Day1-2 掃除生詞
Jail break-Reforming prisons
America’s approach to incarceration is an expensive failure. It does not have to be this way
incarceration?
noun BrE //?n?kɑ?s??re??n//; NAmE //?n?kɑ?rs??re??n//[uncountable](formal)
the act of putting somebody in prison or in another place from which they cannot escape; the state of being there
SYNONYM imprisonment
There have been angry protests about his arrest and incarceration.
Donald Trump’s attorney-general, Jeff Sessions, has just torn it up.
tear (something) up
tear something ? up phrasal verb (see also tear)
1. to tear a piece of paper or cloth into small pieces SYN rip up:
She tore up his letter and threw it away.
2. to remove something from the ground by pulling or pushing it violently:
the remains of trees that had been torn up by the storm
3. tear up an agreement/a contract etc to say that you no longer accept an agreement or contract:
threats to tear up the peace agreement
This month he ordered prosecutors to aim for the harshest punishments the law allows, calling his new crusade against drug dealers “moral and just”.
cru?sade /kru:?se?d/ noun
1~ (for/ against sth) | ~ (to do sth) a long and determined effort to achieve sth that you believe to be right or to stop sth that you believe to be wrong （長期堅(jiān)定不移的）斗爭，運(yùn)動(dòng) SYNCAMPAIGN
to lead a crusade against crime
領(lǐng)導(dǎo)長期打擊犯罪活動(dòng)的運(yùn)動(dòng)
a moral crusade
提倡道德的運(yùn)動(dòng)
2(sometimes Crusade) any of the wars fought in Palestine by European Christian countries against the Muslims in the Middle Ages （中世紀(jì)的）十字軍東征
cru?sade /kru:?se?d/ verb
[V] to make a long and determined effort to achieve sth that you believe to be right or to stop sth you believe to be wrong 長期堅(jiān)定不移地奮斗 SYNCAMPAIGN
It imprisons people for things that should not be crimes (drug possession, prostitution, unintentionally violating incomprehensible regulations) and imposes breath-takingly harsh penalties for minor offences. Under "Three strikes" rules, petty thieves have been jailed for life.
中國有句古話，“事不過三”。在美國，有項(xiàng)法律名為“Three Strikes Law”（“三振出局法”，意在嚴(yán)懲累犯），與我們的古話大有異曲同工之妙。
它的來源與棒球運(yùn)動(dòng)有關(guān)。在棒球用語中，有一句名言“Three strikes, and you are out”，意思是，棒球比賽中，擊球手若三次都未擊中投球手所投的球，必須得出局（“strike”在棒球術(shù)語中指“未被擊球手擊中的球”）。引申至法律，“Three Strikes Law”規(guī)定，因暴力或嚴(yán)重罪行“進(jìn)宮”兩次者，以后每被判一次，無論新罪嚴(yán)重與否，至少得服刑25年甚至是終身監(jiān)禁。
這下明白了，對有三次犯案的累犯而言，即使在隨后的25年里不老死獄中，重見天日時(shí)也已白發(fā)蒼蒼了。你說他能不完蛋嗎？
Statistics suggest that the three strikes law has helped reduce crime in California. 統(tǒng)計(jì)數(shù)字表明，“三擊出局法”有助于降低加州的犯罪率。
petty
/?p?t?; ?peti/ ADJ
1 a petty problem, detail etc is small and unimportant〔問題、細(xì)節(jié)等〕小的，瑣碎的，不重要的；同trivial :
petty squabbles 小口角
petty restrictions 小限制
2 unkind and caring too much about small unimportant things 小氣的，小心眼的，心胸狹窄的；只關(guān)注瑣事的：
How can she be so petty? 她怎么會(huì)那么小心眼？
petty jealousy and spitefulness 小心眼的嫉妒和怨恨
3 petty crime a crime that is not serious, for example stealing things that are not very valuable 輕罪
4 petty criminal/thief etc a criminal whose crimes are not very serious 輕罪犯/小竊賊等
5 a petty official is not important – used especially when they use their power as if they were important〔官員〕不重要的；芝麻綠豆大的〔尤用于擺架子的官員〕:
Some petty bureaucrat wanted all the documents in triplicate. 有些小官僚就希望所有文件都一式三份。
— pettiness N[U] :
the pettiness of Hollywood 好萊塢的狹隘
A ten-year sentence costs ten times as much as a one-year sentence, but is nowhere near ten times as effective a deterrent.
