This Alien Life: Privatized Prisons for Immigrants...

[bridgit]

'The small town of Florence, Arizona, sits at an epicenter of a new boom in private prisons for immigrants. The one-lane highway from Tucson to this desert prison town runs through cacti, red rock, and occasional mountains. Then out of nowhere, a roadside sign breaks the spell: “State Prison: Do Not Pick Up Hitchhikers.”

Florence hosts Arizona’s state prison, two privately run prison complexes, and one Department of Homeland Security (DHS) immigration jail.

Florence “has a prison economy and a prison consciousness,” says Victoria López, an attorney who runs the town’s only pro bono legal center that helps immigrant detainees fight their cases. “Florence is another world. Here most locals are people whose families have for generations worked in the prison system. Life revolves around the prisons.”'

http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=14333

[nam78_two]

1. K&R.nt

[The Traveler]

2. Ugh

B, this is creepy. Real creepy.

[bridgit]

3. it's messed up, huh...

x(

[The Traveler]

4. I wish I couold find this link

Some right wing evangelical group writing articles advocating the re-stablishment of slavery. For some reason, this reminded me of that article. Wonder why?

G'nite, B. Thanks for posting this.

[bridgit]

5. g'night friend...

:hi:

[yurbud]

6. can someone make privatizing ANYTHING related to life & liberty illegal, and leave happiness...

to the private sector? That way when they cheat us, we'll be sad but alive and free.

[bridgit]

10. some things must be lifted from the hands of Bonnie & Clyde it is true...

[Manifestor_of_Light]

7. Yep, just like Huntsville, Texas.

Where they use terms like "ad-seg".
(administrative segregation).

[rodeodance]

8. my home town in WI has a prison economy since a new prison opened

up about 5 years ago. no other 'business"-----

[EFerrari]

9. So here we have a case of undocumented workers creating jobs.

This is horrendous. :(

[Jonathan50]

11. Why is everyone so concerned with undocumented workers

From what I can see, everyone on DU is far more concerned about undocumented workers in prison than US citizens in prison. Just why this is I really can't fathom.

"The land of the free" is now the world's largest imprisoner of human beings on the planet.

In my humble opinion this is even a larger problem than the Iraq war.

And yet it seems to be completely off the radar, even for so called "progressives".

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0818/p02s01-usju.html

US notches world's highest incarceration rate

A report highlights extent to which many citizens have served time in prison.

By Gail Russell Chaddock | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

WASHINGTON – More than 5.6 million Americans are in prison or have served time there, according to a new report by the Justice Department released Sunday. That's 1 in 37 adults living in the United States, the highest incarceration level in the world.
It's the first time the US government has released estimates of the extent of imprisonment, and the report's statistics have broad implications for everything from state fiscal crises to how other nations view the American experience.

If current trends continue, it means that a black male in the United States would have about a 1 in 3 chance of going to prison during his lifetime. For a Hispanic male, it's 1 in 6; for a white male, 1 in 17.

The numbers come after many years of get-tough policies - and years when violent-crime rates have generally fallen. But to some observers, they point to broader failures in US society, particularly in regard to racial minorities and others who are economically disadvantaged.

"These new numbers are shocking enough, but what we don't see are the ripple effects of what they mean: For the generation of black children today, there's almost an inevitable aspect of going to prison," says Marc Mauer, assistant director of The Sentencing Project, a nonprofit advocacy group based in Washington. "We have the wealthiest society in human history, and we maintain the highest level of imprisonment. It's striking what that says about our approach to social problems and inequality."

[bridgit]

12. i think the issue is the privatization of the penile system for fun & profit...

and that falls onto our *collective* heads as a society whether you're born here, naturalized, awaiting process, passing through as a tourist on visa, or here picking strawberries; in that those privatized corporate entities are too able to benefit from the trumped up charges of a skewed judiciary for no other reason than to support their corporate charter

[yurbud]

14. if the prison system for men is penile, what's the one for women?

[bridgit]

15. heehee, oooh you...

:rofl:

[EFerrari]

13. You are right. In CA where I live, I believe the prison guards lobby

is the biggest and most powerful one. But, my concern for the plight of undocumented workers doesn't preclude me from this more general concern. :)