Baltimore Report Calls For Alternatives To Prison For Black Men
Sunday, March 20, 2005 at 11:59AM
TheSpook
With one-fifth of Baltimore's black men in their 20s incarcerated, one research group advocating alternatives to prison is questioning the efficacy of imprisonment for lowering crime. More than half of Baltimore's black men in their 20s are in the criminal justice system, according to a study released Tuesday by the Washington-based Justice Policy Institute. Statewide, about one third are in prison or jail or on parole or probation, according to "Tipping Point: Maryland's Overuse of Incarceration and the Impact on Public Safety." The report combines Maryland incarceration statistics with conclusions from selected sociological studies and asks if much of the money spent on incarceration would be better spent on drug treatment and community redevelopment. "The basic idea is there are too many people locked up," said Eric Lotke, co-author of the report and research director for the Justice Policy Institute. "We basically said, 'We've got to tell people about this. We've got to connect these dots."' More than half the city's 25,000 black men between 20 and 30 are under the supervision of the justice system. Almost 10 percent of black men in their 20s statewide are in jail or prison, but in the city of about 650,000 people the percentage is nearly 20 percent, the study found. [more] and [more]
Article originally appeared on (http://brownwatch.com/).
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