deterrent
/d??t??r?nt; d??ter?nt/ N[C]
1 something that makes someone less likely to do something, by making them realize it will be difficult or have bad results 制止物，威懾物，威懾力量：
The small fines for this type of crime do not act as much of a deterrent . 對這種罪行處以小額罰款起不到太大的威懾作用。
[+ to/for/against ]
Window locks are an effective deterrent against burglars. 窗鎖可以有效地阻止竊賊偷盜。
the deterrent effect of prison sentences 監(jiān)禁的威懾作用
2 nuclear deterrent the NUCLEAR weapons that a country has in order to prevent other countries from attacking it 核威懾力量
— deterrence N[U]
Also, because mass incarceration breaks up families and renders many ex-convicts unemployable, it has raised the American poverty rate by an estimated 20%.
render
/?r?nd?; ?rend?/ V[T]
1. to cause someone or something to be in a particular condition 使成為；使變得；使處于某種狀態(tài)：
render sb/sth impossible/harmless/unconscious etc
He was rendered almost speechless by the news. 聽到這個(gè)消息他幾乎說不出話來。
The blow to his head was strong enough to render him unconscious. 打在他頭上的這一下很重，使他昏了過去。
2. formal to give something to someone or do something, because it is your duty or because someone expects you to 【正式】給予，提供：
an obligation to render assistance to those in need 給有困難的人提供幫助的義務(wù)
render a decision/opinion/judgment etc
It is unlikely that the court will render an opinion before November 5. 法庭在 11 月 5 號(hào)以前不可能作出判決。
a bill of $3200 for services rendered (=for something you have done)3200 美元服務(wù)費(fèi)的一張賬單
3. to express or present something in a particular way〔以某種方式〕表達(dá)，表現(xiàn)：
render sth as sth
She made a sound that in print is rendered as ‘harrumph.’ 她發(fā)出一個(gè)聲音，寫下來就是 harrumph。
render sth sth
Infrared film renders blue skies a deep black. 紅外線膠卷可以把藍(lán)色的天空拍成深黑色。
render sth in sth
a sculpture rendered in bronze 一尊用青銅雕刻的雕像
4. render sth into English/Russian/Chinese etc formal to translate something into English, Russian etc 【正式】將某物譯成英語/俄語/漢語等
5. technical to spread PLASTER or CEMENT on the surface of a wall 【術(shù)語】粉刷；往〔墻上〕抹灰：
a brick wall that has been rendered and whitewashed 已經(jīng)抹上灰泥并粉刷好的磚墻
6. to melt the fat of an animal as you cook it 將〔脂肪〕熬成油，使熔化：
Steam the goose to render some of the fat. 把鵝肉蒸一蒸化掉一些油。
convict
/k?n?v?kt; k?n?v?kt/ V[T]
to prove or officially announce that someone is guilty of a crime after a TRIAL in a law court 證明[判定]…有罪；
反acquit :
convict sb of sth
She was convicted of shoplifting. 她被判犯有偷竊商店貨物罪。
convict sb on sth
He was convicted on fraud charges . 他被判犯有欺詐罪。
a convicted murderer 已定罪的謀殺犯
con·vict
/?kɑnv?kt; ?k?nv?kt/ N[C]
someone who has been proved to be guilty of a crime and sent to prison 已決犯；囚犯：
an escaped convict 越獄犯
Divert the less scary ones to drug treatment, community service and other penalties that do not mean severing ties with work, family and normality.
divert?
