to serve every single day of his given sentence.

I agree here. Hard labor is a little over the point though. I want prisoners, all of them, to pay their way in jail, I do not care how 'hard' the labor is as long as it is minimizing the impact that the jail has on the community. I don't really care what the job is except that there should be some sort of tier that affords the worst jobs to the violent offenders. I would like to see a complete end to the commercialization of prisoners though. I do not believe that any labor attained from criminals should be used in the commercial world at all. Instead, they should be doing things for the government and community. It was the community that they wronged, are living off of and it is the community that should reap the benefits.

 

[JBeukema]

Prisons should be self-sustaining, or as near to it as possible.

Why should rape victims and the families of the slain pay for the room and board of the person who wronged them?

 

[Yukon.]

The US prison system is an abject failure, in fact the entire justice system is held up to ridicule globally. Your answer to crime is build more prisons and you now have over 1 million people in prison - highest rate in the western world.

In Canada our system is a model, copied by countries around the world. Wake up America, you are failing at everything.

 

[FA_Q2]

The war on drugs is what is causing the population to spiral out of control. Get that out and there will be far fewer issues within our system.

 

[JBeukema]

The war on drugs is what is causing the population to spiral out of control. Get that out and there will be far fewer issues within our system.

You don't think that's the slightest bit simplistic?

 

[Barb]

The war on drugs is what is causing the population to spiral out of control. Get that out and there will be far fewer issues within our system.

You don't think that's the slightest bit simplistic?

I don't. The drug laws of the 1980s are what overpopulated our penal system with non-violent offenders who should never have seen the inside of a jail cell in the first place. It destroyed families and whole communities.

 

[FA_Q2]

The war on drugs is what is causing the population to spiral out of control. Get that out and there will be far fewer issues within our system.

You don't think that's the slightest bit simplistic?

At first reaction you would think so but the evidence says otherwise. There are WAY too many people in jail that are there solely because of a simple carrying or selling charge and spending a MASSIVE amount of time for it. I believe CA has an automatic 10 year penalty for meth. That's longer than many child molesters receive! How is that right, you are only hurting yourself when you do drugs. The issue really is THAT simple and unfortunately no one is willing to politically come out and deal with that problem. There are far too many people that will not think about the issue before jumping on the drugs are evil bandwagon.

 

[Cecilie1200]

syrenn, nobody hates pedophiles more than me, but rape is a crime. It's a terrible crime. And we both know it isn't dealt out in some just fashion....we can stop it from happening and prosecute those who commit it. I say we should make prisons safer.

A number of years ago I was talking to a man who was in his mid fifties. He had spent the majority of his adult life in various state prisons. I asked him, how prevalent was homosexual rape in the state prison system. He said that he had never heard of it happening in any prison he was in. He said that he had heard of three instances of it in other institutions during the entire time he had been in state prisons, which was over thirty years.

The movies seem to go to homosexual rape like flies on dog poop whenever they are making a movie about prison life. "American Me" and "Shawshank" come immediately to mind. I'll bet there have been half a dozen more. To watch these flicks, one would think that's all that ever goes on in prisons. I suspect the reality isn't anywhere near as bad as Hollywood would have us believe.

My husband used to work as a correctional officer. Rape certainly does happen in prisons, although definitely nowhere like as often as Hollywood would have us believe. It's very problematic for the guards to deal with, because it's often hard to be sure whether it's rape or consensual.

 

[FA_Q2]

syrenn, nobody hates pedophiles more than me, but rape is a crime. It's a terrible crime. And we both know it isn't dealt out in some just fashion....we can stop it from happening and prosecute those who commit it. I say we should make prisons safer.

A number of years ago I was talking to a man who was in his mid fifties. He had spent the majority of his adult life in various state prisons. I asked him, how prevalent was homosexual rape in the state prison system. He said that he had never heard of it happening in any prison he was in. He said that he had heard of three instances of it in other institutions during the entire time he had been in state prisons, which was over thirty years.

The movies seem to go to homosexual rape like flies on dog poop whenever they are making a movie about prison life. "American Me" and "Shawshank" come immediately to mind. I'll bet there have been half a dozen more. To watch these flicks, one would think that's all that ever goes on in prisons. I suspect the reality isn't anywhere near as bad as Hollywood would have us believe.

My husband used to work as a correctional officer. Rape certainly does happen in prisons, although definitely nowhere like as often as Hollywood would have us believe. It's very problematic for the guards to deal with, because it's often hard to be sure whether it's rape or consensual.

I would say that it is somewhat good that Hollywood has overblown the issue though. Jail might be bad but it's Bubba that scares the hell out of me. I AM NOT going to jail

 

[HUGGY]

What Rights Should Prisoners Have?


Bubba...wantz the right to that azz ifn you get your cracker azz thrown in hiz cell.

 

[editec]

What (obviously not UNalienable) rights should they have?

Safety from OTHER PRISONERS. Epic fail in that department, I'm informed.

Adequate food shelter and clothing and medical care.

No cruel or unusual physical or psychological torture by authorities.

The above are the minimum things I think they have the RIGHT to have.

There's a lot of things that some of them probably should have leading to their rehabilitation, but those are dependent on the prisoner, and what society can really afford and are not, I think prisoners rights.