May 16 2008
No Room in the Prisons
The News & Observer has a story today about the situation in the North Carolina penal system where they are running out of room for prisoners. The most obvious solution, but also an expensive one, is to build more prisons. I think that is inevitable in the short term, but long term wise the state needs to work on reducing the number of people committing crimes and that comes with stiffer penalties and a harsher jail environment.
I’m not saying being in prison is a picnic, but obviously it’s not a horrible enough experience to dissuade the almost 40,000 people there now. If it were up to me there would be chain gangs digging ditches and breaking apart rocks with pick axes. It needs to be an experience awful enough that most prisoners will not want to go back and most potential criminals don’t want to go in the first place.
I’m not interested in Sutton’s proposal at focusing on prevention. It sounds to me like throwing a whole lot of money into a furnace and turning up the heat. I don’t agree with reducing sentences because that will only exacerbate the issue by creating more criminals. I’m also not too keen on Mobley’s suggestion of investing more resources into rehabilitation. We don’t send people to jail to be rehabilitated. We send them there for punishment.
Stop being so lenient on the criminals. Throw the book at them and that will solve the state’s problem down the road.