Experts: Jail is no remedy

• Incarceration's failure carries a heavy price, criminal justice conference is told.

Experts gathered Tuesday in Detroit for a summit on what some have called the epidemic of incarceration, and concluded that no nation can spend $50 billion a year to hold 2 million citizens behind bars -- not without paying an unacceptable price, both economically and socially. Author and Columbia University Professor Manning Marable explained to the gathering at Detroit's Opera House that nearly 1 in 5 Americans now has a record of having been jailed; making it a problem that bridges racial lines but rarely economic and social status. The daylong summit, entitled "Rebuild Lives: Restoration, Reformation and Rehabilitation," examined the U.S. criminal justice system. Marable called for a new civil rights movement "to heal ourselves" and overcome what he described as a new form of color-blind racism that believes equality has been legislated and requires no further attention. He said this view ignores the stark reality of continued economic, educational and social inequality. Nonviolent drug offenders make up the majority of the prison population and most of them are Hispanic or African -American. Many are serving long, mandatory sentences imposed during the past 20 years by tough-on-crime politicians. [more]