Ex-con becomes private prison investor to expose systematic rape by employees

[n2doc]

By Scott Kaufman

snip:
Now, Friedmann is attempting to use the rules of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) against both the company that imprisoned him, CCA, and the other largest for-profit prison company, the GEO Group. He purchased shares of stock in both companies, which allow him to attend the annual shareholder meetings and ask uncomfortable questions.

“I would ask questions like, ‘Why do your employees keep raping prisoners?’” Friedmann told VICE News. “Of course they don’t have a good response, other than ‘We’re doing the best job we can.’”

In 2010, he purchased $2,000 in CCA stock, which — according to SEC rules — allows him to submit shareholder resolutions at the annual meetings. CCA is the company in charge of the so-called “gladiator school” prison in Idaho, in which control of the prison was turned over to inmate gangs to save money on guards.

The first resolution he brought to the table was for the company to provide biannual reports on rapes that occurred in CCA-operated prisons.

“They really went haywire when I did that,” Friedmann said. “They didn’t like it.”

more

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/03/24/ex-con-becomes-private-prison-investor-to-expose-systematic-rape-by-employees/

[840high]

1. kick

[aikoaiko]

2. Well played, convict. Hold them accountable for their crimes.

[LiberalAndProud]

3. Is corporate democracy the wave of the future?

Maybe this is the only way to effect societal change as corporations' influence on government continues to grow.

[adieu]

4. Corporate "democracy" is commonly called

Fascism. The joining of corporations and government for the mutual benefit is fascism, whether the government is a democracy, republic, authoritarian, theocratic, or whatever other choice.

[BainsBane]

6. No, that refers to a system of government

in which the state is imagined as the corpus, like a human body. The corporatist state is one with integrated business, labor, and other key sectors as a single organism (imagined as the human body) functioning toward a common goal. It does not refer to the influence of corporations on government. That is simply the product of capitalism. Fascism sought a third way between capitalism and socialism. That is all clear in Mussolini's writings.

[Adam051188]

9. endgame capitalism(economic system) usurps democracy(government system),becomes oligarchy or fascism

i don't really understand your human body analogy and in my opinion gaining accurate insights into an extremely corrupt individual such as Mussolini generally is not done by reading their self accounts. you should Wikipedia "Fascism"

[BainsBane]

13. If you don't understand the conception of the state as a human body

You don't understand fascism, as that is how the corporatist state is envisioned under fascism. The Wikipedia article specifically says that fascism replaced the class conflict of capitalism with conflict between states and races. It is not simply capitalism. That existed before fascism and has continued to exist after. Fascism was a way of coopting the revolutionary potential of the working class into the state, for the purposes of the state. The corporatist state did not simply incorporate business interests but also workers and other sectors, like the military and agriculture.

Corporatism (or corporativism) is the socio-political organization of a society by major interest groups, or corporate groups, such as agricultural, business, ethnic, labour, military, patronage, or scientific affiliations, on the basis of common interests.[1] Corporatism is theoretically based upon the interpretation of a community as an organic body.[2][3] The term corporatism is based on the Latin root word "corpus" (plural – "corpora&quot meaning "body".[3

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatism

Fascism's theory of economic corporatism involved management of sectors of the economy by government or privately controlled organizations (corporations). Each trade union or employer corporation would, theoretically, represent its professional concerns, especially by negotiation of labour contracts and the like. This method, it was theorized, could result in harmony amongst social classes.[30] Authors have noted, however, that de facto economic corporatism was also used to reduce opposition and reward political loyalty.[31]

In Italy from 1922 until 1943, corporatism became influential amongst Italian nationalists led by Benito Mussolini. The Charter of Carnaro gained much popularity as the prototype of a 'corporative state', having displayed much within its tenets as a guild system combining the concepts of autonomy and authority in a special synthesis.[32] This appealed to Hegelian thinkers who were seeking a new alternative to popular socialism and syndicalism which was also a progressive system of governing labour and still a new way of relating to political governance. Alfredo Rocco spoke of a corporative state and declared corporatist ideology in detail. Rocco would later become a member of the Italian Fascist regime Fascismo.[33]

