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Prisons and Public Safety: Learning from the "Gitmo North" debate

By Jonathan Simor

President Obama's announcement that the federal government will buy a mothballed supermax prison in northern Illinois (the fact that the such a facility was empty is itself an intriguing signal that the war on crime is drawing down) is bringing a new wave of criticism (mostly from Republicans) that this endangers public safety. As Helene Cooper and David Johnston, reporting in the NYTimes, summarize the thrust of concern:?The administration has failed to explain how transferring terrorists to Gitmo North will make Americans safer than keeping terrorists off of our shores in the secure facility in Cuba,? Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Senate Republican leader, said in a statement. Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the House Republican leader, told reporters he would not vote to ?spend one dime to move those prisoners to the U...continue to full post

Full post as published by Governing Through Crime on December 16, 2009 (boomark / email).