“Jail makes criminals”

Excerpt from Dwight, a defendant at the Hall of Justice in winter 2022.

Dwight: You know, it's like—it's like all these laws are made by all these different men. And well, pretty much mostly men—from the past. And like, these different men have different, like, life ideals and morals and stuff … and the populous is different: different men, different morals and ideals. Now, we kept all these laws, and we send all these people to one place. The same fucking place. [They’ve] broken different laws, but they're made by different men. For one place.  

Interviewer: Mm hmm.  

Dwight: Which is, I mean, it's kind of unfair. Not unfair—uh, it’s ridiculous. It doesn't solve anything. It actually hurts the problem. Because you turn somebody who otherwise wouldn't be such a hardened criminal, and you may have inadvertently turned him into a criminal. But, not—not—not just a criminal, but a hardened, jaded soul in a person, you know. Because like, even if he was a guy who just had a couple of unpaid parking tickets, you know, and he just, you know, the guy was, you know, he just, he made a mistake. And then, now he's in a cell with, you know, like, a really… like jaded fucking psychopath, sociopath, who... like um, through osmosis, is teaching this man how… to be... to have more compromised morals and, uh— just hard inside, you know?  

Interviewer: Mm. Mm hmm.  

Dwight: And if he’s lucky he may be hard outside, I don’t know—but, but, I mean, like seriously, like, it—it—it’s—it’s—It makes it … My brother, my big brother, always says, like—he says: “Jail makes criminals.”

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