Associated Press – July 7, 2007:
After months alone in his cell, Scot Noble Payne finished 20 pages of letters, describing to loved ones the decrepit conditions of the prison where he was serving time for molesting a child. Then Payne used a razor blade to slice two 3-inch gashes in his throat. Guards found his body in the cell’s shower, with the water still running.
Hundreds of pages of documents obtained by The Associated Press through an open-records request show Idaho did little monitoring of out-of-state inmates, despite repeated complaints from prisoners, their families and a prison inspector.
“They cut corners because the bottom line is making money,” said Caylor Rolling, prison program director at Partnership for Safety and Justice in Portland, Ore., a group that promotes prison alternatives.
So what exactly were the problems in the prison?
no substance-abuse treatment, and a complete lack of Idaho-sanctioned anger-management classes and pre-release programs.
inadequate church services, poor food and limited recreation time.
sewage from adjacent cells, poor medical and dental care, and a lack of educational programs.
Yeah, awful stuff, smelly room, no free education, and poor medical attention, sort of like the real world for the poor. Now in comparison, let’s look at prison life in Japan. Here’s a good quote, although I strongly suggest you read the rest here.
The cell I was placed in this time had the window blocked and wreaked of piss. The walls were moldy and the floor surrounding the toilet was too. There were lots of bugs to keep me company. Everything was taken out of the cell except for a filthy mattress. It was explained to me that I would have to sit in the middle of my cell and face my door all day long [from 7:30am-5:00pm]. I was told to keep my hands on my lap and not to move. That was my existence for an entire month! The little bit of rice and soup I had previously received, my daily allotment, was cut in half. If I wanted to use the toilet, I had to wait until the guard gave the signal twice daily. No exercise and 1 x 15minute shower every ten days! I was caught on several occasions exercising in my cell and time was added to my solitary confinement. After about 40 days, I was taken out of solitary and placed back in a factory to work.
I am only the 2nd American to be transferred out of Japan. Apparently, the Japanese prison authorities know that we will receive better treatment in American prisons, so they are making foreigners serve at least 50% of our sentences in Japan before they will agree to let us transfer.
When I arrived at the federal detention center in Los Angeles, I felt like I had died and gone to Disneyland. The difference in the two prison systems is incredible! The treatment I received in the American prison was humane and tolerable. The Japanese system lacks any trace of humanity.
The Japanese don’t have a bit over 2% of their population incarcerated, mostly from drug related offenses. Its our reactionary drug laws and mandatory sentencing that’s costing a fortune in the US to house prisoners.
1. “Its our reactionary drug laws and mandatory sentencing that’s costing a fortune in the US to house prisoners.”
First, you should read what I linked, because the story out of Japan arises out of 1 kilo of hashish.
Second, could it be that Japan has a lower rate of incarceration because their prisons are tougher, while we in the US face 80% recidivism rates because the most prisoners have to complain about here is the smell and the lack of free stuff?
Healthy prison conditions cost less to maintain than crappy. Because the cost of maintaining the health of inmates is part of it. It’s dollars and cents and nothing to do with blaming everything on someone’s politics.
Poor, guy. I feel so badly for him. How could we, in a civilized society, treat our child molesters so poorly. He will be missed.
3. “Healthy prison conditions cost less to maintain than crappy”
It appears to me that Scot Noble Payne’s incarceration is pretty cheap.
#2, SN
You’re a sick puppy. What happens in Japan is a Japanese problem, not an American one. Apples and oranges. Don’t use one phuked up system with another. There are many Japanese customs we would never approve of in this country.
A man committed suicide because he was driven to despair. He was sentenced for committing a crime, for a period of incarceration. He wasn’t sentenced to be mentally tortured.
Yes, tortured. I realize many assholes love to get their pleasure from other’s suffering and feel anyone in prison only deserve the worst. If that is your bent then may you never experience the pain you inflict on others. But I know, the world is there for your benefit and pleasure, not that YOU would ever get caught.
