[Magdalen] Yet another case of race abuse?

[Sally Davies]

I don't know much about racism in America (though I do know a few things
about it here). We have much to learn, I think, from America; and maybe
vice versa.

And I have recently learned (or rather revised) a few things about
statistics, enough to understand that it's not just a matter of counting
heads and comparing. Statistics tell a story that is important but also a
reduction of the data that can be misleading.

If there is a disproportionate population of black people in prison, I can
think of several "statistics" that might be relevant to understanding that
better:

- comparing arrest rates and conviction rates across race groups per head
of population
- comparing who gets a lawyer of their choice and/or bail
- comparing how many minutes the defence attorney spends reading the case
and talking to the client, before going in to defend
- comparing how many of whatever group pleaded guilty under pressure
- and how many pleaded Not Guilty but were convicted
- how many pleaded Not Guilty and got off scot free
- the impact of minimum sentencing which seems to have become a dogs'
breakfast
- the impact of gangsterism and especialy prison gangs, which in this
country have an enormous reach far beyond the prison walls
- controlling the research for confounding factors such as age, level of
education and economic status
- looking at youth populations who stay out of prison to see what might be
helping them do that
- looking at other social variables such as parent support or health or
housing
- including medical records to see what proportion have a history of
significant drug abuse
- likewise, head injury or developmental problems (especially youth
offenders and young adults)
- looking at issues such as training of magistrates/judges and
their accountability or lack of it

...and probably many other things that influence the expression of racism
in the justice system, sometimes directly interacting with sentencing as it
were, and other times exercising an independent effect.

The comparisons would have to be done against a background of demographics
of the country as a whole or county by county since there is wide variation
as Sibyl mentioned (there is here too but not as much as in the USA).

None of it, I'm sure, would indicate that social scientists
could understand why people are dragged into the system without taking race
into account as a key factor.

But the reasons for people being unjustly accused, inadequately represented
in terms of their constitutional rights, pressured into plea bargains,
inadequately rehabilitated in prison, unfairly denied parole, or
inadequately supported on release, are bound to be more complex and not
necessarily based on race.

That kind of information is helpful to activists as well as to
administrators.

Many of these issues are real problems here in SA and 20 years of democracy
along with attempts to make the judicial bench more racially representative
over the years, and various moves to reform the law, have not changed
expressions of criminality or the forms of inequality that lead to it;
though we certainly have as much "white collar crime" and corruption as
ever, and probably more than ever.

I think that both America and South Africa have, historically, set a high
value on the use of violence and force to resolve problems and on locking
criminals up in increasingly horrible conditions rather than trying to
address the root causes of why they are there. And, it's not working.
You've got more and more prisons being built and outsourced, and we've got
impossible overcrowding....

And some of them, whatever colour they may be, should be there and should
stay there. As a personally relevant anecdote, one of my close colleagues,
a therapist working in a prison at the time, was slashed by a gangster and
nearly killed - nothing personal, it was some kind of prison-gang ritual.
Regardless of the reasons, someone capable of doing that needs to be kept
out of circulation, long term, because they are a danger to the general
public that needs to be kept safe; and which also includes black, white and
every other race group.

In South Africa a black person is far more likely to be a crime victim than
a white person, and less likely to see justice done. This past week,
criminals in New Brighton, a poor township outside PE, started making fake
ambulance calls and then holding up the crews at gunpoint for cash, phones
and whatever. Now the ambulances have been told they can't go there except
with police escort. That is really sad and I wouldn't blame that community
for feeling that they're being punished for being poor and unsafe...

If someone commits a crime here in our suburb, no one expects US to get out
in the middle of the night and somehow stop them, and no one assumes that
the criminals are "part of the community", quite the reverse. Here, private
security guards patrol around (not quite Night Guard if anyone's seen that
bizarre show, but not far off). Then all of a sudden when it's New
Brighton, "the community" must take responsibility. And that was from a
Government Health Department spokesman (a known idiot but someone who's
been in his job a long time).

