Dearborn County, Indiana: A Microcosm for America's Prison Problem

The Takeaway | Sep 2, 2016

Click on the 'Listen' button above to hear this interview.

Dearborn County, Indiana is not a county that has a high rate of violent crime. In fact, Dearborn's percentage of people below the poverty line is less than its state and national average.

But Dearborn County sends more people to prison per capita than almost any other county in the United States, and a report from our partners at The New York Times finds that about 1 in 10 adults in the county find themselves in prison, jail, or on probation, frequently for drug use. To put in more clearer terms, the county incarcerates more people to prison than San Francisco and Durham, N.C., combined.

Dearborn County Prosecutor Aaron Negangard is one of the people responsible for this high incarceration rate, but he defends his hard-line stance. Click on the 'Listen' button above to hear our full conversation.

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