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In the US, Debtors' Prisons Are Alive and Well [truth-out.org]

 

This article was published by TalkPoverty.org

Officially, the United States ended debtors' prisons in 1833. Unofficially, as we saw in the Justice Department's report on racially biased policing in Ferguson, there is a system of fines and fees for minor crimes that often result in jail time for the poor, mostly black citizens who cannot afford to pay them.

To provide more context on the issue, I talked with Peter Edelman, Georgetown University law professor and former staffer for Robert F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton, about his new book Not a Crime to be Poor: The Criminalization of Poverty in America.

[For more on this story by By Rebecca Vallas, go to http://www.truth-out.org/news/...t-a-crime-to-be-poor]

Photo: Author, Peter Edelman

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