Truly racism has many faces and many voices, and is exceptionally difficult
to root out.
Time to dismount from my hobby horse and go to bed :-)


Sally D


On Friday, October 2, 2015, Jon Egger <revegger at gmail.com> wrote:

> The VA police don't like to be called security either.  They have completed
> extensive work in Georgia, then commissioned as police officers.    What
> the bad guys don't realize is that when they commit a crime -any sort- on
> VA property is that such crime is federal, not state or local.  A whole lot
> different.
>
> Grace and peace,
> brud
>
> On Fri, Oct 2, 2015 at 12:51 PM, Sibyl Smirl <polycarpa3 at ckt.net
> <javascript:;>> wrote:
>
> > I didn't say that Black people mattered less.  I said that I personally
> > know of a lot of white people in prison, many of them for drugs, which is
> > where this thing started, with Colorado's legalization.  You were
> > apparently saying that only black people get sent to prison.
> >
> >
> >
> > On 10/2/15 11:49 AM, James Oppenheimer-Crawford wrote:
> >
> >> I don't know many Black people either even though I worked with hundreds
> >> of
> >> them through my life. So I don't know, aside from those I've taught
> >> English
> >> or theology in prison, the millions of blacks who have been incarcerated
> >> at
> >> an incredibly high rate, compared with whites. That does not make them
> >> matter any less, at least in my obviously distinctly minority opinion.
> >>
> >> James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
> >> *“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not
> preserved,
> >> except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy
> >>
> >> On Fri, Oct 2, 2015 at 12:08 PM, Sibyl Smirl <polycarpa3 at ckt.net
> <javascript:;>> wrote:
> >>
> >> On 10/1/15 8:50 PM, James Oppenheimer-Crawford wrote:
> >>>
> >>> The number of Blacks in prison is far and away greater than their
> actual
> >>>> behavior.  It's a matter of give the white boy a pass and when the
> Black
> >>>> kid comes before the bar, throw the damn key away.
> >>>>
> >>>> When I taught in prison, it was like it was a Black prison.  I could
> be
> >>>> the
> >>>> only white face in sight, excepting, of course all the white guards
> >>>> (they
> >>>> hate being called guards.  They prefer to be called correction
> >>>> officers.)
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>> That's odd.  The people who go to jail from here are almost all white,
> or
> >>> maybe Latino.  We're doing race in this thread, so I should mention
> that
> >>> the "whites" here are frequently part Indian, but they usually don't
> >>> _look_
> >>> Indian at all, unlike the Latinos.  I see the pictures in the papers.
> >>> They
> >>> go for everything from drugs (meth, usually, around here, lots of
> >>> kitchens,
> >>> though we have some grass kicking around too), burglary, drunk driving
> >>> with
> >>> resulting death, domestic violence, on up to murder.  We do get some
> >>> nasty
> >>> stuff happening, like the boy who went to prison last summer (white).
> He
> >>> got badly beaten up at a beer party, by a somewhat older young man,
> went
> >>> home and got his gun, went back to the party, and shot him.  The
> picture
> >>> in
> >>> the paper at the kid's arrest (I think he's 19-20) showed the battered
> >>> condition of his face from the beating.  I got the impression from the
> >>> newspaper stories that it was one of those post-adolescent macho pride
> >>> things.  Admittedly, we don't have a high proportion of black people,
> but
> >>> not one of my friend Joyce's dozen or so kids (black) have ever been in
> >>> prison (that I know of).  I don't know a black person in this county
> (of
> >>> course, I don't know everyone in the county) who has been in jail.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> Sibyl Smirl
> >>> I will take no bull from your house!  Psalms 50:9a
> >>> mailto:polycarpa3 at ckt.net <javascript:;>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >
> > --
> > Sibyl Smirl
> > I will take no bull from your house!  Psalms 50:9a
> > mailto:polycarpa3 at ckt.net <javascript:;>
> >
>