Court to review prison segregation policy

[Khephra]

Court to review prison segregation policy
Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- Fifty years after the Supreme Court declared racial segregation unconstitutional in public schools, the court agreed today to consider whether state prisons may separate new inmates by race as a safety measure.

California routinely assigns newly arrived black prisoners to bunk only with other black prisoners for three months or more, and likewise assigns white and Asian inmates to cells with others of their race or ethnicity.

A black prison inmate challenged the practice as a violation of his constitutional right to equal treatment. Garrison S. Johnson also argued the policy flouts previous Supreme Court rulings striking down segregation in other areas.

"Intentional state racial segregation has been outlawed in this country for over half a century," Johnson's lawyers argued in asking the Supreme Court to hear his appeal.

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http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/nation/2427649

[ihaveaquestion]

1. safety measure?

The only real safety measure I'd agree to would be a single occupancy cell!

Being housed in the same 50 sq. ft. space with a murderer or rapist or other bad guy is unsafe on it's face!

[KissMyAsscroft]

2. Ummm...Prison isnt a Democracy..

The segregation is just as much for the safety of guards as it is for the inmates.

This guy obviously doesn't understand that prison is already segregated by the inmates themselves.