cjjack
05-20-2004, 10:36 PM
This is an older article, written sometime in 2002 so some of the info may not be accurate any longer.
Joe Bogan was the warden at Carswell when I was there. He was a kind man who always visited with the ladies at lunch, going from table to table, asking how you were doing, do you need anything. He did this every single day.
I thought this article was very profound, coming from a former warden.
MANDATORY MINIMUM SENTENCES OFTEN ONEROUS AND COSTLY
by Joe Bogan
In my 30 years working in federal prisons, I witnessed the explosive growth in the inmate population send an evolution of harshness in punishment that I could not have imagined when I began. Both stem in large part from the mandatory minimum sentences enacted by the federal and state governments in response to the epidemic of illegal drugs in the 1970's and 1980's.
Those laws, passed in an effort to solve the crime and drug problem in a "get tough" environment, took any discretion in sentencing, even in non-violent cases, away from judges. The result is that in the United States we now imprison four times more people per capita as we did from 1920 to 1970. Our criminal justice system costs $147 billion a year, and annual prison costs alone are about $38 billion. No matter how well intended the lawmakers may have been, the laws need to be reformed.
Fortunately, this issue is beginning to gain national attention. Judges, including many federal ones, are speaking out. In part because of the drop in crime, public attitudes are shifting to support a more rational approach to punishment.
A bill has been intoduced to Congress (H.R. 1978) that would eliminate some "mandatory minimum" sentences. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala, has also proposed legislation to give judges more flexibility in certain cases. Hearings are expected soon.
Tonight ( at 8 p.m.) Court TV will air its first original TV movie, giving national audiences a look at the harrowing impact of mandatory minimum sentences. Starring Acadamy Award Mercedes Ruehl, "Guily by Association" tells the story of a widow with two children who has been sentenced to 20 years in prison. Her crime? She was involved with a charming but dissembling boyfriend, a drug dealer. Because she took a few messages, brought a gym bag to him, had a few of his friends over, she became ensnared in a "conspiracy" to sell marijuana. Her lover had led her unknowing into the vortex of this country's war on drugs. Her life would never be the same. It's a compelling drama and it's right on target.
In my experience, the population that has been harmed the most by mandatory minimum sentences has been women. Typically, these women made poor choices; usually they knew they were committing crimes-often in relationships with criminal men. The vast majority of them deserved, even needed, the intervention of the justice system. What they don't deserve are sentences that are vastly disproportionate to their actual crimes. A more sensible system of sentencing, which gives guidance to judges but allows discretion, is now needed.
Prisons should confine offenders for their criminal culpability but also reach out to their human capability. Many women in prison want to improve and restore their lives, heal from abus, trauma, and guilt, become better mothers and more productive workers. That is easier to do if sentences are reasonable. "Justice delayed is justice denied " has more than one meaning.
A mother's incarceration places an immense stress on her family. The great majority of children of prison mothers have to be placed with caretakers other than the father. (The reverse is true for fathers in prison: 80 percent of the children remain with the mother.) If a mother can be separated from her kids less, and if prisons offer effective parenting programs, there will be a lot less damage to society because of a mother's imprisonment.
One memory stands out for me. It was the end of a crowded visiting day at a prison where I was warden. I stood within arms length of an inmate in her mid-20's waiting to say goodbye to her 3 stair-stepped children and their grandparents.
Her youngest child was crying quietly. His mother lovingly picked up the 2 year old. She gently wiped his tears from one cheek, then the other. "Look ," she said. "Momma's wiped your tears away."
Tears streamed from her eyes, too, as she held her childs face close to hers. "Wipe Momma's tears," she said to the boy. With a small closed hand, the wide-eyed toddler wiped her cheeks-first one, then the other, saying nothing, saying everything.
If Congress changes sentencing laws that are not just and that waste countless lives and resources, there would be a million fewer tears to fall, or to be wiped away from the hand of a child.
Joe Bogan served as warden of prisons for men in Rochester, Minn., in Michigan and Florida and a prison for women in Texas during a 30-year career with the U.S. Bureau of Prisons.
