release the prisoners, but you have to stay home...

[pucho812]

Covid related and not sure what they are thinking here.

The local law enforcement for the county has decided we should release some 1700 inmates to prevent covid spread.  WTH? I thought stay at home was about containing it. Why are we releasing people who broke the law? I don't fathom this logic here.

 

[gltech]

It's hard to fathom that people this stupid are in positions of authority.

 

[pucho812]

It's hard to fathom that people this stupid are in positions of authority.

it gets better the sheriff and department who runs the county jail said that not only do they stand by this decision, they are also going to enforce any shelter in place, curfews, etc that are asked of us in this time. So basically if I am out and about I could Get as much as a felony misdemeanor for violating the shelter in place that is demanded of us at this time, yet they just released some 1700 inmates. I can't understand the logic here

 

[Brian Roth]

Is the sheriff an appointed political lackey or elected?  If elected.......impeach if possible, otherwise vote him/her/it out of office.

 

[Dreams]

Probably their logic is not wanting to turn an already under-resourced facility into a petri dish of death. I'll bet those 1700 prisoners were in for some low level stuff. Looks like leadership has (correctly) recognized their inability to keep the prisoners safe in place, and decided it better to release them than play invisible russian roulette with some shoplifter or whatever's life, which would be certainly unusual, and definitely cruel

You're probably not calling for the death penalty for who-knows-which-prisoners, but it is one way to read your position. Tricky subject though.

How would you deal with it?

 

[living sounds]

This thread looks like people rushing to judgement on limit information.

Just one thing: The US prision population is way out of proportion compared to most modern industrialized countries. A lot of this has to do with overreaction to a crime epidemic that has ebbed away a long time ago. For instance, there are a lot of people in overcrowded prisons for many years or even life because they got caught with a little dope 3 times. Also, privatized prison facilities, often well connected to local leadership, are profiting from these injustices, so there are incentives to drive prizon population up.

The government has a constitutional duty to protect the health of the prison population. If they cannot guarantee it, releasing people may become unavoidable. BTW, this is also happening here in Germany (on a much smaller scale). Prisoners have rights, too.

 

[Tubetec]

We have a similar timebomb waiting to go off in the direct provision system for housing refugees here in Ireland  , even before the virus the conditions people are forced to live in are cramped and inhumane. Just like the privately run prison system ,there are well placed people making millions off all of this. While I understand the visceral anger over prisoner release. If we start down the road of cherry picking who's human rights are upheld and whos are not are we any better than Josef Stalin or Adolf Hitler in the end ?
My guess is people who pose a danger to others will remain behind bars . People who were locked up over possession of personal amounts of weed in states where the laws have changed should definately be considered for early release.

 

[pucho812]

How would you deal with it?

simple really. If we are supposed to shelter in place, aka stay at home, why can't they do the same and stay locked up?

 

[Dreams]

simple really.

I suppose it really is just that simple if you want to ignore all of the differences between a prison and a house, but I'll bet you don't live with several thousand strangers, and you can probably go out to buy soap if you need to

 

[gyraf]

..it's probably just about not having medical/financial responsibility for someone you don't care if survives or not.. :-[

/Jakob E.

 

[ruffrecords]

There is talk in the news today of doing something similar here in the UK.

Cheers

Ian