Repeatedly it has been shown that prisoners given remedial training, counseling, medical treatment, and after release assistance do better and have much lower recidivism rates then prisoners not helped. As a cost to the taxpayer and society, the answer is obvious.
I hope the family sue the company into oblivion. And phuk those who claim this would be a frivolous lawsuit.
6. “Don’t use one phuked up system with another”
People bitch about how high our rate of incarceration is in the US. Using Japan as an example I pointed out exactly why it’s so low in the rest of the world. And as I already said, our recidivism rate is nearly 80%. Prison life cannot be that bad if 80% choose to go back.
“A man committed suicide because he was driven to despair.”
Or he committed suicide because he did a terrible thing and really felt bad about it. Were you in his mind when he pulled his plug? I certainly wasn’t.
“He wasn’t sentenced to be mentally tortured.”
What exactly was the mental torture? The lack of free education or the lack of free medical care? Because if either of those are torture, then every poor person in the US is being mentally tortured.
“Repeatedly it has been shown that prisoners given remedial training, counseling, medical treatment, and after release assistance do better and have much lower recidivism rates then prisoners not helped.”
Or we could do what Japan does for a heck of a lot less!
“I hope the family sue the company into oblivion. And phuk those who claim this would be a frivolous lawsuit.”
Like I said, the liberals will jeer!
I find it interesting that in Japan they allow all matter of manga, video and computer game that deals directly with child sex. So there this man would have been catered to with all manner of media and here they are incarcerated.
BUT if you smuggle a kilo of drugs, you get locked up in terrible conditions and here you waltz out because there is not enough room for all the drug dealers and users.
It would seem to me that both crimes are equal in peril.
Cursor_
They’re called “prisons” for a reason, people. They’re not supposed to be country clubs.
Can’t do the time? Don’t do the crime.
Can’t do the time? Don’t do the crime.
Tell that to Scooter and Mr. Bush and all their ardent supporters!
#7, SN
Ya, right,
Prison life cannot be that bad if 80% choose to go back.
So why do they go back?
11. “So why do they go back?”
Um, because prison is not that bad?! Are you having trouble reading today?
To put it another way, the benefits of crime outweigh the admitted “Disneyland” like punishment of a US prison.
Both these cases – the suicidal pederast and the hash smuggler caught in a foreign prison system – are far enough out of the ordinary to deserve special mention. They’re interesting. But they’re not typical and using them to draw sweeping conclusions about prison systems in either country makes no sense to me.
[Duplicate post. – ed.]
12. Anyone who says a U.S. prison is like Disneyland has never been to prison… and/or Disneyland.
He used a RAZOR BLADE? wtf kind of security do they have at that “privatized” prison?? I thought they took away your shoelaces and belt in an effort to prevent this kind of thing. And they let the guy have a razor blade? I’m surprised they didn’t loan him a gun, just to make things easier.
If we want to legalize torture, mistreatment, and Lubyanka-style prisons, we should just legalize them. Not just privatize out government services with the implicit knowledge that the love of money will serve the same purpose.
Figgers this would happen in Texas.
#7,
Or we could do what Japan does for a heck of a lot less!
Nope. It costs as much as $100,000 per year to keep someone behind bars. That doesn’t include the cost to society for the support for his family, for any future crimes, or the next trial. It also doesn’t include the contribution to society the prisoner can make. Instead, Americans, as a whole, have this vengeance aspect that requires them to be as mean spirited as possible.
Most prisoners are held as long as possible before being released, many never having parole. They report to overworked Parole Officers that don’t have enough time to check that their charge reported and pissed cleanly. There is little help in finding a job. The jobs that most ex-cons qualify for don’t pay a living wage and usually have no benefits. For many, their housing is restricted. For most their travel is restricted. Their records will haunt them whenever they do try to reintegrate.
Some might get some help with addictions or mental illnesses. Most won’t. Some might get counseling to help with anger management or coping. Most won’t. Some might get some training or education. Most won’t.
That is the recipe to help them re-offend and go right back in. Society has the money to help ex-cons reintegrate. We would rather spend it in keeping them incarcerated though. Just so some people can crow about a horrendous recidivism rate.
