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Angry Brown Butch (who’s blogging again!) about California’s leadership role in resurrecting classic prison-management techniques:

For offenders whose crimes are usually relatively minor (carjackers should not bother) and whose bank accounts remain lofty, a dozen or so city jails across the state offer pay-to-stay upgrades. Theirs are a clean, quiet, if not exactly recherché alternative to the standard county jails, where the walls are bars, the fellow inmates are hardened and privileges are few.

Many of the self-pay jails operate like secret velvet-roped nightclubs of the corrections world. You have to be in the know to even apply for entry, and even if the court approves your sentence there, jail administrators can operate like bouncers, rejecting anyone they wish.

“I am aware that this is considered to be a five-star Hilton,” said Nicole Brockett, 22, who was recently booked into one of the jails, here in Orange County about 30 miles southeast of Los Angeles, and paid $82 a day to complete a 21-day sentence for a drunken driving conviction.

Ms. Brockett, who in her oversize orange T-shirt and flip-flops looked more like a contestant on “The Real World” than an inmate, shopped around for the best accommodations, travelocity.com-style.

“It’s clean here,” she said, perched in a jail day room on the sort of couch found in a hospital emergency room. “It’s safe and everyone here is really nice. I haven’t had a problem with any of the other girls. They give me shampoo.”

Although apparently this isn’t exactly new:

The pay-to-stay programs have existed for years, but recently attracted some attention when prosecutors balked at a jail in Fullerton that they said would offer computer and cellphone use to George Jaramillo, a former Orange County assistant sheriff who pleaded no contest to perjury and misuse of public funds, including the unauthorized use of a county helicopter. Mr. Jaramillo was booked into the self-pay program in Montebello, near Los Angeles, instead.

“We certainly didn’t envision a jail with cellphone and laptop capabilities where his family could bring him three hot meals,” said Susan Kang Schroeder, the public affairs counsel for the Orange County district attorney. “We felt that the use of the computer was part of the instrumentality of his crime, and that is another reason we objected to that.”

I want to quote the whole thing. The list of amenities, the advertising campaigns, the market solution mentality…just read the article.

Meanwhile, back in Marshalsea, Schwarzenegger signed legislation that doesn’t seem like anything other than expansion of the current system:

Add ongoing hiring problems at all levels — one-quarter of the prisons’ teaching positions are vacant, and one-third of the state’s 33 prisons do not have a permanent warden — and even some supporters of the new legislation say they don’t think the department will be able to implement the rehabilitation programming it calls for.

“I must say this tests any article of faith that I’ve ever been associated with,” Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland, said last week as the Legislature approved the plan. “I do not, as I stand here, believe that this job can get done.”

21 thoughts on Upgrade

  1. It sounds likes a 2nd-best alternative for those with not quite enough money to simply buy their way out of jail all together.

  2. This is one of the reasons that Paris Hilton is so pissed about the sentence she got — the judge specified that she could not go to one of these jails and would have to serve her sentence in the LA County jail.

    Here’s a though, morons — if the jails are too unsafe to put middle-class people in them, they’re too dangerous for poor people, too! Clean the fucking things up!

  3. You have to be in the know to even apply for entry, and even if the court approves your sentence there, jail administrators can operate like bouncers, rejecting anyone they wish.

    ianal, but how the hell is this not a gross violation of the 14th amendment?

    A scenario:
    1. I’m convicted of some white-collar crime and am told to serve my sentence in a state-run minimum-security prison.
    2. I offer to pay for an upgrade to the nicer jail.
    3. My offer is approved by the court, but the prison admin. rejects it for whatever reason.

    Do prisons have to show a cause for my rejection?
    If they don’t, don’t I have grounds to sue the state for equal treatment?

    Look, I’m realistic enough to know that the rich will always have a tremendous advantage in crime/punishment issues, simply because they can afford better lawyers. But once convicted, don’t they have to treated just like everybody else? And if they do get special priveleges on the sly, is there any reason to codify it in law?

    If the prisons aren’t safe enough for the rich, clean up the prisons. Don’t offer the safe ones only to those who can afford it.

