Three hundred years ago a prisoner condemned to the Tower of London carved on the wall of his cell this sentiment to keep up his spirits during his long imprisonment: “It is not adversity that kills, but the impatience with which we bear adversity.”
One crime is everything; two nothing.
I wrote a million words in the first year, and I could never have done that outside of prison.
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.
Body is a home, a prison and a grave.
The common argument that crime is caused by poverty is a kind of slander on the poor.
The worst of prison life, he thought, was not being able to close his door.
I don't like jail, they got the wrong kind of bars in there.
No matter how you seem to fatten on a crime, that can never be good for the bee which is bad for the hive.
Fear can be like a prison. It is, however, a self made prison. Many are imprisoned by fear. No one else can liberate them from this prison. Others may inspire them but they must liberate themselves.
Overlook our deeds, since you know that crime was absent from our inclination.
What restrains us from killing is partly fear of punishment, partly moral scruple, and partly what may be described as a sense of humor.
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.
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.
Adversities such as being homeless and going to prison has made many people stronger.
While we have prisons it matters little which of us occupy the cells.
It is more dangerous that even a guilty person should be punished without the forms of law than that he should escape.
As we grow in wisdom, we pardon more freely.
There is a point at which even justice does injury.
Crime is a logical extension of the sort of behavior that often [is] considered perfectly respectable in legitimate business.
Prison makes you a better judge of character. You pick up on people much faster.
If we were brought to trial for the crimes we have committed against ourselves, few would escape the gallows.
Once we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our mind, our duty is to furnish it well.
Law is merely the expression of the will of the strongest for the time being, and therefore laws have no fixity, but shift from generation to generation.
It is safer that a bad man should not be accused, than that he should be acquitted.
