Lucas at PrideDepot has a very good post on recently released figures that one in thirty-two Americans are behind bars.

“Today’s figures fail to capture incarceration’s impact on the thousands of children left behind by mothers in prison,” Marc Mauer, the executive director of the Sentencing Project, a Washington-based group supporting criminal justice reform, said in a statement. “Misguided policies that create harsher sentences for nonviolent drug offenses are disproportionately responsible for the increasing rates of women in prisons and jails.”

Not included in the Justice Department statistics is the increase in prison rapes among inmates. Along with the rapes that go on is the increase in HIV transmission.

Included in the post is an introduction to American Chain Gangs. More clips from the startling and disturbing DVD can be found here.