In the old days time in prison was more about hard labor, now a days it's just about hard time meaning that the punishment of jail is more about having to endure and survive the deplorable and violent life prisoners are allowed to live under. Now granted, doing hard time is a powerful deterrent the thought of having to protect from being raped every day or maybe being killed for a trivial debt like a candy bar or a pack of cigarettes undoubtedly makes many criminals think twice before committing a crime that will get them hard time. The thing is there used to be a time where that sort of thing was the exception rather then the rule and prison guards worked much harder at trying to prevent those sorts of things then they do now. You know back when prison time at least made the attempt to rehabilitate prisoners. Back then there was a lot more emphasis about forcing people to do hard work (hence the term "hard labor") for which the prisoner got some small reimbursement for their work which gave them the opportunity to buy things to make life in prison a little more tolerable. I think at least for violent crimes involving guns they should re-establish such prisons but rather then menial work that is hard but produces things of little value such as working on chain gangs or busting up rocks all day, the work should be hard but produce something of value that can then be sold on the market for a decent return. Also instead of just paying a slave wage of maybe a couple of dollars per day, pay a low but more realistic hourly wage but then take from that a percentage for the housing and food, etc. Have something go towards restitution (where applicable) and force a certain amount set aside in a savings so the inmate had something to work with when released. That then could become what reduces the compensation the prisoner get to use for himself, down to the slave wage of a couple of dollars per day. Then additionally make the stiff sentencing time day for day with no reduction of sentence for good behavior and no early release on parole. It may not deter gun violence but if nothing else it would get violent criminals off the streets for long periods of time and do it in a manner where the prisoner isn't such a burden on society for just warehousing him. Plus since he would have a "savings" to work off when he is finally released maybe he would be less inclined to return to crime just to survive. It might even actually rehabilitate the criminal if the work he did in prison gave him skills for work outside of prison that people don't want to do and therefore employers might be less reluctant to hire an ex convict. I'm not sure if it would be more effective then the "hard time" model prisons operate under now but that's mainly because nobody has ever really tried to create such a prison. Sure there have been prisons that put inmates into hard labor but with few if any of the positive benefits I mentioned above. Without the benefits for society and potentially for the inmate it's much easier to just give up on it if it seems too difficult to enforce. I think it would at least be worth trying out for a while rather then just warehousing people for periods of time that as some inmates might say, one can do "standing on their head." I should also add that since these types of prisons would operate differently then the typical prison of today, they shouldn't be allowed to mix non violent criminals with the violent ones. Having all inmates be the same class of criminal should make it easier to operate uniformly across the entire inmate population and thereby have a great chance for this being a successful prison model. There should probably also be some recognition for violent criminals that might not fit into such a system like the Hannibul Lector type or the Charlie Manson type that would maybe be better served by placing in a maximum security prison for the criminally insane.
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yeah, i know. the SC, even as now staffed, would prob not let this slide by... just a random idea i had. 
kid MIGHT have had a double barrel & did not get reloaded quickly enough. i'd bet #3 finds a "different line of work" to go into if nothing else...
