I'm completely against using prison labor for profit, and there are inequalities in the US system...but prisoners in the US have had due process. Despite our problems, the protections for the accused in the US are among the best in the world.
To pretend that there isn't an enormous difference between labor camps in China and prison labor in the US is absolutely absurd.
Prisoners in the US have largely been screwed into pleading guilty through a horrific bail system combined with malicious plea deal bargains (over 90% of convictions did not go to trial - https://theoutline.com/post/2066/most-criminal-cases-end-in-...). The Chinese camps are terrible in a different way, that doesn't excuse any of the inadequacies of the US prison system.
>Prisoners in the US have largely been screwed into pleading guilty through a horrific bail system combined with malicious plea deal bargains
Largely implies that the majority are innocent. There is nothing to support that claim. I disagree with the way our bail system works, but keep in mind that the US has ranks very highly with respect to limits on pretrial detention in general.
>over 90% of convictions did not go to trial
That number is meaningless by itself without knowing how many of those people were actually guilty. Our ability to collect convincing evidence has drastically improved over the last century, of course guilty pleas have gone up.
I agree that there are perverse incentives, unfair treatment with respect to race and class, horrible prison conditions, too many custodial sentences for non-violent crimes, and numerous other issues that we should fix immediately.
>The Chinese camps are terrible in a different way, that doesn't excuse any of the inadequacies of the US prison system.
No it doesn’t. Are you reading the entire thread or are you just replying to my comment in a vacuum?
It implies nothing about their innocence, only about whether they have gone through a trial or been coerced out of doing so. The ability to hold someone in jail for years without trial and to apply coercive punitive sentences to anyone who chooses to go to trial is a much stronger factor in guilty pleas than any evidence.
I did read the entire thread, but if you said something elsewhere that acknowledged that it is wrong for the US to use prisoners as slaves, I missed it.
It does because you said "screwed". If someone is guilty and receives a lesser sentence in exchange for admitting guilt, you can hardly say they've been "screwed".
>The ability to hold someone in jail for years without trial
You can't hold someone for years without trial unless they explicitly agree to it. The way you structured you sentence "hold without trial" and "plea bargains" implies there is some other way to forgo a trial.
>much stronger factor in guilty pleas than any evidence.
I'm sure the plea bargain system is abused and I'd support switching to a schedule system like the UK has, but to say that it has a higher impact on guilty pleas than "any evidence." Surely you have proof for such a strong claim?
>I did read the entire thread, but if you said something elsewhere that acknowledged that it is wrong for the US to use prisoners as slaves, I missed it.
Here is a random major news article about how plea bargaining is broken, to introduce you to the topic (it cites lots of references for you to follow up with if you don't feel like it is a complete introduction)
Here is a bail payment fund, which finds that 55% of their clients, who were in jail and would stay there because they couldn't afford bail, are not found guilty (which may mean the charges are just dropped) after their bail is paid. (I've seen similar numbers from the local bail fund I volunteer with, but don't have actual figures available to share). However, the vast majority of people do not have access to any such assistance, and 92% of people held in jail and unable to afford their bail plead guilty. Because the clients who have access to a bail fund are selected almost randomly (basically by having a court appointed lawyer who knows about the bail fund application and submits their case while the fund has available cash) we can take that as very simple evidence that many of those pleading guilty were innocent. There's definitely more detailed work available, probably cited in the articles above.
> You can't hold someone for years without trial unless they explicitly agree to it. The way you structured you sentence "hold without trial" and "plea bargains" implies there is some other way to forgo a trial.
This is disappointingly uninformed. The way to forgo a trial is to not hold a trial. What do you think happens, they say "excuse me sir, you can't afford bail and you say you are innocent, would you like to go home til we get around to doing something or stay here in jail?" Here are just a few cases:
tl:dr; the US criminal justice system today is largely administered through the process of setting bail and then expecting plea agreements, and many convicted criminals have not received what most Americans think of as 'due process'.
