Fifty Million Years in Prison: The Futility of Prisoners Seeking Justice in America - Paperback

by Ivan Denison (Author)

Mass incarceration has emerged as one of the biggest stains on the fabric of American society in the early 21st century, an embarrassment for a country championing itself as a defender of freedom and human rights. With the exception of the world's genocides, we are witnessing the greatest wanton deprivation of human liberty since 1865. The human cost: fifty million years in prison, and counting. Not even Stalin locked up as many people as the United States does today, and the only countries that come close to the U.S. incarceration rate are dysfunctional, oppressive regimes, such as North Korea, Cuba, and Rwanda. The crime rate in the U.S. is in no way exceptional, so what is it about Americans that we feel the need to confine so many people? In this non-fiction narrative, author Ivan Denison takes the reader inside a maximum-security state prison, on a journey examining the lives and criminal cases of prisoners caught within the criminal justice system. He follows their mostly futile efforts to get their convictions overturned or their sentences reduced, always tying their individual struggles to the effects of the state apparatus used to imprison them. By examining the "quantum unit" of incarceration - the solitary prisoner - and expanding the focus outward, to the county, the state, and the nation, one can see a pattern emerge that explains why the incarceration rate has soared, and what can be done about it. The conclusions are atypical, but strongly supported by original research, and could lead to a dismantling of this modern gulag system that even Stalin would have envied.

Author Biography

Ivan Denison is the pen name of Indiana prisoner Ty Evans, #158293, who currently resides at the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City. The nom de plume was chosen as an homage to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's title character in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. Evans is serving a 71-year sentence from Marion County for attempted murder (40 years) and resisting arrest (1 year), with a habitual offender enhancement (30 years). He began his incarceration on May 16, 2005, and his release date is November 16, 2036. Evans is a graduate of Ball State University, Bachelor of General Studies, summa cum laude, with minors in History, Anthropology, and Sociology. He previously graduated from Southeastern Illinois College with a degree in Land Surveying. Prior to his incarceration, he owned and operated Centurion Surveys LLC in Indianapolis.