In America, people are imprisoned for using even very mild drugs, tortured by the government, and forced to bail out reckless financial companies.

Judged as of 2009-04-13. There are three parts: (1) people in the US were being jailed or imprisoned for possessing or using mild drugs such as marijuana; (2) the US government tortured people (e.g. CIA enhanced interrogation such as waterboarding, as documented in official reports or memos); (3) the public, via taxpayers, was made to fund bailouts of risky financial firms (e.g. TARP, AIG). TRUE: all three are documented as of early 2009. MOSTLY TRUE: all three are documented, but one is somewhat overstated, e.g. incarceration for marijuana use alone was rare compared with possession arrests, or the torture victims were foreign detainees rather than 'people in America'. MIXED: two parts are documented and one is substantially unsupported. MOSTLY FALSE: only one part is documented. FALSE: none is documented.

Set before the research began.

1. E1 Who's Really in Prison for Marijuana? | Office of Justice Programs Office of Justice Programs (NCJRS Virtual Library), U.S. Department of Justice · May 2005

   “In 1997, the year for which the most recent data are available, only 1.6 percent of State inmates were in prison for offenses that involved only marijuana; and less than 1 percent of all State inmates had been convicted under a charge of only marijuana possession.”

2. E2 2002 memo: Had to be intent to inflict 'severe pain' to be torture - CNN.com CNN · 16 April 2009

   “The memo said waterboarding and other techniques were used on Zubaydah; Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, believed to be the mastermind behind the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and identified as "KSM" in the memo; and another suspected al Qaeda leader, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri.”

3. E3 Memos Shed New Light on CIA Interrogation Tactics PBS NewsHour · 17 April 2009

   “That memo found that while the "use of the waterboard constitutes a threat of imminent death" it concluded that in the absence of prolonged mental harm, no severe mental pain or suffering would have been inflicted and "the use of these procedures would not constitute torture."”

4. E4 Who’s Really in Prison for Marijuana? Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP)

   “Recent BJS estimates based on prisoner surveys show that at midyear 2002, approximately 8,400 state prison inmates were serving time for marijuana possession (any amount)”

5. E5 Who’s Really in Prison for Marijuana? Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP)

   “About 1.6 percent of the state prison population were held for offenses involving just marijuana, while just 0.7 percent were incarcerated with marijuana possession as the only charge.”

6. E6 Who’s Really in Prison for Marijuana? Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP)

   “of the 174 for whom sentencing information is known, just 63 actually served time behind bars.”

7. E7 The Criminal Justice Costs of Marijuana Prohibition in Rhode Island OpenDoors (Rhode Island), supported by Marijuana Policy Project · March 2010

   “In 2008, 396 people were put in jail because of marijuana possession charges”

8. E8 Marijuana Arrests For Year 2008: 847,864 Pot Arrests Now Comprise One-Half Of All US Drug Arrests NORML · 14 September 2009

   “Of those charged with marijuana violations, approximately 89 percent, 754,224 Americans were charged with possession only.”

9. E9 Answers to Frequently Asked Questions about Marijuana Office of National Drug Control Policy (White House archive) · 22 August 2012

   “In total, one tenth of one percent (0.1 percent) of state prisoners were marijuana possession offenders with no prior sentences.”

Government and independent sources show that people were held in US prisons and jails for marijuana possession, though as a small share of inmates (E5, E6, E8, E1). April 2009 reporting on the Justice Department memos says a memo described waterboarding and other techniques being used on detainees such as Zubaydah and KSM (E3), and that a memo on waterboarding concluded its use would not constitute torture (E4). None of the evidence addresses the third part, taxpayer-funded bailouts of financial firms. Without it, the evidence cannot settle whether the claim is mostly true or mixed under the criteria.