Reprinted from the St. Paul Pioneer Press
Joe Bogan was the warden at Carswell when I was there. He was a kind man who always visited with the ladies at lunch, going from table to table, asking how you were doing, do you need anything. He did this every single day.
I thought this article was very profound, coming from a former warden.
MANDATORY MINIMUM SENTENCES OFTEN ONEROUS AND COSTLY
by Joe Bogan
In my 30 years working in federal prisons, I witnessed the explosive growth in the inmate population send an evolution of harshness in punishment that I could not have imagined when I began. Both stem in large part from the mandatory minimum sentences enacted by the federal and state governments in response to the epidemic of illegal drugs in the 1970's and 1980's.
Those laws, passed in an effort to solve the crime and drug problem in a "get tough" environment, took any discretion in sentencing, even in non-violent cases, away from judges. The result is that in the United States we now imprison four times more people per capita as we did from 1920 to 1970. Our criminal justice system costs $147 billion a year, and annual prison costs alone are about $38 billion. No matter how well intended the lawmakers may have been, the laws need to be reformed.
Fortunately, this issue is beginning to gain national attention. Judges, including many federal ones, are speaking out. In part because of the drop in crime, public attitudes are shifting to support a more rational approach to punishment.
A bill has been intoduced to Congress (H.R. 1978) that would eliminate some "mandatory minimum" sentences. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala, has also proposed legislation to give judges more flexibility in certain cases. Hearings are expected soon.
Tonight ( at 8 p.m.) Court TV will air its first original TV movie, giving national audiences a look at the harrowing impact of mandatory minimum sentences. Starring Acadamy Award Mercedes Ruehl, "Guily by Association" tells the story of a widow with two children who has been sentenced to 20 years in prison. Her crime? She was involved with a charming but dissembling boyfriend, a drug dealer. Because she took a few messages, brought a gym bag to him, had a few of his friends over, she became ensnared in a "conspiracy" to sell marijuana. Her lover had led her unknowing into the vortex of this country's war on drugs. Her life would never be the same. It's a compelling drama and it's right on target.
In my experience, the population that has been harmed the most by mandatory minimum sentences has been women. Typically, these women made poor choices; usually they knew they were committing crimes-often in relationships with criminal men. The vast majority of them deserved, even needed, the intervention of the justice system. What they don't deserve are sentences that are vastly disproportionate to their actual crimes. A more sensible system of sentencing, which gives guidance to judges but allows discretion, is now needed.
Prisons should confine offenders for their criminal culpability but also reach out to their human capability. Many women in prison want to improve and restore their lives, heal from abus, trauma, and guilt, become better mothers and more productive workers. That is easier to do if sentences are reasonable. "Justice delayed is justice denied " has more than one meaning.
A mother's incarceration places an immense stress on her family. The great majority of children of prison mothers have to be placed with caretakers other than the father. (The reverse is true for fathers in prison: 80 percent of the children remain with the mother.) If a mother can be separated from her kids less, and if prisons offer effective parenting programs, there will be a lot less damage to society because of a mother's imprisonment.
One memory stands out for me. It was the end of a crowded visiting day at a prison where I was warden. I stood within arms length of an inmate in her mid-20's waiting to say goodbye to her 3 stair-stepped children and their grandparents.
Her youngest child was crying quietly. His mother lovingly picked up the 2 year old. She gently wiped his tears from one cheek, then the other. "Look ," she said. "Momma's wiped your tears away."
Tears streamed from her eyes, too, as she held her childs face close to hers. "Wipe Momma's tears," she said to the boy. With a small closed hand, the wide-eyed toddler wiped her cheeks-first one, then the other, saying nothing, saying everything.
If Congress changes sentencing laws that are not just and that waste countless lives and resources, there would be a million fewer tears to fall, or to be wiped away from the hand of a child.
Joe Bogan served as warden of prisons for men in Rochester, Minn., in Michigan and Florida and a prison for women in Texas during a 30-year career with the U.S. Bureau of Prisons.
Reprinted from the St. Paul Pioneer Press