San Francisco is My Home

15
Oct

Doing time

Author: kris, Category: News

Sheriff Michael Hennessy has been forced to release a bunch of petty criminals back onto the streets recently. As taxpayers demand more arrests of drug users, petty thieves, etc., the jails fill up way beyond capacity and we wind up drastically curtailing peoples’  sentences to regain bed room. 

In The Wizard of Oz books, L. Frank Baum describes the jail of Oz as a luxurious palace where every want is provided for — except the desire for liberty. “Yes, we have to lock people up, but that’s no reason to treat them like animals,” says the Clockwork Girl of Oz or someone. Even as a kid I remember wondering who exactly was paying for all this luxury.

Anyway, that’s a digression, but one that often comes to mind when I consider our penal system, especially when I consider that inmates were being forced to sleep on the floor before the Sherriff started releasing people.

Maybe the jail overload will turn out to be a blessing, forcing judges to start getting creative with sentencing. Maybe it will lead to more treatment programs and less useless jail time. I will continue to be happy and optimistic about all this, right up until I get mugged by a recently-released felon.