Italian Fascism involved a corporatist political system in which economy was collectively managed by employers, workers and state officials by formal mechanisms at the national level.[34] This non-elected form of state officializing of every interest into the state was professed to reduce the marginalization of singular interests (as would allegedly happen by the unilateral end condition inherent in the democratic voting process). Corporatism would instead better recognize or 'incorporate' every divergent interest into the state organically, according to its supporters, thus being the inspiration for their use of the term totalitarian, perceivable to them as not meaning a coercive system but described distinctly as without coercion in the 1932 Doctrine of Fascism as thus:

Benito Mussolini
When brought within the orbit of the State, Fascism recognizes the real needs which gave rise to socialism and trade unionism, giving them due weight in the guild or corporative system in which divergent interests are coordinated and harmonized in the unity of the State.[35]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatism

Other governments have used the model of the corporate state without the intense focus on nationalism and ethnic enemies that were part of fascism. Examples include populist governments in Brazil (Vargas' later years); Argentina under Peron, and the PRI in Mexico.

[LiberalAndProud]

7. I think I meant activist shareholders rather than corporate democracy.

Anyway, it's the idea that if everybody had shares in corporations, we could influence corporate behaviors, minimizing or eliminating the government's role in shaping our society. The takeaway is that unregulated capitalism is a good thing. I read of the theory years ago but can't remember the name of the theory or the theorist. Whatever the name, I thought it was bunk. Still do.

[defacto7]

12. If one has money

it could be useful in this regard for the period of time that the loophole exists allowing public shareholders to cause a certain amount of constructive disruption. But we can't forget the systematic divestiture of most working class people over the last few decades for the very purpose of right wing control of corporate capitol and the acquisition of the government. That puts the majority of controlling stockholders in the right wing camp by design and they won't keep allowing themselves to be outed where their investments are concerned even if those investments are secured and multiplied by unethical and inhuman activities.

Constitutional rights and the enforcement thereof are only as good as the government that displays them. We are entering a time when our rights are in the balance. Out focus should lie in bringing our government back into human focus. Fighting a battle on corporate turf is a short lived and less effectual investment.

[Liberal_in_LA]

5. kick

[DeSwiss]

8. Next come lawsuits.

K&R

[tea and oranges]

10. Of course! You know,

that could be a good thing. The privatized prison system complete w/ lobbyists gives me the night terrors.
Just the business model - the more prisoners the more money - what isn't wrong w/ that?

K&R

[DeSwiss]

11. The only drawback I can see......

...is that corporate law protects the personal assets of the assholes who run this garbage company and that capital sentences will never be considered for them.

- Other than that, let the lawsuit begin! Sue them back into the Stone Age.

[tea and oranges]

15. The stone age is way too good for them

But what a delicious thought to imagine them realizing, slowly, "maybe it wasn't such a great idea after all"as they are pressed w/ suit after suit. You know, like the Catholic Church? Only faster results.

That would be some real fine political theatre.

[closeupready]

14. Aren't there laws about preserving video surveillance?

In cell blocks?

If there is such video, then seems like:

1) it would help corroborate/evidence allegations of rape; and

2) isn't fraternization between staff and prisoners illegal, and if not, shouldn't it be, among other reasons to prevent the ambiguity of whether prisoners are consenting to such activity?

[trusty elf]

16. "the so-called “gladiator school” prison in Idaho"

"in which control of the prison was turned over to inmate gangs to save money on guards."



This is stunning to me. I guess I'm naive, but that this is allowed just floors me. Absolutely outrageous.

[CrispyQ]

17. Good luck to you, Sir!

“I would like to see at some point private prison stock be lumped in the same category as tobacco companies, arms manufacturers, and people that make land mines,” he told VICE News, “toxic stocks that people do not want to be involved in for ethical and moral reasons.”

[Tsiyu]

18. Brilliant

Call those greedy, criminal scum to account, Friedmann!

Trying to make imprisonment a growth industry should be considered treason against the American people.

Land of the free, my ASS. Land of the anarchist capitalists is more like it.

"So what if a lot of our prisoners endure unspeakable violence? Check out my awesome quarterly bonus! Others must be raped so that I can make a lot of dough! It's the American way!"

[Hekate]

19. Good for him. The whole notion of a "private" prison system is so akin to slavery it's appalling.

That shit has no place in any country that calls itself a democracy.