In Arizona, you can get a 4 month prison sentence for aggravated DUI.
Is it really cost effective for the state to send a person to prison for only 4 months? I thought prisons were designed for long term incarceration and jails for short terms of less than a year.
Depends. A friend of mine was sentenced to something like three months or something - Cook County (jail) was full (you go to county if it’s under a year). He ended up in - I want to say Stateville Prison (I know it was bizarre cause Stateville is Max. Security) and had to do his time there.
Perhaps their county facilities were full?
One other thing - from the googling I just did a minute ago, only your link talks about “PRISON” - everything I found talks about “Jail”. Since it’s an ad for a law firm, perhaps they are trying to sound “scary” or something so they’ll get hired. I don’t know.
A prison sentence in Arizona is served in one of these facilities.
The jail facility in Maricopa county is run by the publicity hound Joe Arpaio. I’d think he’d want DUI offenders in his jail so he can parade them around in pink underwear and make them eat rotten bologna for lunch.
Of course, there are many other counties in Arizona. Perhaps their jail facilities aren’t set up to hold inmates for a sentence of several months?
I don’t know, but I will remark that prison is muuuuuuuuuuuch more fun than jail.
You’ve got all kinds of rights in prison you don’t have in jail.
Perhaps it’s a leniency thing?
That would be very unusual in New York. The general rule is that only people sentenced to imprisonment of a year of more are sent to prisons. Shorter sentences are served in jails. There are a handful of exceptions but they’re in unusual and rare circumstances like being an absconder or a civil confinement or a very high-profile security risk.
Stateville is a maximum security facility, but it also has a minimum security unit called Stateville Farm. I’d wager your friend was at the farm.
/aside
What freedoms would someone enjoy in prison that they would not have in jail? What is the practical difference anyway?
Well, in brief:
"# Jails don’t have many amenities for people serving time there, since they won’t be there for very long (although a jail sentence can seem like a very very long time). A county jail may have a work release program and services to combat substance abuse and address vocational needs of its inmates — or it may provide only the basic necessities of housing, food, and safety.
Cite: http://www.criminal-law-lawyer-source.com/terms/jail-prison-difference.html