Quotes

Kill a man, and you are an assassin. Kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. Kill everyone, and you are a God.

I can work for the Lord in or out of prison.

Nothing can be more abhorrent to democracy than to imprison a person or keep him in prison because he is unpopular. This is really the test of civilization.

Vices are not crimes.

When I was in prison, I was wrapped up in all those deep books. That Tolstoy crap - people shouldn't read that stuff.

One man meets an infamous punishment for that crime which confers a diadem upon another.

Man is condemned to be free.

The mellow sweetness of pumpkin pie off a prison spoon is something you will never forget.

I never told a victim story about my imprisonment. Instead, I told a transformation story - about how prison changed my outlook, about how I saw that communication, truth, and trust are at the heart of power.

I don't like jail, they got the wrong kind of bars in there.

The thoughts of a prisoner - they're not free either. They keep returning to the same things.

The number of laws is constantly growing in all countries and, owing to this, what is called crime is very often not a crime at all, for it contains no element of violence or harm.

The English laws punish vice; the Chinese laws do more, they reward virtue.

It isn't true that convicts live like animals: animals have more room to move around.

The refined punishments of the spiritual mode are usually much more indecent and dangerous than a good smack.

Since 1957, black people have experienced double-digit unemployment - in good times and bad times. Look at the population of African Americans in prison. They represent more than half the population of prisoners in the country, 55 percent of those on death row.

In the halls of justice, the only justice is in the halls.

If punishment reaches not the mind and makes not the will supple, it hardens the offender.

The only difference between me and my fellow actors is that I've spent more time in jail.

Women now have choices. They can be married, not married, have a job, not have a job, be married with children, unmarried with children. Men have the same choice we've always had: work, or prison.

Trial by jury itself, instead of being a security to persons who are accused, shall be a delusion, a mockery, and a snare.

The penalty for laughing in a courtroom is six months in jail; if it were not for this penalty, the jury would never hear the evidence.

History is full of people who went to prison or were burned at the stake for proclaiming their ideas. Society has always defended itself.

Care should be taken that the punishment does not exceed the guilt; and also that some men do not suffer for offenses for which others are not even indicted.

Whatever you think of de Sade, he was a complex figure and we should not look for easy answers with him. He was, strangely perhaps, against the death penalty, and he was never put in prison for murders or anything like that.