In chapter 5 of Robert Sampson’s book, The Great
American City, he focuses on the mass incarceration that happened
in America that began to occur after the 1970’s. He says that scholars have
defined it as a national phenomenon as the incarceration rate hasn’t risen as
much as it has in American than in other places in the world. Between the 1920’s
to the early 1970’s, the United States incarceration rate was 110 inmates per
one hundred thousand persons which by 2008 had become 504 inmates per hundred
thousand persons. There is a good portion of those that are incarcerated that
have been living in poverty. From class we have learned several reasons to why
those in poverty are likely to commit crime. Drug involvement is likely the
best one to look at when looking at the mass incarceration of America. Everyone
in America has likely heard of the war on drugs and it has taken its toll on
the penalties involved with drugs. In the first article I found, it points out
in its 11th reason that the average sentencing for drug offenders is
7 months in France and 12 months in England, but America’s average sentencing
is 23 months. The number of people in prison because of drug involvement will
continue to rise as it is unlikely for a large portion of individuals, who are
incarcerated, to get out before a greater number become incarcerated in the
U.S. In the video I have found it mentions that in 2010 was the first year in
almost forty years that the number of incarcerated individuals did not increase
in America.
Individuals who are poor and
arrested are offered public defenders but as my first article points out, they
are often overworked and underfunded. The public defender can only then be so
effective for the individual but that is if they use the public defender. The
article continues to mention that face misdemeanors will rather plead guilty
than pay for a lawyer because it would likely overall be less costly for them
to do. Because people are just pleading guilty, they can be sentenced up to a
year in jail for misdemeanors which increases the incarceration rate. This just
then puts those who are poor in a worse situation as now they have a criminal
record that follows them around. Finding jobs or places to live become
increasingly difficult for those individuals to do. Individuals being released
from jail are often don’t have the means, whether money or connections, to get
out of the neighborhood in which they committed those crimes. They are then
likely to repeat those crimes they committed before because they can’t get out
because of poverty and the criminal record that they have.
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/06/02/40-reasons-our-jails-and-prisons-are-full-black-and-poor-people
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaPBcUUqbew
This is a very informative blog. It provides a great image how there is a mass amount of incarcerations in America compared to other countries. I really like the statistical information that you provided. The information was pulled from the book, article, and video and all sifted together. The first article was good and helped build on the books information and analysis. I did not know the average sentencing was so high in the United States. 23 months is an incredible amount of time. It surprised me that it was almost two years for a simple misdemeanor. England is only 12 months which is still a very long period of time. The video was great because it built on the readings from Sampson and the article that you found. I also like how you emphasized on the poor and their situation in this process. It provided a clear image on how the poverty cycle continues to spin at a very high rate. I especially liked how you mentioned the situation whether or not to plead guilty and how that process effects an individual’s circumstance. Overall, the information for this blog is concrete and backed up with credible evidence.
ReplyDeleteOn the flip side, there could have been a little more on the specific side. Breaking the information down into ethnicity or race would have been a nice addition. Also, breaking it down by age would have been nice to. I don’t know if the data is out there, but if there was an article or database that broke down the statistics more, it could help define the problem better on why this is happening and who the key contributors to this cycle are. I understand that the poor and disadvantaged are many of the offenders, but diving deeper to the root of the problem would be pretty neat to research.
Overall, this is a great post. It provides clear cut and in depth statistics about the mass incarceration rates in America. It also provides simple details that are easy to relate to and comprehend. Nice job.