Do you Agree with Sherrif Joe?

i think it’s a good idea to have them work with the animals. that’s been shown to be a good source of therapy, and they’ve used it with seniors who are depressed/ill as well. it’s better than just killing the animals, as well.

the whole idea of the tent city, etc. is a good idea, but eventually someone’s going to die or something, and that’ll change. Again, i understand the rational behind it – if you make it is as unpleasant as possible, and somewhat embarrassing, they’ll think twice before they come back.

i think it’s crazy that there’s a law that saws prisoners have to have cable.

There is a prison in Ohio that takes in animals, potty trains them, trains them in general and then adopt them out. I think this is an excellent idea. The tent idea, I don’t know. I would hate for someone to die that way, but as the sheriff says, the soldiers in Iraq are living the same way. Cable should not be given to prisoners. I agree with taking away weights and porn. It just creates tension. All in all, I think the sheriff’s ideas are good ones. Let me just add this though, I don’t have any loved ones in prison, so maybe I wouldn’t be so agreeable to the harsh treatment.

my thoughts exactly. My brother routinely complains about how inmates don’t worry about jail in the least, because honestly, it’s easier to spend life in jail than to survive in horrible conditions on the street. So getting convicted isn’t a scary possibility. He works in a maximum security prison that’s supposedly one of the harshest in NY. He says his Warden has gotten plenty of flack for being harsh on prisoners(and by harsh they mean limiting their tv time, making them pay for it, etc.)

To be honest, I think Sherrif Joe is pretty hilarious. Pink?... PINK?! that’s awesomely clever. as well as using his farm to feed the prison, and cutting costs with stray animal care. Imagine if actions like this were taken on a national scale, saving 15 million dollars per budget nation wide would equate to billions of dollars, not to mention the other ways he has saved Arizona Money.

@chyna I could see why loved ones of prisoners wouldn’t agree to his policies as well. and if anyone does have family or friends in prison, please comment because I think bringing in all three sides(neutral party[having no affiliation to the prison system] Prison Enforcement[CO’s] and former prisoners or family of prisoners) would provide for a great conversation.

Yes. I live in Arizona now and feel for sheriff Joe in that he doesn’t want to see this state continue to be number in the nation for all riff raff. AZ is already #1 for meth, #1 for dogfighting, trying hard not to be #1 for penitenteries. The only people who need fear are the ones doing wrong.

If this quote is true, I love it, ‘It’s 120 degrees in Iraq and our soldiers are living in tents too and they have to wear full battle gear but they didn’t commit any crimes so shut your mouths!”

I can’t believe anyone would say a good word about that (insert worst insult you can think of here).

This might be a wake-up call:

http://americasvoiceonline.org/page/-/resources/sheriffjoe.pdf

Now, the few bucks he saves the county are NOTHING compared to what Maricopa is paying in settlements for dead inmates.

Erch, you know what, I can’t even discuss this guy without getting all…..wrrrrrr. If there has ever been a head of a corrections dept. or Sheriff that should be in jail himself it’s Arpaio. Inmate abuse at record highs, inmates housed in tents at temps of 110+, dereliction of duties, using office for private gain, and the list goes ON AND ON AND ON.

@TaoSan, I will have to look around for an article I read about this guy a while ago. There were things in that article not listed in the link above. Scarier things.

Personally, I think the guy is an egomaniac with his priorities out of whack. Yes, he’s had some great ideas and implemented some very effective programs. That doesn’t mean he should be allowed to do whatever he wants.

If you want to know more aboutif his methods are successful or not, read the Arizona university study on his operation.

@TaoSan aside from racism, it doesn’t really bring up any issues with his prison policies, which is what we’re discussing. You are right though that he needs limits, as do we all, but that still doesn’t take away from the methods he uses in the prison systems. I view it more or less as this, take the good methods, root out the bad.

@ABoyNamedBoobs03

Normally, I would agree with you, really. But in Arpaio’s case applying this logic would be like saying, well, a certain German dictator did “some” good things too, like, build the Autobahn for example.

Few, very few people are so evil that you just can’t pick one of the three good things they did.

And on top, if Arpaio does something, you can be sure his agenda is self-serving. Let me guess, one of his buddies is a pet food supplier maybe?

(That is not to say that I don’t subscribe to the fact that animals may have a rehabilitative effect on delinquents).

@MissAusten
Don’t get me started…

@TaoSan see – that’s what i figured. someone is bound to die under those conditions.

