-Welcome to the show.
-Thanks. Great to be here.
You are considered by many
to be the leading expert
on sentencing policy
and the criminal justice system
in America.
This book, The Meaning of Life,
uh, specifically tackles
abolishing life sentences.
The big question is, why?
Well, two reasons, mainly.
As we have a movement
to end mass incarceration now,
which is very encouraging,
in far too many cases,
I think people believe
if we just had some more
drug treatment programs,
that would take care
of the problem.
The problem's much deeper
than that.
In terms of sentencing,
one of every seven people
in American prisons today
is serving a life sentence--
206,000 people.
So we can't end
mass incarceration
unless we do something
about excessive sentences.
-Right. -It's also
a public safety problem,
and life sentences
actually are counterproductive
for public safety.
The one thing we know
about involvement in crime
is that people age out of crime.
Uh, mid-teen years,
late-teen years, early 20s,
that's a high-risk time.
Crime rates go up
in that age group,
but they rapidly come down.
So by the late 20s, 30s, 40s,
certainly 50s and 60s,
the risk of involvement
for criminal activity
is much diminished.
So if we have people
in their 50s, 60s and 70s,
we're not preventing very much
crime while they're in prison,
but we're spending
enormous resources to do so.
-But now some people...
-(cheering and applause)
I-I agree with you on this book,
but, I mean, there's obviously
people who disagree
and say to you, "But shouldn't
somebody spend life in jail
if they have taken somebody
else's life, for instance?"
-Mm-hmm. -What would your
argument be to counter that?
People have to be accountable
for their crimes,
whether it's taking a life,
whether it's shoplifting,
anything in between that.
But the scale
of what should take place
is very different
in the United States.
We are far more punitive
than comparable nations.
If you look in Western Europe,
it's very unusual
for anybody to spend more
than 20 years in prison,
either by law or in practice,
and they say
for the most serious crimes,
you will get 20 years.
For the less serious crimes,
it may be ten or 15,
-and so on.
-Right.
But we have
a very different scale
with the death penalty
atop of the scale,
life without parole
at the top of the scale,
so it exerts pressure on crimes
across the board.
That's part of the reason
we have mass incarceration.
If you steal a car
in the United States,
you're going to spend more time
in prison than if you did that
in England or Italy
or many other countries.
Right, but when you're trying
to convince people of this idea,
a lot of the time,
it seems like the arguments, um,
are framed
in a way that benefits
someone who's committed a crime,
you know?
Someone will say,
"I understand this, Marc,
"but why should we reward
somebody for committing a crime?
Should they not be punished
as much as possible?"
How would you...
how would you frame a benefit
to a citizen
who has not committed a crime?
Why would it benefit them
to not have people spend
as much time in prison?
Well, you know,
if we care about public safety,
we have finite resources.
We have a certain budget at the
federal, state and local level.
How do we want to spend
that budget?
Now, normally it costs
about $30,000 a year
to keep someone in prison.
When people are aging, it can be
$60,000 more than that.
So we have to think,
do we want to spend money
on aging people in prison--
sometimes they're
in wheelchairs, incapacitated--
when we have a group
of 14, 15, 16-year-olds
coming up every year.
If we could do something
in preventing them
from getting into
high-risk activities,
-we'd have a much better impact
on crime. -Right.
So we have to think
about what the balance is.
The balance we've developed
in the last 40 years
is all about incarceration,
forgetting about prevention
and treatment.
We-we recently saw a story
that has garnered
a lot of attention,
-the case of Cyntoia Brown.
-Sure.
And she was granted clemency
by the governor, who's outgoing.
And this was a story
of a young girl
who was, um, picked up by a man
-as basically a sex slave.
-Right.
And, you know,
she fought for her life
and says in her defense
she killed the man.
And now this became
the big story,
and people said she had to spend
the rest of her life in prison
-as a child.
-Right.
And after she was
granted clemency,
the question then became,
is this something
-that America needs to do
for everybody? -Mm-hmm.
Do you think America is moving
in the right direction?
Slowly but surely we're moving
in that direction.
You know, we saw in Congress
passing legislation,
the First Step Act,
just a few weeks ago.
Uh, it's not gonna end
mass incarceration,
but it reduces the use
of mandatory sentencing
for drug crimes.
It'll have some modest effect
on reducing the number of people
in prison overall.
So it's a beginning.
It's a first step,
as it's called.
We need a second,
third and fourth step
-if we really want
to have an impact. -Right.
But after four decades
of rising prison populations,
we're beginning to see
some reduction,
a little more rational
development policy now.
And then, what do you think
the U.S. does
for those people who are let out
and then repeat a crime?
Well, we have to look
at what we're doing
to help people refrain
from getting involved in crime.
You know,
the movement for reentry,
people coming home from prison,
liberals and conservatives alike
have embraced this idea
that people coming out of prison
should have the skills,
should have the resources,
the support they need
so they don't have to go back
in prison.
-Right. -But the resources
we're putting into it
is just a fraction
of what's needed.
Uh, you have to remember,
when people go to prison
at the age of 30,
far too many cases,
it's been a very dysfunctional
lifestyle they've had--
family, community problems
and the like.
That doesn't change overnight,
so we have to be
much more serious
about reducing time people spend
in prison
and focusing on that reentry
back into the community.
Your book is amazing. Thank you
so much for being on the show.
-Thanks so much for having me.
-Pleasure having you.
 The Meaning of Life, 
a really fantastic read,
is available now.
Marc Mauer, everybody.