/da??v?:t; NAmE -?v?:rt?/ verb [VN] ~ sb/ sth (from sth) (to sth)
1.to make sb/ sth change direction 使轉(zhuǎn)向；使繞道；轉(zhuǎn)移
Northbound traffic will have to be diverted onto minor roads.
北行車輛將不得不繞次要道路行駛。
2.to use money, materials, etc. for a different purpose from their original purpose 改變（資金、材料等）的用途
3.to take sb's thoughts or attention away from sth 轉(zhuǎn)移（某人）的注意力；使分心 SYNDISTRACT
The war diverted people's attention away from the economic situation.
戰(zhàn)爭把民眾的注意力從經(jīng)濟(jì)狀況上移開了。
4(formal) to entertain people 娛樂；供消遣
Children are easily diverted.
孩子們很容易被逗樂。
Cognitive behavioural therapy—counselling prisoners on how to avoid the places, people and situations that prompt them to commit crimes—can reduce recidivism by 10-30%, and is especially useful in dealing with young offenders.
recidivist
/r??s?d?v?st; r??s?d%v%st/ N[C] technical
a criminal who starts doing illegal things again, even after he or she has been punished 【術(shù)語】累犯，慣犯
— recidivism N[U]
In America there are 27,000 state licensing rules keeping felons out of jobs such as barber and roofer.
roofer?
/?ru:f?(r)/ noun
a person whose job is to repair or build roofs 修理（或蓋）屋頂?shù)墓と?/p>
Appeals to make prisons more humane often fall on deaf ears; voters detest criminals.
fall on deaf ears
未被理睬，未受到重視
例句：
She would feel heart-broken if she knew that her advice to you had fallen on deaf ears.
如果她知道你把她的忠告當(dāng)成耳旁風(fēng)，她會(huì)很傷心的。
detest
/d??t?st; d??test/ V[T not in progressive 不用進(jìn)行式] formal
to hate something or someone very much 【正式】憎惡，憎恨，嫌惡：
Liz and Mo detested each other. 莉茲和莫相互憎惡對方。
— detestation /?dit??ste??n; ?di?te?ste??$n/ N[U]
Day3 背景知識(shí)補(bǔ)充
United States incarceration rate
In October 2013, the incarceration rate of the United States of America was the highest in the world, at 716 per 100,000 of the national population. While the United States represents about 4.4 percent of the world’s population, it houses around 22 percent of the world's prisoners. Corrections (which includes prisons, jails, probation, and parole) cost around $74 billion in 2007 according to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
In 2016, the Prison Policy Initiative estimated that in the United States that about 2,298,300 people were incarcerated in the United States, of which about 1,351,000 people were in state prison, 646,000 in local jails, 211,000 in federal prisons, 34,000 in youth correctional facilities, 33,000 in immigration detention camps, 14,000 in territorial prisons, 5,500 in civil commitment, 2,400 in Indian country jails, and 1,400 in United States military prisons.
Prison and jail population
Total U.S. incarceration (prisons and jails) peaked in 2008. Total correctional population peaked in 2007. If all prisoners are counted (including those juvenile, territorial, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) (immigration detention), Indian country, and military), then in 2008 the United States had around 24.7% of the world's 9.8 million prisoners.
The United States has the highest documented incarceration rate in the world, at 754 per 100,000 (as of 2009). As of December 31, 2010, the International Centre for Prison Studies (ICPS) at King's College London estimated 2,266,832 prisoners from a total population of 310.64 millionas of this date (730 per 100,000 in 2010).
