The Netherlands is closing emptying prisons. What can other countries learn?

> This also applies to shorter sentences. Even these can completely turn an offender’s life upside down. You can lose your job, home and social network. And you rarely become a better person during a short stay in jail.

I had a few experiences helping people who were trapped or harmed by Arizona's criminal justice system. I eventually decided Arizona's jails and prisons are make-work programs to remove people from the labor supply.

America's Make-Work Sheriff: The Anachronism of Joseph Arpaio: https://www.taxiwars.org/2017/09/americas-make-work-sheriff-...

Ordinary Rendition: The Public Servants' Quagmire: https://www.taxiwars.org/2017/10/ordinary-rendition-public-s...

The second one was about the passenger who remembered me from the night she got the 'catch and release' treatment. Her second taxi trip was almost 2 years after her first trip.

It takes about 7 days of confinement before people begin to develop PTSD...

Aside from the central thesis, I found this part very interesting (and worth an article of its own):

"As in many other western countries, the number of violent crimes has significantly dropped in the Netherlands in recent decades.

"This does not necessarily mean that there is actually less crime overall, as Dutch criminologist Francis Pakes, professor at the University of Portsmouth, who has studied the reasons for the emptying Dutch prisons, told me: “There is less conventional, violent crime, like murder. On the other hand, a lot of conventional crime went online and is less visible. And it is quite possible that there is a kind of organised crime that we have little visibility on. But fewer serious cases are coming to the police and courts.” And so fewer people end up in jail."