The Privatision of Prisons threatens justice

The passage of the Corrections (Contract Management of Prisons) Amendment Bill this week is a disaster for anyone concerned about a safer, more humane and just society. It represents nothing less than a return to the age of human slavery. Private prisons turn inmates into commodities.

The profit motive is the singular distinguishing feature of a private prison system. It changes the nature of the prison system, and more broadly, the criminal justice system. All other objections brought by reformers and opponents of privatisation could easily be made of the public system in varying degrees. This is not to excuse the private system from these objections; it is only to say that the entire prison system, regardless of who runs it, is deeply flawed founded as it is for social control of the poor and marginalised in society.

In an opinion piece for the Dominion Post in early 2009, Corrections Minister Judith Collins expounded on the wealth of opportunities that privatisation offered noting, ‘By changing the law to allow private management of prisons, we are giving ourselves a choice.’ She proceeded to observe that, ‘Allowing private firms to provide custodial services creates an opportunity to benefit from private sector know-how.’[1]

Prisoners, of course, are not given a choice. If they were they would not likely choose to be incarcerated by several of the companies who have indicated that they are interested in running NZ’s prisons. These include:

GEO Group

The GEO group is a multinational corporation that claims it is ‘a world leader in privatised correctional and detention management.’[2] In addition to corrections, their services include immigration detention; facilities design construction and management; and health services and residential treatment (including sex offender treatment). GEO previously ran the Auckland Central Remand Prison when it was under private contract in 2000-2005. The horror stories about it abound, here are but two examples:

At the company’s Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, Washington, federal prosecutors charged a GEO prison administrator in September 2008 with “knowingly and wilfully making materially false, fictitious, and fraudulent statements to senior special agents.” Two months before the fraud charges, a study by the Seattle University School of Law and the non-profit group OneAmerica reported that conditions at the Tacoma facility violated both international and domestic laws that grant detained immigrants the right to food, due process and humane treatment. [3]

AND

In 2007, the firm settled a lawsuit with the family of an inmate for $200,000. LeTisha Tapia, a 23-year-old woman incarcerated at the GE0-owned Val Verde Correction Facility in southern Texas, told her family in July 2004 that she had been raped and beaten after being locked in the same cellblock with male inmates. Shortly after, she had hung herself in her cell.’[4]

The previous National government deemed GEO possessed the requisite ‘expertise capacity and capability’ to manage the Auckland Remand prison. Given their obvious qualifications, they will no doubt be high on the list of providers for a renewed round of prison privatisation

G4S

G4S, a multinational security company, operates nine juvenile and adult custody facilities in the UK and USA, eight immigration facilities in the Netherlands and operates police custody suites in the UK. In addition, it also guards US defence facilities, supports the US military, provides US embassy security in 39 countries, and protects the Kazakhstan pipeline.[5]

G4S involvement with the US military should be cause enough for alarm, so should their protection of NATO facilities. The company is providing ‘security’ for a militaries involved in torture and wars of aggression in Iraq and Afghanistan along with support for major oil and gas corporations who bear a large responsibility for the world’s instability.

For many people, the issue of private prisons is an abstract idea. It might sit uncomfortably as something that is ‘probably not a good idea’ or it might be something that you don’t think matters much one way or the other.

However, it is not abstract. It is very real – and not only to the people who are behind bars. Private prisons fundamentally change the nature of the justice system. This highly publicised US example puts into stark relief the effect of the profit motive in the justice system:

‘As many as 5,000 children in Pennsylvania have been found guilty, and up to 2,000 of them jailed, by two corrupt judges who received kickbacks from the builders and owners of private prison facilities that benefited. The two judges pleaded guilty in a stunning case of greed and corruption. The judges received $2.6 million in kickback while imprisoning children who often had no access to a lawyer.’[6]

Aotearoa New Zealand already has the 2nd highest rate of imprisonment in the Western world. The rate of imprisonment of Maori should be our national shame. Private prisons do affect all of us, not least because many of us have friends and whanau on the inside. Private prisons are a profound step to dehumanisation. Changes by the National government to ‘overhaul the justice system’ will not help, because the problem isn’t spiraling crime and the need for more prisons, it is social inequality. That is something, we can be sure from past experiences, the National government will do nothing about.

Notes:

[1]Judith Collins. 2009. ‘By changing the law to allow private management of prisons, we are giving ourselves a choice.’ The Dominion Post. March 26, pB5.
[2]GEO Group. 2009. ‘What we do.’ GEO website. http://www.thegeogroupinc.com/whatwedo.asp
[3]Erin Rosa. 2009. ‘GEO Group, Inc.: Despite a Crashing Economy, Private Prison Firm Turns a Handsome Profit.’ Corpwatch. 1 March. http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=15308
[4]Ibid
[5]G4S. 2009 Corporate website. http://www.g4s.com/home/our_services/government_expertise.htm
[6]Amy Goodman. 2009. ‘Jailing kids for cash.’ Truthdig.com. 17 February. www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090217_kids_for_cash/

ENDS

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