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Privatized corrections
Author(s) -
Eisen LaurenBrooke
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
criminology and public policy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.6
H-Index - 33
eISSN - 1745-9133
pISSN - 1538-6473
DOI - 10.1111/1745-9133.12447
Subject(s) - statutory law , prison , accountability , law , state (computer science) , government (linguistics) , work (physics) , economic justice , ideology , political science , misconduct , business , public administration , law and economics , sociology , engineering , politics , mechanical engineering , linguistics , philosophy , algorithm , computer science
Research Summary In this article, I look at some of the statutory and case law that has shaped the evolving regulation of the private prison industry. I also examine some critical gaps in legal issues regarding private contractors that manage prisons, jails, and detention facilities. The privatization of justice encompasses all for‐profit firms that make money in the prison‐industrial complex. Critical unanswered legal questions run the gamut from whether it is legal for corporations to pay undocumented detainees to work inside detention centers to whether it is legal for a private probation company to extend a probationer's supervision. Policy Implications The United States has never fully wrestled with many of the questions that private prisons raise. As private firms stretch across state lines contracting with the government at the local, state, and federal levels, their authority and accountability is not always settled law. Additionally, moral considerations have infrequently made their way into America's jurisprudential history in grappling with issues around privatizing corrections, raising possibilities of future litigation focusing on ideological grounds.