tygereye
Regular Member
imported post
I haven't even read the comments yet, but the thought is enough to make me happy I can protect my family!!
http://www.freep.com/article/20090524/NEWS06/905240478/1001/rss01
A nearly 30-year-old Michigan prison policy -- roughly characterized as: "When in doubt, lock 'em up" -- is ending.
In the midst of -- and partly in response to -- the economic crisis, many of the state's expensive prison cells are being emptied.
Gov. Jennifer Granholm announced in February plans to downsize the state's prison population, by about 3,000 by Oct. 1, effectively ending an era in which policymakers built more prisons, enacted tougher sentences and hired parole board members conditioned to "just say no."
The questions are: Who are the people the state has decided don't belong in prison? Can we be comfortable with them on our streets and in our neighborhoods?
The Free Press attempted to answer the first question by looking at 318 parolees released in December under similar criteria to those being released this year. Most have committed violent acts in the past -- murder, armed robbery, rape and assault, among others. But relatively few -- 29 of the 318 as of late last week -- had gone off the tracks again. None had committed a new, violent crime in the latest months of parole.
The answer to the second question depends on whom you ask. Granholm and top corrections officials insist downsizing can be done safely if enough care is taken to manage parolees before and after their release.
Skeptics, led by the state's elected county prosecutors, doubt it will happen.
"There will be more crime," says Saginaw County Prosecutor Mike Thomas.
I only copied the first portion... This is a very long article...
I haven't even read the comments yet, but the thought is enough to make me happy I can protect my family!!
http://www.freep.com/article/20090524/NEWS06/905240478/1001/rss01
A nearly 30-year-old Michigan prison policy -- roughly characterized as: "When in doubt, lock 'em up" -- is ending.
In the midst of -- and partly in response to -- the economic crisis, many of the state's expensive prison cells are being emptied.
Gov. Jennifer Granholm announced in February plans to downsize the state's prison population, by about 3,000 by Oct. 1, effectively ending an era in which policymakers built more prisons, enacted tougher sentences and hired parole board members conditioned to "just say no."
The questions are: Who are the people the state has decided don't belong in prison? Can we be comfortable with them on our streets and in our neighborhoods?
The Free Press attempted to answer the first question by looking at 318 parolees released in December under similar criteria to those being released this year. Most have committed violent acts in the past -- murder, armed robbery, rape and assault, among others. But relatively few -- 29 of the 318 as of late last week -- had gone off the tracks again. None had committed a new, violent crime in the latest months of parole.
The answer to the second question depends on whom you ask. Granholm and top corrections officials insist downsizing can be done safely if enough care is taken to manage parolees before and after their release.
Skeptics, led by the state's elected county prosecutors, doubt it will happen.
"There will be more crime," says Saginaw County Prosecutor Mike Thomas.
I only copied the first portion... This is a very long article...