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Reader dwb writes:

I want you to imagine a place that we can keep 100% gun free. It’s behind barbed wire, with high walls. No guns, guaranteed. Admission to this place is tightly controlled. What would the murder rate be in such a gun-free utopia?
Easy to find out. Just such a place exists — it’s called the Maryland state prison system . . .

According to the justice department, the murder rate in Maryland prisons is 11 per 100,000. That’s three times the national average…for prisons, twice the national average for the non-incarcerated population, and almost three times the rate of the non-incarcerated population of “guns-everywhere” Texas.
So since there’s a long-term correlation between a rising gun ownership rate and a falling crime rate, should we be putting guns into the Maryland correctional system?

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25 COMMENTS

  1. Nan no more guns for Marylands govt, ban them. Fill up the prisons there with prisoners from other states.
    Let them kill each other off and a big problems solved.
    Costs.
    Not one red cent to any Northeastern prison system for guns.

  2. Wait wait wait wait wait……wait….no hold on….wait….just a second….

    You mean to tell me that criminals will kill people even if they don’t have guns?

    (**Explosion….red mist…..cleaning lady scrapes cerebellum material off the computer monitor***)

  3. The funny thing about the premise of this article is that it isn’t even true: inmates have acquired firearms in prison.

    A prison is only as secure as the people — guards — who secure it. And, being people, sometimes guards accept bribes and other times guards fail to detect smuggling.

    The important point is this: if a trained team of people cannot keep secured prisons anywhere close to violence and firearm free, how in the world would anyone expect a wide-open free nation to be violence and firearm free?

    • No worries. Maryland lets prisoners have all the drugs, sex, (and twinkies) they want, courtesy of the guards. Once they have learned to be especially violent without guns, Maryland lets ’em out early so they can obtains their guns. I am sure they are going through the permit, fingerprint, and background check process!

      Prison is not something Maryland criminals fear. In fact some go their to burnish their creds and move up the ladder. Would the gang leaders who run the jail let the guards smuggle guns in?

      One thing is for sure, all those murders in Baltimore would not happen with out guns, right?

  4. Actually, this is once situation where more guns ≠ less crime. Why, you ask? Because it’s a population of criminals. The similarities it has to society are very small. So, since you have a group of people who have already proven their willingness to commit crimes up to and including murder, better tools to kill with are not the correct answer. Try again.

    • I have a modest proposal for preventing the children of poor people from being a burden to their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the public that you might be interested in.

      j. swift

    • Prison populations are made up of criminals who were caught. There are a significant number if criminals on the street. The sad truth of it is that nearly every one of us is a criminal, sans the judicial conviction to make it official (read “Three Felonies a Day”).

      Did you drive at it below the speed limit today? But you are not a murderer? Neither is everyone in prison.

      I think the premise of the sarcastic question of this blog post holds true.

    • Nathan, you have to consider the learning curve before you say things like that. It’s true that the crime rate would spike instantly, but if every prisoner had a gun and adequate ammo, the crime rate would drop to zero pretty quickly. Which would be a very positive result, especially after considering the effects over decades.

    • Why not? “Our” State gubmint barely allows the serfs that live here to have guns. The prisoners prolly have more handguns per capita than the subjects outside the walls. Even including the Rich and Connected.

  7. Lets try it and see what thee outcome is. Taxpayers are paying to keep them so worst case taxpayers have to keep supporting them best case prison is no longer needed. You know that would never happen. Taxpayers would have to pay to build more prisons.

  10. F@$k Maryland, I say we build a fence around the whole carp hole and use the whole state as a prison.
    Jersey too.

  11. Wait a minute! My spidey-sense is tingling. What percentage of the incarcerated population of the U.S. are convicted criminals, currently serving time? And what percentage of the un-incarcerated population of the U.S.aren’t? I can’t quite pin it down but I’m thinking there might be a….uh….argh!! why the hell can’t I stop picturing apples and oranges long enough to figure this logic problem out?

    Also, I might be mistaken, but I am pretty sure the people walking around this prison that aren’t convicted criminals, currently serving time, DO have access to firearms, for their self-defense.

    Anyways, That email was impressive…for all the wrong reasons.

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