    This is nuts.

  5. uh… wth?
    A criminal is a criminal, and that is a jail sentance, not some summer camp vacation.

    Normal citizens don’t do anything that warrents jail time, so it’s not that hard to follow the law.

    I say treat the criminals like the criminals they are and throw all their asses in the same hell hole together, then we can spend tax dollars elsewhere, such as creating more programs/jobs for people who have a hard time paying his or her taxes or the homeless that actually want to improve.

  6. Didn’t we have a revolution over the issue of equality under the law? Maybe I’m thinking of some other country. Burkina Faso, perhaps?

  7. “The benefits are that you are isolated and you don’t have to expose yourself to the traditional county system,” said Christine Parker, a spokeswoman for CSI, a national provider of jails that runs three in Orange County with pay-to-stay programs.

    Hey, here’s an idea on how not to be ‘exposed’ to the county system … DON’T BREAK THE LAW.

    It’s a novel concept, I know.

  9. Well, we had a revolution over the issue of equality among property-owning white males under the law. So you may indeed be thinking of some other country.

  10. I say treat the criminals like the criminals they are and throw all their asses in the same hell hole together…

    Oh, yes, the old “they’re criminals, so who cares” argument.

    Does anyone think that gang-rape or vicious daily beating is an appropriate punishment for, say, shoplifting, drug possession, or drunk driving? We all know that’s what goes on in jails, and as long as we tolerate it, and saying “who cares, they’re criminals” is tolerating it, then we are, in effect, sentencing non-violent offenders to repeated rape and/or daily beatings.

    The irony of that attitude is that it’s the non-violent offenders who get the most severe punishment, since the really scary thugs are the ones dishing it out, with some protection from each other by their gangs. Prisoners without a gang affiliation are on their own.

    If anyone wants that to be the legal sentence for such crimes, then lobby to enact a law saying so. Mandatory gang-rape for a dui. Good luck with that. Cruel and unusual punishment, anyone?

    The problem of unsafe jails is very real. By having such a pay-for-safety system in place, the state is fully recognizing that they can’t protect non-violent prisoners from violent prisoners.

    As it stands now, we’ve got a condition of illicit cruel and unusual punishment, with the state’s full awareness of it, UNLESS you can afford to pay for your safety.

    Clean up the damned prisons already.

    From the NYT article linked:
    “The benefits are that you are isolated and you don’t have to expose yourself to the traditional county system,” said Christine Parker, a spokeswoman for CSI, a national provider of jails that runs three in Orange County with pay-to-stay programs. “You can avoid gang issues. You are restricted in terms of the number of people you are encountering and they are a similar persuasion such as you.”

    She neglects to say… “You can avoid gang issues… if you’re wealthy.”

    Note that CSI is a private company. For-profit prisons at work.

    “Our sales pitch at the time was, ‘Bad things happen to good people,’ ” said Janet Givens, a spokeswoman for the Pasadena Police Department… “People might have brothers, sisters, cousins, etc., who might have had a lapse in judgment and do not want to go to county jail,” Ms. Givens said.

    Yes, indeed. Quite a forgiving attitude… if you’re wealthy. Lapses in judgement don’t “happen to” poor people. They need to be severely punished by putting them in with gangsters.

    But cities argue that the paying inmates generate cash, often hundreds of thousands of dollars a year — enabling them to better afford their other taxpayer-financed operations…

    And does that money go toward, say, improving the prison system? Doesn’t seem so, does it? Why would it? If the prison were safe for non-violent offenders, the rich ones wouldn’t feel the need to pay for their safety.

    “The prisoners who are charged with nonviolent crimes and typically have no record are not in the best position to handle themselves in the general county facility,” Professor Goldman said..

    This is absolutely true. It also is irrelevant to the questions of wealth and justice.

    Once again, if you think gang-rape of non-violent first offenders is ok, you’re an idiot. If you think it’s ok, but only for those who can’t afford to pay $100/day (thereabouts), then you’re an asshole.