This number comprises local jails with a nominal capacity of 866,782 inmates occupied at 86.4% (June 6, 2010), state prisons with a nominal capacity of approximately 1,140,500 occupied at approximately 115% (December31, 2010), and federal prisons with a nominal capacity of 126,863 occupied at 136.0% (December 31, 2010). Of this number, 21.5% are pretrial detainees (December 31, 2010), 8.7% are female prisoners (December 31, 2010), 0.4% are juveniles (June 6, 2009), and 5.9% are foreign prisoners (June 30, 2007).
The imprisonment rate varies widely by state; Louisiana surpasses this by about 100%, but Maine incarcerates at about a fifth this rate. A report released 28 February 2008, indicates that more than 1 in 100 adults in the United States are in prison.
According to a U.S. Department of Justice report published in 2006, over 7.2 million people were at that time in prison, on probation, or on parole (released from prison with restrictions). That means roughly 1 in every 32 Americans are under some sort of criminal justice system control.
Growth
A graph of the incarceration rate under state and federal jurisdiction per 100,000 population 1925–2008. (Omits local jail inmates. Topline = males. Bottom line = females. Middle line = combined.)
In the last forty years, incarceration has increased with rates upwards of 500% despite crime rates decreasing nationally. Between the years 2001 and 2012, crime rates (both property and violent crimes) have consistently declined at a rate of 22% after already falling an additional 30% in years prior between 1991 and 2001. As of 2012, there are 710 people per every 100,000 U.S. residents in the United States that are imprisoned in either local jails, state prisons, federal prisons, and privately operated facilities. This correlates to incarcerating a number close to almost aquarter of the prison population in the entire world. Mass incarceration is an intervening variable to more incarceration.
The Bureau of Justice Statistics has released a study which finds that, despite the total number of prisoners incarcerated for drug-related offenses increasing by 57,000 between 1997 and 2004, the proportion of drug offenders to total prisoners in State prison populations stayed steady at 21%. The percentage of Federal prisoners serving time for drug offenses declined from 63% in 1997 to 55% in that same period. In the twenty-five years since the passage of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, the United States penal population rose from around 300,000 to more than two million. Between 1986 and 1991, African-American women's incarceration in state prisons for drug offenses increased by 828 percent.
In 2009, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that the growth rate of the state prison population had fallen to its lowest since 2006, but it still had a 0.2% growth-rate compared to the total U.S. prison population. The California state prison system population fell in 2009, the first year that populations had fallen in 38 years.
When looking at specific populations within the criminal justice system the growth rates are vastly different. In 1977, there were just slightly more than eleven thousand incarcerated women. By 2004, the number of women under state or federal prison had increased by 757 percent, to more than 111,000, and the percentage of women in prison has increased every year, at roughly double the rate of men, since 2000. The rate of incarcerated women has expanded at about 4.6% annually between 1995 and 2005 with women now accounting for 7% of the population in state and federal prisons.
Comparison with other countries
Comparing some countries with similar percentages of immigrants, Germany has an incarceration rate of 76 per 100,000 population (as of 2014), Italy is 85 per 100,000 (as of 2015), and Saudi Arabia is 161 per 100,000 (as of 2013). Comparing other countries with a zero tolerance policy for illegal drugs, the rate of Russia is 455 per 100,000 (as of 2015), Kazakhstan is 275 per 100,000 (as of 2015), Singapore is 220 per100,000 (as of 2014), and Sweden is 60 per 100,000 (as of 2014).
Causes
A 2014 report by the National Research Council identified two main causes of the increase in the United States' incarceration rate over the previous 40 years: longer prison sentences and increases in the likelihood of imprisonment. The same report found that longer prison sentences were the main driver of increasing incarceration rates since 1990.
Increased sentencing laws
Even though there are other countries that commit more inmates to prison annually, the fact that the United States keeps their prisoners longer causes the total rate to become higher. To give an example, the average burglary sentence in the United States is 16 months, compared to 5 months in Canada and 7 months in England.
