Last week, the Justice Department announced that it had reached a $470 million settlement with mega-bank HSBC related to mortgage lending and foreclosure fraud that led to the economic collapse of 2008. “This settlement illustrates the department’s continuing commitment to ensure responsible mortgage servicing,” Benjamin Mizer, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division, said in […]
Incarceration
Posted inLaw and Justice
New Mexico Bucks Criminal Justice Reform Trends, Moves Toward Harsher Penalties
Proponents of tough-on-crime policies aren’t throwing in the towel just yet. In late January, the Republican-controlled New Mexico House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a bill that would expand the number of violent felonies punishable under the state’s “three-strikes” law. Currently, New Mexico law mandates a life sentence for repeat offenders convicted of three separate violent […]
Posted inCivil Rights in America
After Incarceration, What Next?
Sentencing overhauls would shrink the nation’s prison population, but those released from jail face multiple hurdles to employment, housing, and social services.
Posted inLaw and Justice
Prisoner Proliferation
When most of us think of convicts at work, we picture them banging out license plates or digging ditches. Those images, however, are now far too limited to encompass the great range of jobs that America’s prison workforce is performing. If you book a flight on TWA, you’ll likely be talking to a prisoner at […]
Posted inWorking in America
Captive Labor
The old prison labor was chain gangs and license plates. The new prison labor is contracts with corporate America to employ inmates at less-than-minimum wage.
Posted inLaw and Justice
Policing the Police
Where is the line between effective crime control and violation of civil liberties?Â
