Rania Khalek wrote for AlterNet 29 November 2011,
The Shocking Ways the Corporate Prison Industry Games the System
Just a decade ago, private prisons were a dying industry awash in
corruption and mired in lawsuits, particularly Corrections Corporation
of America (CCA), the nation’s largest private prison operator. Today,
these companies are booming once again, yet the lawsuits and scandals
continue to pile up. Meanwhile, more and more evidence shows that
compared to publicly run prisons, private jails are filthier, more
violent, less accountable, and contrary to what privatization advocates
peddle as truth, do not save money. In fact, more recent findings
suggest that private prisons could be more costly.So why are they still in business?
In a recently published report,
“Banking on Bondage: Mass Incarceration and Private Prisons,”
the American Civil Liberties Union examines the
history of prison privatization and finds that private prison companies
owe their continued and prosperous existence to skyrocketing immigration
detention post September 11 as well as the firm hold they have gained
over elected and appointed officials.
We’d already heard from Bloomberg that