>Here is a bail payment fund, which finds that 55% of their clients, who were in jail and would stay there because they couldn't afford bail, are not found guilty (which may mean the charges are just dropped) after their bail is paid. (I've seen similar numbers from the local bail fund I volunteer with, but don't have actual figures available to share). However, the vast majority of people do not have access to any such assistance, and 92% of people held in jail and unable to afford their bail plead guilty. Because the clients who have access to a bail fund are selected almost randomly (basically by having a court appointed lawyer who knows about the bail fund application and submits their case while the fund has available cash) we can take that as very simple evidence that many of those pleading guilty were innocent. There's definitely more detailed work available, probably cited in the articles above.
I see where you’re going with this, but it really doesn’t imply what you’re saying it does. First it’s unlikely that access to the bail funds is actually random. It’s very likely that defense lawyers are more willing to go out of their way to find bail money for clients who they believe are actually innocent.
It’s also likely that many of the 55% that are found not guilty are actually guilty, but there isn’t enough evidence to convict. Prosecutors tend to move slower when defendant isn’t in custody and cases can go stale, so people out on bail are less likely to be convicted. If a guilty person pleads guilty, despite the fact that there wasn’t enough evidence for a conviction, there’s nothing inherently wrong with that. The person wasn’t “screwed”. The ethical dilemma arises when an innocent person is wrongfully convicted, or wrongfully admits guilt. The numbers you gave don’t show the rate at which that happens.
>This is disappointingly uninformed. The way to forgo a trial is to not hold a trial. What do you think happens, they say "excuse me sir, you can't afford bail and you say you are innocent, would you like to go home til we get around to doing something or stay here in jail?"
There is no universal right in any country I’m aware of to avoid jail while awaiting trial. Bail is a privilege. The problem is that the privilege is unfairly dispensed, not that it is inherently immoral to make someone wait in custody for their trial. Telling someone that if they voluntarily admit guilt, they can avoid waiting in jail for a trial isn’t the same thing as incarcerating someone without a trial.
All of these cases are extraordinary. They make the news specifically because they aren’t the norm. You’re first example even has “extraordinary tale of justice delayed and denied.” as a subheader.
In the Jerry Hartfield case he was released despite being convicted of murder because the trial was delayed for such an extremely long time. Had the trial taken place when it was supposed to, he’d probably still be in jail.
The second case doesn’t have much information beyond a single sentence. In the 3rd case, Kalief Browder’s family settled a lawsuit with the city, got cash and an agreement to close Reikers and stop putting people under 21 in solitary confinement.
Regardless, you are offering proof for a narrow claim: There are people who are coerced into pleading guilty--they exist. And using it as evidence for a much stronger claim: The majority of prisoners have been screwed into pleading guilty.
There are problems with our criminal justice system. Black people are more likely to be arrested, more likely to be convicted, and more likely to receive harsher sentences. It’s a complete and utter travesty--we should do better.
However, it’s not close to a system where the majority of prisoners have been denied due process. You can criticism our system without making a moral equivalence to a totalitarian regime.
Your argument is that, because they had a fair trial and were found guilty, it is ethical to force them to work without compensation?
> Over the years, the courts have held that inmates may be required to work and are not protected by the constitutional prohibition against involuntary servitude. They have also consistently held that inmates have no constitutional right to compensation and that inmates are paid by the ‘grace of the state.”
>Your argument is that, because they had a fair trial and were found guilty, it is ethical to force them to work without compensation?
Yes to some extent. I think forcing prisoners to cook their own meals, clean up after themselves etc... is fine. I draw the line at contracting out prisoners for money, or selling products that prisoners make--not because I think requiring work as a part of fairly meted punishment is inherently wrong, but because I believe it creates perverse incentives.
My primary argument is that requiring work as a part of punishment for an offense for which they were convicted at a fair trial is not remotely comparable to forcing hundreds of thousands of unconvicted political prisoners into labor camps.
To pretend that there isn't an enormous difference between labor camps in China and prison labor in the US is absolutely absurd.