Here is a Debate Case I typed in High School for the topic "For Profit Prisons Should Be Banned". Enjoy!
I stand in firm affirmation of the resolution resolved "For-profit prisons in the U.S.
should be banned". I give the following definition of for profit prisons from
Merriam Webster dictionary.For-profit prisons are prisons that exist for the
purpose of making a profit.
Contention 1: For profit prisons are unsafe.
There has been a plethora of reports questioning the safety of for profit prisons.
According to the Justice Department, there are 49% more staff assaults in for profit
prisons than public prisons and 65% more prisoner assaults in private prisons. So,
looking at this statistics, we are already seeing a drastic change in assaults in for
profit prisons than in public prisons.One such account of the questionable safety in
for profit prisons is an account by Dana Como, a corrections officer who has
worked in both private and public prisons in Colorado and she states that she felt
she had more safety in public prisons than in for profit prisons.She also stated that
she once had an encounter with a volatile inmate and was left alone with the
inmate for a half hour,and when she had reported for backup,she was left with no
response.Because of this and many other encounters she had with inmates at the
for profit prisons,she has sued the Colorado Corrections Committee, the committee
in charge of the for profit prisons in Colorado, and she won.There is also another
example of questionable safety in for profit prisons. In Crowley,Colorado there
was a riot of inmates at a for profit prison who smashed and destroyed property at
the for profit prison.The guards who were supposed to be guarding the cells ran
away in a panic, and a report of the incident later read that the for profit prison had
been understaffed.
Contention 2: For profit prisons have the intent of stealing money.For Profit
prisons lead to corruption
There are many examples of for profit prisons turning to corruption to make
money. One such example of corruption in for profit prisons was in 2010 when
judges Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan were bribed $2.8 million by the
Mid-Atlantic Youth Services Corp.,a for profit prison company who runs juvenile
facilities, to send 2,000 children to their prisons, falsely accusing them of crimes
such as trespassing into vacant buildings and stealing DVD’s from Walmart.The
Mid-Atlantic Youth Services was later found guilty for doing so, according to The
Guardian.
Contention 3:For profit prisons are irresponsible.
One example of for profit prisons being irresponsible is the case in 2006 with
Glenn Hoffman when he and 479 other inmates were transferred from the Buena
Vista state prison in Colorado, to a for profit prison in Oklahoma. According to
PBS, Glenn Hoffman’s family was told he wasn't going to transfer to a different
prison because he didnt have any problems, then, without warning, he was
suddenly transferred to the for profit prison in Oklahoma. Hoffman also had started
developing early signs of bone cancer, and when he had told the corrections
facility in Oklahoma about his cancer, he was denied constant requests for
advanced treatments for his cancer. By the time the corrections facility in
Oklahoma found out Hoffman had cancer,the cancer had already spread to his
lungs,and later Hoffman died. This example proves the irresponsibility and
ignorance for profit prisons have for their inmates.
Thus, my partner and I urge the judge to vote an affirmative ballot.