Looking at reasons for imprisonment will further clarify why the incarceration rate and length of sentences are so high. The practice of imposing longer prison sentences on repeat offenders is common in many countries but the three-strikes laws in the U.S. with mandatory 25 year imprisonment — implemented in many states in the 1990s — are statutes enacted by state governments in the United States which mandate state courts to impose harsher sentences on habitual offenders who are previously convicted of two prior serious criminal offenses and then commit a third.
Economic and age contributions
Crime rates in low-income areas are much higher than in middle to high class areas. As a result, Incarceration rates in low-income areas are much higher than in wealthier areas due to these high crime rates. When the incarcerated or criminal is a youth, there is a significant impact on the individual and rippling effects on entire communities. Social capital is lost when an individual is incarcerated. How much social capital is lost is hard to accurately estimate, however Aizer and Doyle found a strong positive correlation between lower income as an adult if an individual is incarcerated in their youth in comparison to those who are not incarcerated. 63 percent to 66 percent of those involved in crimes are under the age of thirty. People incarcerated at a younger age lose the capability to invest in themselves and in their communities. Their children and families become susceptible to financial burden preventing them from escaping low-income communities. This contributes to the recurring cycle of poverty that is positively correlated with incarceration. Poverty rates have not been curbed despite steady economic growth. Poverty is not the sole dependent variable for increasing incarceration rates. Incarceration leads to more incarceration by putting families and communities at a dynamic social disadvantage.
Drug sentencing laws
The "War on Drugs" is a policy that was initiated by Richard Nixon with the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970 and vigorously pursued by Ronald Reagan. By 2010, drug offenders in federal prison had increased to 500,000 per year, up from 41,000 in 1985. According to Michelle Alexander, drug related charges accounted for more than half the rise in state prisoners between 1985 and 2000. 31 million people have been arrested on drug related charges, approximately 1 in 10 Americans. In contrast, John Pfaff of Fordham Law School has accused Alexander of exaggerating the influence of the War on Drugs on the rise in the United States' incarceration rate: according to him, the percent of state prisoners whose primary offense was drug-related peaked at 22% in 1990. The Brookings Institution reconciles the differences between Alexander and Pfaff by explaining two ways to look at the prison population as it relates to drug crimes, concluding "The picture is clear: Drug crimes have been the predominant reason for new admissions into state and federal prisons in recent decades" and "rolling back the war on drugs would not, as Pfaff and Urban Institute scholars maintain, totally solve the problem of mass incarceration, but it could help a great deal, by reducing exposure to prison."
After the passage of Reagan's Anti-Drug Abuse Act in 1986, incarceration for non-violent offenses dramatically increased. The Act imposed the same five-year mandatory sentence on those with convictions involving crack as on those possessing 100 times as much powder cocaine. This had a disproportionate effect on low-level street dealers and users of crack, who were more commonly poor blacks, Latinos, the young, and women.
Courts were given more discretion in sentencing by the Kimbrough v. United States (2007) decision, and the disparity was decreased to 18:1 by the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010. As of 2006, 49.3% of state prisoners, or 656,000 individuals, were incarcerated for non-violent crimes. As of 2008, 90.7% of federal prisoners, or 165,457 individuals, were incarcerated for non-violent offenses.
By 2003, 58% of all women in federal prison were convicted of drug offenses. Black and Hispanic women in particular have been disproportionately affected by the War on Drugs. Since 1986, incarceration rates have risen by 400% for women of all races, while rates for Black womenhave risen by 800%. Formerly incarcerated Black women are also most negatively impacted by the collateral legal consequences of conviction.
According to the American Civil Liberties Union, “Even when women have minimal or no involvement in the drug trade, they are increasingly caught in the ever-widening net cast by current drug laws, through provisions of the criminal law such as those involving conspiracy, accomplice liability, and constructive possession that expand criminal liability to reach partners, relatives and bystanders."
