Jail must be a safe and humane place

Re “In jail and in danger,” Dec. 17

The conditions of Los Angeles County jails that were reported recently shock the conscience and haunt the soul. The lack of medical care and unsafe conditions for inmates reflect our society’s lack of concern for the less fortunate. Los Angeles is a city of Dickensian extremes, and nowhere is this more visible than visiting an inmate at county jails. They have a sickening pall of gloom. They devitalize the inmate for life, and the detrimental effect to a man’s spirit is just as deadly as the physical germs that filled English prisons of the 18th century. In time, the idleness breaks the current between man and life so that when he emerges from jail, it is hard to make normal connections with the world again. As a society, we must make every effort to make our jails a humane and safe place for those who are incarcerated. Until then, the words of Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky come to mind: “The degree of civilization in a society is revealed by entering its prisons.”

JEFFREY A. LOWE

Beverly Hills