The Jena 6

lmboogie wrote: NYTimes has an interesting piece on children being sentenced to life in prison. only in america!

In December, the United Nations took up a resolution calling for the abolition of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for children and young teenagers. The vote was 185 to 1, with the United States the lone dissenter.

Indeed, the United States stands alone in the world in convicting young adolescents as adults and sentencing them to live out their lives in prison. According to a new report, there are 73 Americans serving such sentences for crimes they committed at 13 or 14.

lilbangladesh wrote: When they leave prison, they get $200 and "good luck!"

SevenOneEighty wrote: We can't fix the prisons until we fix the value system in our culture.

lilbangladesh wrote: Here's the thing: the vast majority of people who are in prison are nonviolent drug offenders. Because of draconian drug laws and mandated sentences, these people are serving long sentences and losing huge chunks of time that could otherwise have been used to acquire education and job training. Most of these people are overwhelmingly minorities with fewer job training and educational opportunities to begin with. So what the heck do they do when they get out of prison without the skills necessary to make it?

I'm not making prisoners the victims here. If someone commits a crime, particularly a violent one, they deserve to be in prison. However, if you don't prepare a nonviolent offender with the necessary skills so they can function in legit society, they will probably end up reoffending, not because they want to, but because they don't have the life skills necessary to make better choices.

Besides, if we're going to lock people up for long periods of time, we may as well have them do something useful.

MK, that neighborhood is SCARY!!! I don't even like going down there during the day!

Here's the thing: the vast majority of people who are in prison are nonviolent drug offenders.

See table #12,13 and 14:

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/p05.pdf

As of 2003-2005: Prison Populations

State: Total 1,256,400

Violent offenses 650,400
Property offenses 262,000
Drug offenses 250,900 : +/- 20% of State prison population
Public-order offenses 86,400
Other/unspecifiedd 6,800

Federal: Total 158,426

Violent offenses 16,688
Property offenses 11,283
Drug offenses 86,972 +/- 49% of Federal
Public-order 42,325
Other/unspecified 1,158

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The U.S. Sentencing Commission voted unanimously Tuesday to allow some 19,500 federal prison inmates, most of them black, to seek reductions in their crack cocaine sentences.

Advocates argue that crack-cocaine offenders are unfairly targeted under sentencing guidelines.

The commission, which sets guidelines for federal prison sentences, decided to make retroactive its recent easing of recommended sentences for crack offenses.

Roughly 3,800 inmates could be eligible for release from prison within a year after the March 3 effective date of Tuesday's decision. Federal judges will have the final say whether to reduce sentences.

The commissioners said the delay would give judges and prison officials time to deal with public safety and other issues.

U.S. District Judge William Sessions of Vermont, a commission member, said the vote on retroactivity will have the "most dramatic impact on African-American families." A failure to act "may be taken by some as particularly unjust," Sessions said before the vote.

The seven-member commission took note of objections raised by the Bush administration, but said there is no basis to treat convicts sentenced before the guideline change differently from those sentenced after the change. Watch one mother's story »

Inmate family representatives and other advocates had said a Supreme Court decision on Monday could only improve chances the commission would address the long-criticized disparity in sentences for crack and powder cocaine offenses. Crack is predominantly used by blacks; powder cocaine, predominantly by whites.

The administration restated its opposition to the easing on Tuesday before the commission voted.

"Our position is clear," said Attorney General Michael Mukasey at a news conference. "We oppose it."

The attorney general said the convicted crack offenders were sentenced under an existing standard and to change that standard retroactively dismisses any mitigating factors the sentencing judge considered when deciding how long a prison term to set.

In addition, the release of inmates would cause problems for communities whose probation and supervisory systems are not ready to receive crack offenders, he said.

In two decisions Monday, the Supreme Court upheld judges who rejected federal sentencing guidelines as too harsh and imposed more lenient prison terms, including one for crack offenses.

In the crack case, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's majority opinion said Derrick Kimbrough's 15-year sentence was acceptable, although guidelines called for 19 to 22 years. "In making that determination, the judge may consider the disparity between the guidelines' treatment of crack and powder cocaine offenses," Ginsburg said.

Kimbrough is black.

So are 86 percent of the 19,500 inmates who might see their prison terms for crack offenses reduced after the commission approved retroactive easing. By contrast, just over a quarter of those convicted of powder cocaine crimes last year were black.

The sentencing commission recently changed the guidelines to reduce the disparity in prison time for the two crimes. New guidelines took effect November 1.

"The Kimbrough decision is a tremendous victory for all who believe that the crack and powder cocaine disparity is unjust," said Mary Price, vice president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums.

Kimbrough's case, though, did not present the ultimate fairness question. Congress wrote the harsher treatment for crack into a law that sets a mandatory minimum of five years in prison for trafficking in 5 grams of crack cocaine or 100 times as much powder cocaine.

Seventy percent of crack defendants get the mandatory minimum.

Kimbrough is among the remaining 30 percent who, under the guidelines, are supposed to receive even more prison time for trafficking in more than 5 grams of crack.


Neither the court's decision nor the commission's guidelines affect the minimum sentences, which only Congress can alter.

In previous years, the sentencing commission reduced penalties for crimes involving marijuana, LSD and OxyContin, which are primarily committed by whites, and made those decisions

Subject: Jena

Subject: Re: Jena

no_slappz wrote: By the way, does anyone really believe that blacks become terrified and turn to jelly at the sight of rope tied in a certain fashion?

That belief is the most condescending thought I can imagine in the context of race.

Subject: Re: Jena

I'm pretty sure the average person of Jewish faith isn't rendered helpless when they come across a swastika, either. That's not the point. It's what it represents. If you've had tense situatons w/your neighbors and come home to find "Your ass better not walk down the street or we'll set you on fire, bitch" written on your door, for instance, you're not gong to easily dismiss it unless you know for certain the source is not a threat. And in a part of the country that loves its symbolism--ie the public flying of the Confederate flag--a noose within the context of racial tension is no laughing matter.

Subject: Michael Keys

Subject: Who Commits the Crimes?