People in the Florida prison system suffer a mortality rate 2.5 times higher than free people living under Medicaid—the healthcare system created for low-income Americans. Our life expectancy is 15 years shorter, just because we are housed in a Florida prison. Aside from being shocking, these data points expose the system for what it is: state-sponsored cruelty. Worse still, this cruelty accomplishes no statistically significant improvement in recidivism or crime prevention in general.
Recidivism has remained consistent for the last 40 years, despite increasingly harsh sentencing over that same time period. Other states have less crime with more humanitarian criminal justice systems. For example, Georgia instituted programs to decrease their prison population (e.g., substantial early release for good behavior). As a result, between 2008 and 2016 Georgia reduced its imprisonment rate by 24% while cutting its index crime rate by 6%.
Florida’s prison cruelty is poignantly portrayed in our 2019 prison death rate–predominantly from death by incarceration (heart disease, cancer, diabetes)—with 425 deaths/100,000 inmates compared to the national prison average of 331. Compare Texas at 307 deaths/100,000 inmates.
So, when policy makers talk about reducing visitation, increasing barriers for re-entry, or creating tougher sentencing laws, what they are really saying is that human life only matters when it is convenient. Human life is only worth protecting when a free person, a voter, a person with a voice is involved. Oh, and also, if your name happens to be Brittany Griner.
The harsh reality is that the efficacy of prison is a myth. We as a State have made a terrible, century-and-a-half-long mistake. We have wasted incalculable sums of money (roughly $3 billion/year) on a system which is self-defeating, causing more harm than it seeks to “correct”–as the department’s name ironically suggests.
The only measurable societal benefit to prolonged incarceration is to keep people off the street who are actively dangerous. Yet, the State is not required to prove this danger. For example, thousands of incarcerated who have a proven record of decades of good decision making and responsible conduct are offered no path for a second chance. Definitively, Florida has sentenced more people to Life without Parole than any other State. More than 8,000 souls have been caged for life in Florida without consideration of their ability to change, to provide societal benefit. In comparison, a similar State in population and politics, Texas, has done this grave injustice to 798 people. Florida intentionally holds people in an environment that they know is unsafe, and can never be made safe, when they have substantial inmate file data to show that many of these individuals are non-violent, productive, and could be beneficial members of society.
Unlike a public school, or hospital, Florida prisons have virtually no incentives to effectively “correct” anyone. If anything, prisons are disincentivized from doing so as they receive income from inmates and their families. Poor living conditions, penalties (in some cases) which are incalculably worse than the crimes committed, increasing inmate debt (medical/clothing/food prison fees), no ability to earn an income, and inadequate healthcare or nutrition are all symptoms of a system defined by cruelty and political cowardice.
Every time a policy maker advocates for reducing services in prison, what they are really saying is that trauma and harm to incarcerated people is not only justified but preferable to fiduciary responsibility. In the “free world”, losing even a single human life is intolerable. We should not be supporting people or policies which harm others–especially policies which have proven to only increase trauma to society by shattering families, magnifying cyclical poverty, and causing horrifying rates of mortality.
If human life matters to us as a society, then it should matter here as well. Prisoners are people. People are worth saving. Prisons are not.
One Comment
I believe the problem with our prison system is we have too many that don’t need to be there and too many that need to be there but either have money, had a good lawyer or possibly just a white middle aged man with the luck of having a racist judge on his side. I think punishment should be across the board no matter the money you have. You get murder 1, you get this… no if and or buts, same with child molesters, rapists etc. We have too many people in there that aren’t “real” criminals. Addicts need to be treated ALONG with incarceration. They CAN be rehabilitated. I don’t believe murders, rapist, chil molesters, hitmen.. can change. We need hard punishment for hard crimes that can’t be changed simply because you have a lawyer that makes thousands an hour and owns a judge. We need to hold judges accountable when they don’t do this. The victims have less rights than the perpetrator.