Pubdate: Mon, 28 Apr 2014
Source: New Yorker, The (US)
Copyright: 2014 Conde Nast Publications Inc.
Contact: http://www.newyorker.com/contact/letterToEditor
Website: http://www.newyorker.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/847
Author: Trish Randall

INSIDE JOBS

Jeffrey Toobin's piece on the inmates and staff at the Baltimore City 
Detention Center illustrates the devastation of human lives and 
communities which decades of drug prohibition have wrought ("This Is 
My Jail," April 14th). Most American drug-prohibition enforcement is 
in minority communities, even though drug use among minorities is 
virtually no higher than it is in the white population. With a large 
percentage of the young men from minority neighborhoods locked up, 
and few opportunities for young women to make a living wage as 
anything other than their jailers, sex, romance, smuggling, and gangs 
within detention facilities should come as no surprise. Even after 
huge expenditures, the erosion of civil rights across the country, 
and the disruption of communities and families, drugs are still 
available both outside and inside our jails and prisons. It is 
baffling that anyone would think that mere regime and policy changes 
could improve the conditions in jails, communities, or in the country at large.

Trish Randall

Vancouver, Wash.
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