As the immigration debate continues across Arizona, most pragmatic people seem to agree on a few undeniable facts: racial profiling is illegal. Stopping a motorist for no reason other than their skin color is wrong. Terrorizing American citizens under the guise of immigration enforcement is intolerable.
This week, a class action lawsuit brought by the victims of Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s racial profiling practices will get underway. These proceedings will hopefully change the way Arpaio runs the Sheriff’s Office and prevent future instances of discrimination. Among our goals: helping deputies return to pursuing outstanding felony warrants and child rape cases that have been ignored for years, rather than being forced to detain law-abiding citizens for “traffic violations.”
For 19-year-old Hugo Carrillo Escobedo, SB1070 is about more than just “showing your papers.” After “squealing” his tires, Hugo wound up in immigration detention for eight hours. Hugo’s story is particularly compelling because he was initially just given a citation for the traffic violation and immediately released. But the police officer later showed up at his house, saying: “Do you know about SB1070? If I don’t report you, I could lose my job.”
We can honor Dr. King's legacy by embracing his dream of equality for all people – regardless of race, creed or color. We can also make a decision to be of service – to take actions that improve our communities and, ultimately, our society.
By Mike Tartaglia, Paralegal, National Prison Project & Andrew Waks, National Prison Project at 5:31pm
As America’s prison population has grown to unprecedented levels and imposed record-high costs on taxpayers, it is time to evaluate what we hope to achieve through incarceration: is it revenge, or safety? The two values appear to be in conflict as objectives of our criminal justice system. After decades of tough-on-crime policies, we have experienced little return on our investment— as rates of incarceration have continued to rise, rates of recidivism have increased since the early 1980s, remaining relatively unchanged from the mid-1990s through the present.
New York has allowed a human rights crisis to fester in its prisons. Each day, the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision subjects nearly 4,500 prisoners to solitary confinement...
Today, the U.S. has the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world. With over 2.3 million men and women living behind bars, our imprisonment rate is the highest it’s ever been in U.S. history. And yet, our criminal justice system has failed on every count: public safety, fairness and cost-effectiveness. Across the country, the criminal justice reform conversation is heating up. Each week, we feature our some of the most exciting and relevant news in overincarceration discourse that we’ve spotted from the previous week. Check back weekly for our top picks.
