Michelle Alexander Quotes

Maybe I won't stay out of prison. Who knows?

In 1960, when I came out of prison as an ex-convict, I had more freedom under parolee supervision than there's available... in America right now.

The people deemed too dangerous to release therefore become the very people released with no conditions and no supervision.

Our proclivity for incarceration costs American taxpayers about $80 billion a year. And that doesn’t count the vast indirect costs visited upon the incarcerated, their families and communities.

I've never been in prison. I've been in jail a lot. But I've never actually been sentenced to anything.

Almost one in three Americans has had some contact with the criminal justice system. When you reach that saturation point, people begin to understand, in a very visceral way, the difficulties of reentry.

None of my peers avoided prison. None of 'em.

As a law-enforcement official, as a politician, you are always going to have in the back of your mind the fear that someone you release will end up committing another crime, potentially a serious crime, during a period when they otherwise would have been incarcerated.

As the U.S. prison population has surged over the decades, the legal profession's distaste for former inmates has become more conspicuous. And it isn't only law. Medical schools often have committees to evaluate cases and mitigating factors but are generally reluctant to admit ex-inmates.

I was gladly cuffed, shackled, loaded into the caged bus and driven through the main gate of Bare Hill Correctional Facility for what I pray to God will be forever.

I was in prison for a charge in Texas, murder one. Back in the '70s in Texas, I was there. I heard the shot. I was in the car.

So for you people who are filled with fear that I might someday be released: breathe easy, I don't see it happening.

We're recycling very dangerous criminals over and over again.

The United States imprisons many non-violent offenders who could instead be required to pay fines, perform community service, and make restitution to their victims… Maintaining our vast network of prisons consumes resources that could be better spent on education and other crime prevention efforts... Rather than reforming offenders, prison too often degrades and dehumanizes prisoners, making the task of rehabilitation and reentry into society even more difficult.

[We have to make] a distinction between dangerous violent criminals and people who are engaged in non-violent criminal activities….Your taking somebody out of the economy, breaking up their families, and putting them in a place with hardened criminals. I think that it is pretty hard to argue that has been a positive long-term result.

The United States makes up 5 percent of the world’s population yet has 25% of its prison population.

The majority of the people in jail are suffering from mental illness.

In the long run, a flexible sentencing procedure which works to rehabilitate offenders offers the best hope in the majority of cases in the Federal courts.

We don't live in a world where, if you commit a crime, your life's over. We as a society believe in rehabilitation. We believe in second and third chances.

Burdensome fees have made it harder for people to exit the criminal justice system.

I saw worse stuff inside prison than I ever saw in the streets.

I don't ever want to go back to prison.

The typical prisoner has numerous brushes with the law before finally being sent behind bars. Each year thousands of cautions are issued to people who will come back to crime again.

My father was jailed off and on for seven years.

The prison systems in this country actually are exploitative and they are not in any way rehabilitative.