@eponymoushipster

Yeah, but the heat is only one factor. Arpaio’s goon squad have pulled off everything from beating the crap out of a paraplegic because he “fought”, to killing an epileptic guy because his seizure was considered a “struggle”.

Sweden has a moratorium on extraditing delinquents to Maricopa because a high court decided that the living conditions in Phoenix are “inhumane”.

This guy is a danger to the public, nothing less

Well, I couldn’t find the article, but the wiki page about him has convinced me that being arrested by his dept. is very bad for your health, especially if you happen to be disabled, mentally ill, pregnant, or diabetic. I don’t have much sympathy for criminals who have actually been proven guilty, but these people don’t even get to make it to trial.

@TaoSan yikes. that has a very Cool Hand Luke vibe to it.

I think it’s wonderful what he does. If more prisons in the country did what he does, we’d have a lot of criminals think twice before they went to the wrong side of the law. These guys are in prison for a reason. If they were nice guys, they wouldn’t BE there in the first place. To many of our prisons are like hotels.

@jbfletcherfan

I disagree, they wouldn’t think twice about it, because when you commit a crime you think you won’t get caught, otherwise you wouldn’t commit the crime now would you?

As for hotel prisons, have you ever been in a prison, any prison? Probably not, right?

@TaoSan This is true. The bad asses don’t think they’ll get caught. That’s their superior mentality. This is where they need to be knocked down a peg or two. And it sounds like his system is just where that happens.

Again, I say ‘go for it, Joe.’

@jbfletcherfan, you’d think that would be the case. However, “In her book on prison policy The Use of Force by Detention Officers, Arizona State University criminal justice professor Marie L. Griffin reported on a 1998 study commissioned by Arpaio to examine recidivism rates based on conditions of confinement. Comparing recidivism rates under Arpaio to those under his predecessor, the study found “there was no significant difference in recidivism observed between those offenders released in 1989–1990 and those released in 1994–1995.”[53]”

His methods must not be that much of a deterrent. Like I said above, just because he’s had successful programs doesn’t mean he should be able to do whatever he wants, from killing people who haven’t even been to trial to intimidating and treatening to arrest reporters who attempt to look into PUBLIC records related to the department.

@jbfletcherfan

I respectfully disagree. MissAusten has nailed it to the point. I am definitely not for being “cushy” with criminals, but in the end, recidivism is the only number that counts.

I don’t want to know how many people get “pushed over the edge” by excessively harsh conditions in prisons. We HAVE TO consider that these people WILL be free again one day, moving in next to us maybe.

I rather have rehabilitated criminals than broken psychos come out of there.

@MissAusten: have you any links to reports or statistics within the current decade?

@MissAusten This is true. I agree with you on that part. I have also heard that he’s overstepped his authority. There needs to be a balance somewhere, I understand that.

@Taosan, you also have a good point. But like I said, he has done some good. This isn’t a debate to me. I see both sides.

@jbfletcherfan

I think we can agree on that :)

@TaoSan :-)

@TaoSan oh I’m not agreeing with the man. I’m agreeing with certain practices he has. Essentially, I’m not saying I like hitler, I’m saying that it’d be nice to have an autobahn in america, to use your analogy. get my drift?

Sounds like a lot of it is good, but some is crossing the line. Somewhere between there and California where prisoners get access to 24 hr dental, and desert at every meal should be good. The animal part is GREAT!
I should point out that there is a difference between a Jail that is managed by a sheriff and prisons that are managed by state government. Way more politics in prison.

@ABoyNamedBoobs03

I hear where you come from boobs, I merely think that the VERY little good that comes out if him wasn’t “by design” but coincidence and unexpected side effects.

For a civilian I’d say, yeah, what gives, ends justify the means. For an elected public official I simply have higher standards.

As others have said, the opportunity for prisoners to work with living things and nature is ideal. Being able to touch another being, like a puppy or a tomato, and help it thrive, has been proven to help nurture humanity in the hardened.

However, punishments must suit crimes. People don’t stop being human at the prison door. A guy busted for selling pot shouldn’t die from ungodly heat – it’s not a capital crime.

The guy gets voted back into office all the time, I bet, not because this way of doing things is “right,” but because it makes the voters feel superior and feeds their lust for revenge. People seem to need to be able to look down on others, and prisoners are a captive audience, so to speak.