  11. Not to mention the fact that our criminal justice system is deeply racist and incredibly flawed, and in cities like New York the school to prison pipeline disadvantages thousands of kids from the get-go. No, it’s not as simple as “a criminal is a criminal.” Go visit a jail and see how much like summer camp it is. This shouldn’t be about making the better jails worse — it should be about providing a basic level of humanity to the incarcerated population in this country. Yes, even disproportionately poor, disproportionately black people who cannot vote.

    Also, are we still under the impression that every incarcerated person has done something wrong or has broken the law, and that the rest of us “normal” folks just live good and non-law-breaking lives, which is why we aren’t in prison?

    Our criminal justice system is fucked. In my personal opinion, they need to chuck the whole thing and start over. But until then, they need to at least get it in line with basic standards of human rights. And the “prisoners are prisoners” argument doesn’t really cut it. Prisoners may be prisoners, but they’re also people.

  12. (Sorry if I’m testy. This is an issue that I feel really strongly about, and law school has only made me more disgusted with the prison industrial complex and the broken criminal justice system).

  14. Yes, absolutely on the Angela Davis. The Prison Abolitionist’s Handbook is good too, if a little hefty and manual-like. There used to be a copy online somewhere, but I can’t find it.

  15. I’m pretty surprised at the people who suggest that “normal” people don’t ever end up in jail. More than half of the country has smoked marijuana, making it a pretty “normal” activity, and yet, it could land you in jail.

  16. Yes, I agree that US prisons are in need of overhaul. A family member of mine recently spent several months in a women’s prison essentially for being an alcoholic (she had to get a weekly blood test/breathalyzer as part of her probation, and she blew it). She said that for a week or two they didn’t have any tampons or pads for the inmates, and there was blood EVERYWHERE. I feel horrible that my country forces people in unsafe, inhumane and unsanitary conditions. It seems even more ridiculous when it happens to people who have comitted non-violent crimes.

  18. Hey, here’s an idea on how not to be ‘exposed’ to the county system … DON’T BREAK THE LAW.

    Um, you’re assuming that each and every person who is in jail waiting for trial is guilty. I hope you’re not on my jury should I ever end up on trial, since according to you, arrest = guilt. Especially in the Los Angeles County system, there are a lot of people awaiting trial mixed in with people serving actual sentences.

    On the plus side, I guess this means Blunderbuss thinks the Duke lacrosse guys were guilty despite the exculpatory evidence, yes? After all, they were arrested, which means they’re automatically guilty in Blunderbuss’ world.

  19. I’d like the “clean up the prisons” solution; it would help–some.

    I’m not certain, though, that without some segregation by violence-level and affiliation, there is any way of making prison both safe and humane. Long-term solitary is inhumane. Someone wearing a spiderweb* is going to be a threat to others, or endangered by others, if he’s in the general population. And I’m really not comfortable with the idea of gang-run sections of prisons.

    (*Spiderweb–a jail tattoo, usually worn by proud murderous racists, often Aryan Nation-affiliated.)

  20. Holly, do you mean Instead of Prisons: A Handbook for Abolitionists? Thanks for the tip.

    Yep! That is the updated one that Critical Resistance helped put out! Thanks for finding it. I thought the older 1970s one is online somewhere too, for free, but maybe it’s gone now.

  21. Robw quoted the NYT:

    You are restricted in terms of the number of people you are encountering and they are a similar persuasion such as you.

    Hm. Now, is this saying that prisoners who can afford to pay the state’s extortionate not-getting-raped fee get thrown in with white people, or with rich people? I suppose a combination of the two.

    Seriously, “similar persuasion”? Ugh! This nonsense violates the fourteenth amendment in as clear a fashion as possible. Usually rich people and white people (while being rich helps, apparently being white, even if you’re poor, helps you avoid prison–of course, if you’re white and you do go to prison, you’re definitely going to get raped) manage to ignore the horrors of the prison system because, well, it doesn’t happen to anyone they know. Now even if it does happen to people they know, they won’t go to real prison, and they won’t understand what those other, lesser people are whining about.

    Seems like a calculated bid to prevent those with the power to effect change from becoming motivated to do so. Celebrities speaking up about the inhumanity of the prison system? Can’t have that.

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