15. “Anyone who says a U.S. prison is like Disneyland has never been to prison… and/or Disneyland.”
Gee, if you don’t have time to read the links, at least take the time to read my blurb up above. The “Disneyland” quote did not come from me, it came from the guy who served both in Japanese and US prisons.
17. Nope. It costs as much as $100,000 per year to keep someone behind bars.
Your thinking is usually on the ball, you’re having an off day.
I’ll agree with you about the cost of prison per person. To avoid recidivism you want to spend additional money on programs to make the prisoners feel good about themselves. Basically you want them to relive their public school years, something the vast majority of prisoners had voluntarily dropped out of.
I want to make prison so incredibly awful no one would ever want to go back. I also think the stays should be much shorter. Intense but relatively quick. Since my “system” offers no tax subsidized programs, mine is necessarily cheaper and would undoubtedly lead to a lower recidivism rate. So it would actually be more successful for a lower cost.
“That doesn’t include the cost to society for the support for his family”
This shows you’re just clueless about reality. These guys in prison did not support their families prior to their convictions. God, what planet are you from? At best they use their baby mommas, several of them at a time, for support. To borrow money from, to borrow cars from, to have a place to sleep.
The recidivism rate for child molesters is the highest – conversely, despite dozens of sincere, well-funded attempts at developing am effective rehabilitation therapy for them, none has succeeded in lowering the rate more than a token amount.
At the current state of psychological science, we can’t rehabilitate the great majority of child molesters. Most reoffend within 6 months of their release. They are compulsive, and we have no cure for it.
And as far as that’s concerned, the penalty for the forcible rape of prepubescent children should include death.
Suicide is painless, it brings on many changes…
Well, it certainly gave us one less uncontrollable monster to concern ourselves with…
>>And as far as that’s concerned, the penalty for the forcible
>>rape of prepubescent children should include death.
Who said the guy ever forcibly raped a prepubescent child, Fish Man? He was serving seven to twenty for “lewd and lascivious conduct”. Sounds more like he was jerking off in front of an elementary school, rather than forcibly raping any prepubsecents.
In any case, that jail is riddled with scandal, from the warden who “exited”, to the guard who was fired for fucking prisoners; the list goes on.
Yet another “success” for Dumbya’s support of “outsourcing” things that should be kept in house. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!
I wasn’t remarking on him, specifically…
Anyway, putting incarceration of citizens in the hands of people who do it for profit is a mighty big incentive for those people’s friends in govt to make sure as many citizens get incarcerated as possible, so their friends continue to make money…
Pure fucking evil.
>>Pure fucking evil.
I’m with you on that one, Señor Pescado. Pure fucking evil. But hey, it’s Texas!
They have this fucking PR slogan here:
“Texas. It’s like a whole ‘nother country!”
The irony is, they have no idea how true that slogan is…
Good riddance. They should send pedophile priests to this prison… sounds like a model prison for pedophiles.
>>sounds like a model prison for pedophiles.
So far, nobody has offered any evidence that the guy was a “pedophile”. He was doing time for “lewd and lascivious conduct”. Maybe he grabbed some hooker’s tit in a pickup bar. Maybe he kissed some girl that didn’t want to be kissed. Maybe a neighbor was peeking in his window and saw him watching porno.
While everybody thinks that pedophiles and those who “forcibly rape prepubescent children” should be dealt with harshly, there’s no evidence that these fucked-up for-profit prisons in Texas are doing anything to make life safer or better for us law-abiding citizens.
It’s just a scam, so somebody can make money.
Happy now?
“Texas. Where the mean-spirited come to rule.”
The whole thing about shorter, more brutal sentences would make better sense if, as in Mexico, small-time drug offenders and other nonnviolent, no-victim “criminals” weren’t jailed. But in the U.S. prisoners are used to make money in all kinds of ways. Selecting for the least violent, least troublesome ones simply makes economic sense, unless you have something resembling a heart.
#28
So, the he was serving time for molesting a child in the article was just a filler? According to this article, he was sentenced to serve until 2022 for child molestation.