Are prisons mostly for the rehabilitation and eventual reintroduction of prisoners, or are prisons mostly for the citizens on the outside? The answer to that question will tell us a lot, I think, about the rightness of this guy’s practices, and about the brutality of (or hope for) our society as a whole.

@laureth

couldn’t have said it any better! LURVE

I don’t have a lot of faith in the deterrence value of harsh penal systems. From the standpoint of someone with a normally functioning ability to think of the consequences of their actions and repress their impulses, it seems to make sense. But I don’t think that those are the kinds of people who are likely to end up in prison anyway. i suspect Sheriff Joe’s harsher policies are popular more because they satisfy society’s desire to see lawbreakers suffer than because they actually work as a deterrent.

I also believe that nothing is gained by dehumanizing anyone. Many, if not most, of these guys are in this position because they’ve lost sight of their human worth and have no hope of fitting in to the fabric of society, so society becomes the enemy. Reinforcing that sense and then releasing them back into society just seems like a terrible idea.

As counterintuitive as it may seem, countries that have taken the opposite approach and made detention far less punitive and treat prisoners as human beings have had impressive results. The system often cited as the most liberal is Finland’s “open penitentiary” system (exhaustive description here ). Does this lead to hoards of criminals trying to get cushy treatment? Finland incarcerates a far smaller percentage of its population than does the US, and its recidivism rate is far lower.

I’ve know about “Sheriff Joe” and his obscene tactics for years. What a scary society we live in when someone like him gets accolades for what could be argued is torture. I find it both sad and disturbing that anyone would come to this thug’s defense. I wouldn’t even wish to see him suffer under the conditions he has put his prisioners under, although it would seem poetic justice.

@VzzBzz , I just spent 45 minutes searching for more recent recidivism rates for Maricopa county. Other than a couple of unsubstantiated reader comments posted after articles (one said 17% and the other said 90% with no reference as to where those numbers came from), there was nothing. A few articles had some information of specific groups, like juveniles or drug addicts, but no statistics for the prison population as a whole.

Sorry! Maybe someone better at googling and not distracted by three kids will have better luck.

@MissAusten

I’m not surprised. His PR machine and legal department are some of the most effective in the country.

They’re very good at suppressing information over there, years of practice…

I think his harsh tactics, not all, but some, are acceptable. The pink, that’s fine, the pets and county owned farming, a ok with me. putting them out in the heat? I see the logic, but to what ends? pissing off already violently dangerous inmates in close quarters with limited COs to monitor? Putting people into violent surroundings breeds violence in those people, regardless if you’re naturally violent or not, it can turn the most passive people into violent offenders, our prison systems are designed to keep criminals criminals.

@TaoSan, I noticed in the quote I posted above, it said the sheriff himself commisioned the study on recidivism rates.

Maybe he hasn’t commisioned another one because he didn’t like the way the first one turned out.

@MissAusten

Yep, you can find a lot of “anecdotal” stuff about how he tried to convince that professor lady to tip it in his favor, but all very “subjective” stuff, so not suitable for quoting.

I guess he gave up on science after that one.

Working hard and working with animals makes sense. Seems good.

When it comes to crimes, I don’t believe that you can scare people from committing crimes with long and tough jail time or even capital punishment. Why? Because nobody who commits crimes ever plan to get caught.

You can see jail time as either punishment or an opportunity for change. One thing feels quite obvious. If the person who leaves the jail is no different or worse morally, than the person that entered, the good people of the community who sent him there, has to deal with the same – or worse – problem yet again. If jail is seen as only punishment, you leave it up to the inmate to better himself. It’s possible they will. Most likely not.

A person who gets help to become a better person, and gets help after prison to stay away from the bad environments and people that spurs criminal life, has a good chance to become a resource for the society, not a burden.

I miss the constitution…

Bill Of Rights, Amendment 8: Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

I haven’t read any above comments, so sorry if this is repetitious. To me, it seems as if he’s one of the few in the system who is literally “rehabilitating” prisoners. And he is doing it in very creative and synergistic ways. If his example was the model for the privatized prison industry, then I would set aside my belief that we are intentionally creating a prisoner class for corporate profit.

Regarding the ACLU, I see nothing wrong with either point of view, and say let’s the courts decide.

Also, I’m just going on what’s been presented. If there’s another side of the story, that may change my opinion.

My caveat is

I have no problem with prisoners being required to work, especially with animals and farming their own food. What I do have a problem with is inhumane living conditions, his focus on illegal immigration, and him being a general asshole.