Saturday, April 18, 2009
A.C.L.U. CRITICIZES BRUTAL AND OVERCROWDED CALIFORNIA JAIL
According to A.C.L.U. Criticizes Jail:
The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California is calling for the closing of the Los Angeles County Men’s Central Jail, saying it is so overcrowded and brutal that it threatens the mental health of inmates. The conditions are “medieval and drive men mad,” Melinda Bird, a senior counsel for the group, said at a news conference on Tuesday. Mary Tiedeman, the group’s jail project coordinator, said she routinely saw inmates with “black eyes and bruised bodies” who contend that other prisoners or guards beat them. Steve Whitmore, a spokesman for Sheriff Lee Baca, said that any accusations of violence by guards were reviewed by the county’s Office of Independent Review.
We wonder how many of the Los Angeles County inmates are incarcerated for failure to pay debts. And we wonder how the living and safety conditions in Los Angeles County Men's Central Jail compare to the living and safety conditions in Berkeley County South Carolina where an inmate was recently beaten to death by a fellow inmate. And we wonder if the Los Angeles County Men's Central Jail is as crowded as the Charleston County South Carolina Jail. And we wonder whether the Los Angeles County Men’s Central Jail is either profiting from inmate labor or using more inmate slave labor than is being used by either the State of Ohio or by Berkeley County South Carolina. And we wonder if the Los Angeles County Sheriff's wallet is getting fat as inmates are growing thinner.
At the end of the day, there is little or no oversight over how these jails are run, so it is no wonder that they are often used as cash cows and free labor pools. Slavery is alive and well in America--especially, it appears, in South Carolina.
Labels: A. C. L. U., Child Support Collection, Civil Contempt, Inmate Labor, Jail Overcrowding, User Fees/Hidden Taxes
