Hannah Rappleye is an independent reporter living in Brooklyn, NY. She has reported in East and South Africa, and focuses her work on criminal justice and human rights issues in the United States and abroad. Her work has appeared on MSNBC.com, Salon.com, in the Mail & Guardian and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications.
After extensive lobbying, the private probation industry is poised to wield ever more power over Georgia’s debtors.
Most states shut down their debtors’ prisons more than 100 years ago; in 2005, Harpersville, Alabama, opened one back up.
As HB 87 scared away the immigrants who worked its fields, officials in Irwin County, Georgia, scrambled to fill the local detention center, the area’s biggest employer.