These new policies also disproportionately affect African-American women. According to Dorothy E. Roberts, the explanation is that poor women, who are disproportionately black, are more likely to be placed under constant supervision by the State in order to receive social services. They are then more likely to be caught by officials who are instructed to look specifically for drug offenses. Roberts argues that the criminal justice system's creation of new crimes has a direct effect on the number of women, especially black women, who then become incarcerated.
Racialization and Reform Error
This disproportionality has stemmed in racialization for many years. It is important to understand the background of the war on drugs. The earliest influences can be seen in early Chinese immigration for railroad buildings. One of the first acts against drugs was the Opium Exclusion Act of 1909. It prohibited the smoking of opium, ingested by a vast percentage of caucasian housewives in America, but smoked mainly by Asian American immigrants coming to build the railroads. These immigrants were targeted with anti-Asian sentiment as America had a stigma that they came solely to take away jobs. Experts say that the easiest thing to do if we can't remove our problems by killing them is to throw them in jail, and America found a way to do this by criminalizing aspects of ethnic traditions and practices. [citation needed] This continued with African Americans and cocaine and led to the cycle that we now see today.
The Sentencing Reform Act emerged as the ultimate culmination to this. By going tough on crimes, the United States federal government tried to increase consistency on federal sentencing. This stemmed from a tough on crime campaign headed largely by Ronald Reagan. The Crime rate was steadily dipping by upwards of an average of 8 percent each year, and 12 percent in violent crime in the years preceding the bill pointing to numerous questions at the true motive of the bill. Many experts, such as Michael C. Campbell, a doctorate in the department of criminology at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, declares that the scheme of a war on crime was used for political action. Fear was created among the citizens of the state and thus the country looked to him to keep their doors safe. The effects of this bill on the incarceration are shown in the diagram to the right. The effects on crime per 100,000 capita released by the department of homeland security states that violent crimes remained to steadily decrease; however, in the 10 years following the bill, crimes such as rape, theft, robbery, and murder grew by 6, 4, 3, and 2 percent, respectively. It is important to understand the political domination that a war on drugs and crime created, and thus shapes the prison industrial complex today. While incarceration stays at an all time high, crime was actually decreasing.
The motivation for these acts can also be looked at from an economical lens as well. Private prison companies have 3.3 billion dollars in yearly revenue, once growing by over 175% yearly. Buying and trading goods produced by those in prisons stems from exploiting prisoners as free labor. The running of prisons costs numerous sums of money for American tax payers: 31,087 dollars per year per prisoner, just 3 thousand shy of the national average salary. Companies benefit greatly from the use of these prisoners and the construction of prisons and their infrastructure. This causes more and more tobe invested in prisons rather than reform programs to help guide individuals out of prison. Many towns have spawned as "prison-towns" in the last 70 years. These towns are run solely by the prison, and to keep its economy flourishing, jobs must be readily available. They solved this by building aprison and incarcerating more individuals for nonviolent crimes. With more prisoners comes more responsibility to hold the prisoners which creates more jobs. This scheme creates a vicious cycle of incarceration that is also duly responsible for the growth in the incarceration rate. Many experts believe the for-profit private prison expansion motivated by economic benefit, laid down by the foundation of the war on drugs, is the reason why the incarceration rate will remain to increase in the coming years.
It is important to analyze this from a logical perspective as well. Matthew De Michael (Ph. D from William Penn University) frankly states the issues with the American people regarding the recognition of the corruption hidden within the modern era of prisons. He states that the system has a fatal flaw, and though he believes parts are necessary, he notes that money is not invested in reform programs to help get prisoners out of jail and off with jobs. With prisoners coming out of prison with a felony, their chances of receiving a job, experts estimate, are reduced by 78%. To make ends meet, they will fall back into the cycle of drug dealing, and with laws continuing to become stricter and stricter, they will come back to prison. This makes for over-crowding and the ultimate expansion of jails.
Prison privatization
In the 1980s, the rising number of people incarcerated as aresult of the War on Drugs and the wave of privatization that occurred under the Reagan Administration saw the emergence of the for-profit prison industry. Prior to the 1980s, private prisons did not exist in the US.
