Cruel and Unusual Punishment Behind Bars

And now for the bleeding-heart portion of our program:

In the civil rights arena, perhaps no group is more generally reviled than prison inmates. You know the immediate responses to suggestions of prisoner abuse and neglect: "Can't do the time? Don't do the crime" or "These are not nice people" or "Prison's not supposed to be a picnic." Hell, chances are that you've even uttered a few hundred such comments in your lifetime. I know I have.

But then you come across a story like that of Roderick Johnson, and you remember that, hey, not all punishments do fit the crime, not by a long shot.

A former prison inmate who was incarcerated for a probation violation stemming from a burglary conviction, Johnson is now suing the State of Texas for the nightmare he ensured while in Lone Star state custody.

The New York Times' Adam Liptak reports that a member of the Allred prison gang, the Gangster Disciples, testified in court that the 37-year-old Johnson, who is gay, was kept as the Disciples' "property":

"That meant, the witness continued, that gang members could rape Mr. Johnson at will. They could, he said, also rent him out for sex, and they did, daily. A purchased rape, the witness said, cost $3 to $7. Mr. Johnson says the abuse went on for 18 months."

Another witness, a former prison unit supervisor, testified that Johnson was known as a "free-world homosexual" by the other inmates. The witness added that the other prisoners raped Johnson whenever they wanted.

"The witness was a grave man, but he sometime burst into quick, bemused smiles when he was asked what seemed to him a naive question. For instance: Did Mr. Johnson have a choice?

"'You'll be beaten until you say yes,' the witness said. 'He'd be beaten, stabbed, whatever.'

"Prison officials, the witness said, knew what was going on. 'They turned a blind eye,' he said. 'They seen what was happening, but they pretended they didn't.'"

The trial has not yet concluded, but I wouldn't predict much in the way of judicial redress. Johnson is represented by ACLU attorneys -- not the most beloved group of lawyers in this part of the country. And a recent AP story boasts a headline that reveals all you really need to know about how most folks probably view the case: "Trial Opens in Gay Inmate's Civil Lawsuit."

Few reliable statistics exist on prison rape, but some experts estimate that one in every five male inmates is raped by another inmate. For female inmates, who are most often raped by male staff, the figure has been put at one in four.

When you read these sorts of stories, it is worth remembering, too, that AIDS accounts for the majority of prison deaths other than those occurring from natural causes. In Delaware alone, for example, AIDS has been responsible for one of every four inmate deaths since 2000.

Oh, and don't forget the large numbers of mentally ill who fill our prisons instead of hospitals; Human Rights Watch contends one in every six inmates in the U.S. suffers mental illness.

None of this is to suggest that most prisons are not chiefly filled with the dangerous and evil and sociopathic. Of course, they are. But I truly believe we have a moral imperative to guard against a corrections system that becomes as inhumane as many of its inhabitants.

Incidentally, while Arnold Schwarzenegger has come under fire as of late by social progressives for his veto of California's gay marriage bill, give him credit for recently signing into law a measure aimed at stopping prison rape. The Sexual Abuse in Detention Elimination Act has been hailed by prison rights activists as a significant step toward lifting the "veil of silence" surrounding prison rape.