If we look at Houston, which is a very environmentally toxic place, we find that it has one of the highest levels of young men going to prison and also among the highest levels of illiteracy in the country.
Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass, Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron, Can be retentive to the strength of spirit; But life, being weary of these worldly bars, Never lacks power to dismiss itself.
I sometimes wish that people would put a little more emphasis upon the observance of the law than they do upon its enforcement.
The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget.
In prison, you get the chance to see who really loves you.
A man will be imprisoned in a room with a door that's unlocked and opens inwards, as long as it does not occur to him to pull rather than push.
We who live in prison, and in whose lives there is no event but sorrow, have to measure time by throbs of pain, and the record of bitter moments.
The reformative effect of punishment is a belief that dies hard, chiefly I think, because it is so satisfying to our sadistic impulses.
No obligation to justice does force a man to be cruel, or to use the sharpest sentence.
The world itself is but a large prison, out of which some are daily led to execution.
Whatever is worthy to be loved for anything is worthy of preservation. A wise and dispassionate legislator, if any such should ever arise among men, will not condemn to death him who has done or is likely to do more service than injury to society. Blocks and gibbets are the nearest objects with legislators, and their business is never with hopes or with virtues.
Crime is a logical extension of the sort of behavior that often [is] considered perfectly respectable in legitimate business.
The object of punishment is prevention from evil; it never can be made impulsive to good.
Why would anyone expect him to come out smarter? He went to prison for three years, not Princeton.
What is crime amongst the multitude, is only vice among the few.
No man survives when freedom fails. The best men rot in filthy jails, and those who cry 'appease, appease' are hanged by those they tried to please.
When I was in prison, I was wrapped up in all those deep books. That Tolstoy crap - people shouldn't read that stuff.
Well does Heaven have care that no man secures happiness by crime.
As we grow in wisdom, we pardon more freely.
There are few better measures of the concern a society has for its individual members and its own well being than the way it handles criminals.
Prisons don't rehabilitate, they don't punish, they don't protect, so what the hell do they do?
One should respect public opinion insofar as is necessary to avoid starvation and keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny.
The public have more interest in the punishment of an injury than he who receives it.
Do not lay on the multitude the blame that is due to a few.
