By: Scott Ervin E-mail: ervinscott@hotmail.com "The Prison Alternative" America has to wake up and realize that the current structure of our penal system is failing terribly. Take a group of people, strip them of possessions and privacy, expose them to constant threats of violence, overcrowd their cell-block, deprive them of meaningful work, and the result is an embittered underclass more intent on getting even with society than contributing to it. There is a better way to deal with crime and punishment in America. Americans pay too much money for prisons to fail so badly. Like many big government solutions, prisons are expensive. In the Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics 1997, th