In a 2011 report by the ACLU, it is claimed that the rise of the for-profit prison industry is a "major contributor" to “mass incarceration," along with bloated state budgets. Louisiana, for example, has the highest rate of incarceration in the world with the majority of its prisoners being housed in privatized, for-profit facilities. Such institutions could face bankruptcy without a steady influx of prisoners. A 2013 Bloomberg report states that in the past decade the number of inmates in for-profit prisons throughout the U.S. rose 44 percent.
Corporations who operate prisons, such as the Corrections Corporation of America and The GEO Group, spend significant amounts of money lobbying the federal government along with state governments. The two aforementioned companies, the largest in the industry, have been contributors to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which seeks to expand the privatization of corrections and lobbies for policies that would increase incarceration, such as three-strike laws and “truth-in-sentencing” legislation. Prison companies also sign contracts with states that guarantee at least 90 percent of prison beds be filled. If these "lockup quotas" aren't met, the state must reimburse the prison company for the unused beds. Prison companies use the profits to expand and put pressure on lawmakers to incarcerate a certain number of people. This influence on the government by the private prison industry has been referred to as the Prison–industrial complex.
The industry is well aware of what reduced crime rates could mean to their bottom line. This from the CCA's SEC report in 2010:
Our growth … depends on a number of factors we cannot control, including crime rates …[R] eductions in crime rates … could lead to reductions in arrests, convictions and sentences requiring incarceration at correctional facilities.
Editorial policies of major media
Gallup polling since 1989 has found that in most years in which there was a decline in the U.S. crime rate, a majority of Americans said that violent crime was getting worse.
A substantial body of research claims that incarceration rates are primarily a function of media editorial policies, largely unrelated to the actual crime rate. Constructing Crime: Perspectives on Making News and Social Problems is a book collecting together papers on this theme. The researchers say that the jump in incarceration rate from 0.1% to 0.5% of the United States population from 1975 to 2000 (documented in the figure above) was driven by changes in the editorial policies of the mainstream commercial mediaand is unrelated to any actual changes in crime. Media consolidation reduced competition on content. That allowed media company executives to maintain substantially the same audience while slashing budgets for investigative journalism and filling the space from the police blotter, which tended to increase and stabilize advertising revenue. It is safer, easier and cheaper to write about crimes committed by poor people than the wealthy. Poor people canbe libeled with impunity, but major advertisers can materially impact the profitability of a commercial media organization by reducing their purchases of advertising space with that organization.
News media thrive on feeding frenzies (such as missing white women) because they tend to reduce production costs while simultaneously building an audience interested in the latest development in a particular story. It takes a long time for a reporter to learn enough to write intelligently about a specific issue. Once a reporter has achieved that level of knowledge, it is easier to write subsequent stories. However, major advertisers have been known to spend their advertising budgets through different channels when they dislike the editorial policies. Therefore, a media feeding frenzy focusing on an issue of concern to an advertiser may reduce revenue and profits.
Sacco described how "competing news organizations responded to each other's coverage [while] the police, in their role as gatekeepers of crime news, reacted to the increased media interest by making available more stories that reflected and reinforced" a particular theme.” [T]he dynamics of competitive journalism created a media feeding frenzy that found news workers ’s natching at shocking numbers' and 'smothering reportsof stable or decreasing use under more ominous headlines.'"
The reasons cited above for increased incarcerations (US racial demographics, Increased sentencing laws, and Drug sentencing laws) have been described as consequences of the shift in editorial policies of the mainstream media.
Citizenship statistics
According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, 77.6% of Federal inmates are U.S. citizens (as of April 2016). 15.2% are citizens of Mexico, and the next three countries—Colombia, Cuba, and the Dominican Republic, contribute less than 1% each. 4.9% have other or unknown citizenship. The Bureau did not state how many had come to the U.S. legally.
