[hnbad]

Pet peeve of mine but technically prison is for convicts, jail is for those yet awaiting a conviction but who aren't trusted to show up to court if allowed to roam freely. That the jail system (in the US especially) has essentially become a form of preemptive incarceration without the presumption of innocence is largely an artefact of the bond system, the overwhelmed courts and the perverse incentives in all of those systems from law enforcement to private prisons.

I realize the terms are often used interchangeably but I think the distinction is important especially because of the implications for presumption of innocence from conflating the two.

[dragonwriter]

> Pet peeve of mine but technically prison is for convicts, jail is for those yet awaiting a conviction but who aren't trusted to show up to court if allowed to roam freely.

Pet peeve, but despite being a frequently claimed technical distinction, this is wrong both in terms of the strict definition of the terms and the way they are used as names of real institutions (though it is approximately true in most US state justice systems—but not the federal system—if you consider only felony crimes.)