Letters: Crowding out justice in prisons

Re “Brown vows fight over prisons,� April 13

Federal courts have found the overcrowding and inmate healthcare in California’s prisons intolerable, even though Gov. Jerry Brown says officials are “doing the best job possible.� Maybe they’re both right and it’s the justice system itself that is beyond correction and rehabilitation.

Our high-imprisonment system has taken decades to build. It has been fed by harsher sentences without regard for recidivism or public safety; guilty pleas extorted from low-level offenders under pressure from multiple charges that carry long prison terms; the addiction of law enforcement and elected officials to the war on drugs; and released offenders who can’t get a job or the public assistance they need to live.

Any advance toward creating a justice system based on public safety rather than punitive tough talk would serve us all.

Joseph Maizlish

Los Angeles

How will all those ex-cons the federal courts have ordered released from prison find work? Where will they live?

I had my own experience with a “white-collar criminal� who, as many do, found Internet dating sites to be ripe with women eager to meet a potential mate. Of course, parolees tend to have more pressing concerns than love, asking for a few dollars or suggesting an overnight that turns into a free roof.

I was lucky. My ex-con shared his plight up front in his attempt at redemption. I was able to observe his fight for existence. I learned where ex-cons clean up, where they find food and how little the government helps them.

Not every ex-con comes out with the resources of a Michael Milken.

Patricia Wood

Pasadena

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