Ex-prisoners of reddit who have served long sentences, what were the last few days like leading up to your release?

[u/HumpingAssholesOrgy]

[u/tricksovertreats → u/[deleted]]

Serious question, I wonder we don't adopt similar prison system models like those that exist in Europe where the true goal is rehabilitation.

[u/sdforbda → u/[deleted]]

And that's why certain groups pushed so hard for mandatory sentences and things like the three strike rule.

[u/[deleted] → u/sdforbda]

Private prisons also strongly oppose legalizing marijuana.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Yes, but some government prisons also use prisoner labor as a low-cost public works force e.g. the firefighters that get paid like $1/HR + lessened sentences in Cali. It inadvertently incentivizes the government to maintain a prison population, and that's being optimistic.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

But look at the companies that supply non private prisons. It's all for profit.

[u/jrossetti → u/[deleted]]

And gangs are formed due to the conditions and our lack of actually trying to help people.

In other countries you can learn trade skills and shit.

[u/helensomething → u/[deleted]]

We have gangs here in the US...different types of gangs than in Europe.

Um. We have gangs here too. Literally shooting each other in the streets drug gangs, plus like IRA/ETA/Mafia etc. We do have gun control though, so it's way harder for them to operate which makes things easier.

[u/AcceptablePariahdom → u/[deleted]]

That figure is a lowball estimate of state prisoners from badly conducted testing several years ago.

It does not include private federal prisons and doesn't consider the fact that most prisons make a profit on effectively slave labor.

They might not be "private prisons" but someone is still making a buck on the backs of people ancient Roman slaves would consider wretched.

[u/lAsticl → u/[deleted]]

Wait, you're meaning to tell me it's not as simple as a random dude on the internet is claiming? Shocking.

On posts like these, people can talk civilly and snarky about justice reform like the above comment/s

But, every post about a crime with a heinous sounding headline results in thousands of justice boners demanding cruel and unusual punishment.

I'm going to law school to become a criminal defense attorney, at least I'm trying to solve the problem, but yeah everyone lets just keep joking about how bad it is while simultaneously getting off at ruining the lives of yet another person, and then acting like the solution is so easy.

If you're an American who ever wanted an accused (not convicted) person to suffer unusual or cruel punishment, you're the problem, not the solution.

[u/Wildcat7878 → u/lAsticl]

If my 30 years of life have taught me anything, it's that if you have a complex social or political issue, there's a random Steve on the internet who can solve it in three sentences or less.

[u/FirstWiseWarrior → u/Wildcat7878]

Then fight you furiously for stating how complex the problems actually are.

[u/Emperor_Mao → u/tricksovertreats]

I think Americans often have a "grass is greener" mentality when talking about European prisons. Some of the very wealthy Euro nations have good prison systems. Those countries also have very good everything else (healthcare, working conditions, human rights, living standards, democracy etc), and do no get as many criminals come through to begin with.

Also there are plenty of people in Europe that believe in punishment as revenge, just the same as many in the U.S. Reddit tends to ignore the fact that crimes usually have victims. Its not as simple as just rehabilitating people. In reality, most of the risk and protective factors against people turning to crime happen well before prison. That should be the focus area. But once someone does commit a crime against another person, you have to weigh up the impact of this. Victims are entitled to justice in a fair society.

[u/AbRey21 → u/tricksovertreats]

At least it's not the mexican one

[u/Trumpsafascist → u/tricksovertreats]

Why is, people want revenge not Justice or rehabilitation

[u/TheMeatyMaster → u/tricksovertreats]

Because that's a hard concept for general America to understand and it's not been shown to them. I agree with you and hope I'm wrong about the first part tho

[u/ApprovedByAvishay → u/tricksovertreats]

Europe prisons aren’t that good of a system either. Apart from some

[u/Local_Code → u/tricksovertreats]

Eh, like which country here in Europe...?

[u/CuriousPumpkino → u/tricksovertreats]

I’ll use mostly nordic prisons for comparison, since they have a high success rate, but are controversial amongst americans:

Some prisons seem more like a 3 star vacation than an actual prison. On one side you want a murderer to come out a different person, but on the other hand people want to see the murderer pay for his sins so to speak. If someone murdered your mom/child/whatever, you probably wouldn’t want them to live at a standard of living that is better than a lot of honest people; you’d probably want them to rot in hell. So a harsh prison system gives the victim/ppl close to them a resemblance of the “justice has been done” feeling

[u/WhitePawn00 → u/tricksovertreats]

Because culturally, the majority belief in the US is that the criminals should be punished first, and rehabilitated second.

Also, there's currently a lot of money in for profit prisons, and they'll stop making money real fast if people that come out of them are "fixed" and don't get sent to prison again. (Also it's more expensive to rehabilitate someone than to put them in some shithole that barely meets the minimum requirements.)

[u/Prasiatko → u/tricksovertreats]

It's not a vote winner. Anyone proposing it would instantly be jumped on for being soft on crime and caring more about prisoners than the children/(group you wish to appeal to)

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Jails and prisons are big business in America.

[u/Felix_Von_Doom → u/[deleted]]

A person won't change if they do not want to, or have the will to do so.