At Kick-Back Central in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania–AKA Juvie Court–two judges, Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan, have plead guilty to taking millions of dollars in bribes–$2.6 mil, to be precise–to send teenagers to two privately run youth detention centers run by PA Child Care and a sister company, Western PA Child Care.

You could get fed through the sausage machine ala Pink Floyd’s The Wall for such high crimes as stealing loose change from a car, possessing drug paraphernalia (not drugs, mind you), or making fun of your assistant principal, like Hillary Transue (pictured right), who was sent to wilderness camp for making a spoof Myspace page.

According to the authorities, the judges shut down the county-run juvenile detention center, arguing it was in poor condition. They maintained the county had no choice but to send detained juveniles to the newly built private detention centers.

This is a perfect example of crony corporatism. Now, I not advocating that the children would have been better served in the Luzerne County juvie jail, or any other. In most cases, these kids should not have been sentenced to time at all.

Especially since Pennsylvania has the highest rate of life-time incarceration for children in the U.S. A dubious honor, the cherry on top of the cake that is Prison-Planet America, the only country in the world to sentence juveniles to life without parole.

I also have no problem with capitalism: It’s greaaaaaat! But when private companies generate their revenue through government force, things get mighty screwed, mighty fast. Think Blackwater, oh, excuse-moi, Xe (pronounced “Zee”). As in: We will destroy you, A-Z.

Take the detention centers being built across America to house “illegal immigrants.” Here too, they incarcerate children. And babies too! No Child Left Behind–Bars! Says the journalists over at The Business of Detention:

When we first began to look at the phenomenon of immigrant detention in the United States, the obvious step to take as investigative journalists was to follow the money. We found that the trail of taxpayer dollars led primarily to the Corrections Corporation of America, a company that had been on the brink of bankruptcy as recently as 2001. Our desire was to present a picture of how the nation’s largest private prison company had partnered with the federal government to detain close to a million undocumented immigrants until they were deported, and in the process fill their empty beds and increase revenue. CCA now has close to 10,000 new beds under development in anticipation of continued demand.

Do you want to live in a world where there is “anticipation of continued demand” for jail beds. And don’t think it’s just for those “undocumented” people, because you never know when you will be forced to start carrying your “Papers, please.”

In the current economic shit-hitting-the-fan climate, there are opportunities. Locking folks up costs green. States are already feeling the pinch. Jails should be saved for actual criminals, you know, the ones where there is an actual victim (and, no, the state doesn’t count, Yeronner!). Let the people who commit victimless crimes free. Com’on, Dear Worm Your Honor, would you rather be #1 in… Incarceration… or #1 in Compassion?

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