NEWS

November 2 , 2007
Scare black youth straight so they can avoid racist system

To many black prisoners, Iowa is perceived as having America's most racist criminal-justice system. They point to the fact that Iowa leads the nation in racial disparities; more blacks per capita are in Iowa's prisons than in any other state. They believe that prosecutions for drug offenses in Iowa's 99 counties predominately target them for harsher penalties that lead to prison instead of alternative community-treatment programs and probation.

Is this true or just sour grapes by black drug offenders? National studies of drug use and experimentation among young people remain constant and equal, regardless of race. So what factors are at work to explain the great disparity? To parents of black youth in Iowa: You have but one reasonable course of action - inform your children that Iowa's criminal-justice system will target, tag, bag, then drop them off in prison for drug infractions.

Political correctness built on a foundation of hypocrisy and the illusion of fairness may work at the first-in-the-nation caucuses, but eliminate lies when talking with your black children (especially black males) to protect them from Iowa's criminal-justice system.

This sense of alienation among black prisoners in Iowa is real and growing. Public policies to address this inequality are needed now. And since government policy helped create the environment for this problem, the policymakers bear some responsibility to create solutions.

James W. Hall,
Inmate, Anamosa State Penitentiary,

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