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  • 12 years ago
Documentary (2006) 123 minutes ~ Color

According to the Bureau of Justice 49% of all prison inmates nationally are African American compared to their 13% make up of the overall population. Hispanics constitute 17% of the prison population nationally compared to their 10% of the total population. Most inmates are incarcerated due to drug use, not drug sales. Perhaps we should invest in drug treatment programs instead of more prisons. But those who profit from jail construction would obviously oppose such a transition.

The Injustice System In America examines the following:

Ubiquitous leagues of minority inmates reflect a prejudice that still painfully reverberates through American courts. There is no ostensible blindfold covering Lady Justice's eyes.

Wealthy, white Americans who deal in illegal drugs and other criminal subversive activity escape harsh treatment when their poor, minority counterparts jam prison cells.

Cary Silberman, an adjunct professor of law and executive producer of the award winning Documentary, La Senora Eva Peron, embarks upon one of this year's most important feature length documentaries. The film exposes the injustice system in America and uncovers the truth relative to the imbalances infested in our decaying criminal justice system. Interview subjects include San Francisco public defender Jeff Adachi; Van Jones, Esq. (Ella Barker Center); Michelle Alexander, Esq. (Stanford Law School); and Vernell Critendon (Public Information Officer, San Quentin Prison).

Director: Cary Silberman

Writer: Cary Silberman
Transcript
00:00We have reached an all-time high here in the state of California.
00:16There are over 50,000 correctional employees, 165,000 men and women incarcerated in our
00:24prisons.
00:25The number, at no time, is going down.
00:27When I started in the prisons business, there was 30,000 people inside of our state prisons.
00:32There were 12 state prisons.
00:34Today, we have 33 state prisons.
00:37But I think if you were to talk to any public defender, they would be able to identify numerous
00:44cases in which the sympathy of everyone involved in the case, from the police to the jurors,
00:52the prosecutors, the judges, would have been entirely different, and the interpretation
00:58of events would have been entirely different if the defendant had been white rather than
01:02black.
01:03And so it's not, as some people might suggest, that there are more African Americans using
01:10drugs and therefore they're more likely to be arrested.
01:14It's just the opposite.
01:15There are fewer African Americans using illegal drugs, yet they're arrested at three times
01:21the rate of whites.
01:24We know there is no more drug abuse happening in the inner city than in the suburbs.
01:31If you really want to catch a bunch of drug abusers, don't go on a housing project, go
01:36on a frat house.
01:37You'll get all the drugs you want and all the arrests you want.
01:41But the system knows that if any police department sent its drug unit onto Harvard's campus and
01:49arrested the sons and daughters of privileged, the police chief would lose his job by Monday
01:53morning.
01:55And we now in the United States have an incarceration rate that's the highest in the world, and
02:01we have an incarceration rate that's worse than South Africa at the height of apartheid.
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