The Problem With Pay-to-Stay Jails

Across America, a system called “pay-to-stay” jails is an option only the richest criminal offenders can afford. For an average of $100 per night, “prisoners” can buy their way into a more lenient jail. These “pay-to-stay” jails, fully outfitted with beach views, in-house computers, flat screen TVs, and well-equipped libraries, are nothing like the shabbier ones faced by less affluent criminals, often as punishment for far pettier crimes. Such an unequal and obviously lopsided system should be a thing of the past—a throwback to the glory days of the Gilded Age when loose societal norms and unfettered capital markets allowed tycoons and robber barons unprecedented control over America’s justice system. However, these “pay-to-stay” jails remain a huge part of our court system today, having been introduced in the 1980s as part of legislative reforms to America’s criminal justice system. Pay-to-stay jails are a symbol of inequality improperly embedded in the country’s justice system, and America is better off without them.

Since the wealthy can afford better attorneys and thus ensure a friendlier trial outcome, they already have an advantage in the courts. That, on top of a severe shortage of public defendants and legal aid for poor citizens, stacks the deck of the U.S. criminal justice system in favor of wealthy individuals and organizations. A national survey published in 2016 by the Justice Index found that for every 10,000 people within 200 percent of the federal poverty level, there are only .64 civil legal aid attorneys available. That is 60 times fewer than the number of available attorneys per 10,000 people nationally. Not only are $2,000-an-hour attorneys able to prove a guilty (and wealthy) person innocent—or at least greatly decrease one’s sentence—but the punishment meted out to their clients also rarely serves as a representation of the truth.

Proponents of pay-to-stay jails say that it helps offset the cost of housing prisoners and benefits the U.S. economy, but the purpose of the criminal justice system was never to generate profit. While private prisons operate outside of federal oversight, government-run prisons should never aim to benefit financially at the expense of the integrity of the country’s criminal justice system. Others argue that prisoners should pay for their own food, clothing, and shelter during their time in prison, and while this does make sense in theory, the reality is that around 80 percent of those in the criminal justice system are not able to afford an attorney (let alone their own upkeep) without a stable job and source of financial support. Expecting prisoners to help “cut costs” by forcing them to pay for basic rights such as food and shelter is not only nonsensical but also inhumane and deeply immoral.

A popular myth holds that rich prisoners will not pose a threat to society upon release from jail, given the white-collar nature of their crimes. However, a study conducted by the Marshall Project and the LA Times on 3500 individuals in Southern California found that 4.5 percent of criminals residing in pay-to-stay jails had committed deadly crimes such as sexual violence, assault, battery, and others. Still, many more are guilty of vehicular manslaughter and illegally transporting drugs. While the percentage of violent and dangerous pay-to-stay prisoners remains relatively low, it is still a travesty to allow wealthy murderers and rapists to live in comfort while supposedly being punished for their crimes. Pay-to-stay prisons undermine the basic purposes of America’s criminal justice system: to prevent crime through just punishment and to ensure that criminals are not a threat to citizens.

The question comes down to why the rich deserve better jail conditions when it serves as a legal way for the wealthy to circumvent traditional incarceration policies. The simple truth is that they don’t.

Pay-to-stay jails are an instrument of inequality and act as a way for the rich to escape the rightful punishments of a traditional prison. For that reason, they should not exist.