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Charles Koch's Surprising Views on Criminal Justice

Charles Koch, one of the wealthiest Americans and a prodigious supporter of conservative causes, told his hometown newspaper, the Wichita Eagle, that he thinks the American justice system has "been over-criminalized with too many laws and too many prosecutions of nonviolent offenders, not only for him but for everybody." Koch said his family and he are going to expand on the money they give to the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers to work on other efforts to reverse the trends in criminal justice that have led to 2.2 million people being incarcerated in the United States. Koch also has concerns that "the Sixth Amendment right to an attorney has been impaired by allowing public defender offices to be underfunded and overwhelmed, including by government prosecutors with more far more resources at their disposal," the Wichita Eagle's Roy Wenzl reports.