Prison Nation or Field of Schemes

Prison Nation: The Warehousing of America's Poor

Author: Tara Herivel

Prison Nation is a distant dispatch from a foreign and forbidden place--the world of America's prisons. Written by prisoners, social critics and luminaries of investigative reporting, Prison Nation testifies to the current state of America's prisoners' living conditions and political concerns. These concerns are not normally the concerns of most Americans, but they should be. From substandard medical care the inadequacy of resources for public defenders to the death penalty, the issues covered in this volume grow more urgent every day. Articles by outstanding writers such as Mumia Abu-Jamal, Noam Chomsky, Mark Dow, Judy Green, Tracy Huling and Christian Parenti chronicle the injustices of prison privatization, class and race in the justice system, our quixotic drug war, the rarely discussed prison AIDS crisis and a judicial system that rewards mostly those with significant resources or the desire to name names. Correctional facilities have become a profitable growth industry, for companies like Wackenhut that run them and companies like Boeing that use cheap prison labor. With fascinating narratives, shocking tales and small stories of hope, Prison Nation paints a picture of a world many Americans know little or nothing about.

Library Journal

Wright, a prisoner in Washington State's Monroe Correctional Complex, and prison activist Herivel have compiled 41 previously published essays that chronicle the injustices of the U.S. penal system. The essays can be read separately or as a unit, for each is drawn like a magnet to the theme: America is warehousing its poor in prisons, mistreating them, and earning a profit from this mistreatment. The essays, many by reputable writers (e.g., Noam Chomsky, Mark Dow, Judith Green, and Mumia Abu-Jamal), cover the lack of legal counsel, the paucity of healthcare, the racial overtones, the plight of women prisoners, the impact of the war on drugs, and numerous other related subjects. One especially poignant essay describes a prison's effect on the town in which it is located. The writers hammer away relentlessly at their themes, which they back up with careful documentation. Although it may not have strong appeal for the general reader, this work certainly should find a place in the crime collections of academic and larger public libraries.-Frances Sandiford, formerly with Green Haven Correctional Facility Lib., Stormville, NY

Table of Contents:

	Acknowledgments
	Introduction	1
	The Accused Get What the System Doesn't Pay For	6
	Absolute Power, Absolute Corruption	23
	Color Bind	30
	Capital Crimes	41
	Drug Policy as Social Control	57
	"Victims' Rights" as a Stalking-horse for State Repression	60
	Swept Away	66
	An American Seduction	73
	Deadly Nostalgia	85
	Secrecy, Power, Indefinite Detention	93
	Trapped by the System	100
	Relocation Blues	106
	Making Slave Labor Fly	112
	The Politics of Prison Labor	120
	Work Strike Suppressed and Sabotaged in Ohio	129
	Prison Jobs and Free Market Unemployment	133
	Bailing Out Private Jails	138
	Juvenile Crime Pays - But At What Cost?	148
	University Professor Shills for Private Prison Industry	154
	Campus Activism Defeats Multinational's Prison Profiteering	156
	Juveniles Held Hostage for Profit by CSC in Florida	164
	The New Bedlam	168
	Wreaking Medical Mayhem on Women Prisoners in Washington State	174
	Hepatitis C	181
	Dying for Profits	187
	"The Judge Gave Me Ten Years. He Didn't Sentence Me to Death"	195
	FDOC Hazardous to Prisoners' Health	204
	Bill Clinton's Blood Trails	210
	The Restraint Chair	216
	Cowboys and Prisoners	227
	Deliberate Indifference	231
	Corcoran	245
	Guarding Their Silence	252
	Our Sisters' Keepers	258
	Not Part of My Sentence	262
	"Make it Hard for Them"	269
	Anatomy of a Whitewash	274
	Sentenced to the Backwaters of Greene County, PA	276
	Prison Litigation 1950-2000	281
	Barring the Federal Courthouses to Prisoners	301
	The Limits of Law	315
	Contributors	317
	About Prison Legal News	321
	Index	323

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