I just read about a guy sentenced to 60 days of “hard labor” in an Alabama jail. What does that mean?
A quick google only turned up info about prison labor in general, (which is typical factory work, or working in a laundry, etc).
But the phrase “hard labor” sounds old-fashioned chain gangs breaking rocks. Does this still exist?
What will this NFL football player be doing while he is in jail?
Quote from Deadspin:
… In Alabama, hard labor is defined as work on public assets, such as roads and bridges.…
So standing around in a reflective high-vis vest, sweating, leaning on a shovel.
And if that doesn’t work up a sweat, there’s always turning the Stop/Slow sign every 15 minutes.
We’ve got county prisoner programs (I think they’re voluntary) where teams pick up litter on the side of highways. I don’t know if that would qualify as hard.
In Cool Hand Luke, the inmates spread gravel across roads, with a shovel.
If penal servitude and hard labour no longer existed, how could he have been sentenced to it? I mean, it doesn’t exist in normal countries but evidently does in Alabama.
Breaking rocks sounds pretty classic (don’t know about Alabama specifically); others include the treadmill, the hand crank, and pointlessly moving piles of heavy shit from one place to another. Then there is the whole industry of using prisoners for productive slave labor (building roads, etc.), not clear how ultimately profitable that is, though.
Breaking rocks was probably productive. They need gravel for those roads. Not terribly efficient, though.
He seems to be a professional player. Wouldn’t it be more profitable to let him play as usual, but all his pay is forfeit as fine and he sleeps in prison?
He’s not under contract. And he’s not a star, he’s just a guy. Maybe someone else will pick him up, but this may well be a career killer. Michael Vick notwithstanding, public forgiveness for animal cruelty is a real hard sell and teams know this. Nobody is going to take that kind of PR hit for a player like Isaiah Buggs.
The question is not whether “hard labor” as a type of sentence exists; it clearly does. The question is what convicts who have been sentenced to it do exactly. The relevant legal provision appears to be section 14-5-1 of the Code of Alabama, which indeed says:
“Hard labor for the county,” as used in this code or any other law of the state, shall include labor on the public roads, public bridges and other public works in the county.
I’d say that sounds pretty much like the entire range of construction site work, but gives a wide discretion to the Department of Corrections in determining what exactly they make convicts do.
In June he was arrested for second degree domestic violence and burglary. He’s not going to ever put on the uniform again
Not a touted Quarterback, All-pro defense lineman or linebacker - career is toast.
Many states use prison shops to stamp out license plates.
Arkansas has prison farms. The Cummins Unit is 16,500-acres. It’s been reformed significantly in the past 40 years.
The biggest prison farm in Texas, near Palestine, is about 20,000 acres. About 130,000 acres are farmed state-wide. They produce commodities like cane and cotton(for uniforms), and grow fruits and vegetables for the prison system’s food supply. They raise cattle (and sheep I think), and even breed the horses used by guards and sell the rest to the public. According to my 2010 Handbook of Texas, prison farms earned(or offset) about $90 million dollars of prison coste.
OP here…So now I’ve got a related question:
How do the prisoners react to being sentenced to “hard labor” ?
Is it worse than just a regular sentence?
I’ve read somewhere that for many convicts, being given a prison job is a privilege which they actively seek out. . Working in the kitchen or mopping floors gets you out of your cell, which seems like a good thing. And working on a farm or a construction crew gets the convict out of the entire prison and into sunshine and fresh air…which seems to me like a better deal than sitting in a cell with no direct sunshine.
(So if I ever get arrested for murder, I’m going to ask for a sentence at hard labor. Would I regret it? 
)
The Pea farm(Cummins) is hard labor, as all farming work is.
It’s hot as hell in Arkansas in the summer. There’s no shade out in those vast fields. Mile long rows to hoe.
There’s only one way to hoe peas.
It’s gotta be horrible doing that for 8 hours everyday, all summer long.
They don’t enjoy it.