Tim Murphy digs into the big business of the private prison industry over at Mother Jones.

FORBES: Texas and the Prison-Industrial-Complex

Like taking on the military budget, the drug companies, or the teachers unions, taking on the prison industry is a thankless job.

FORBES: Mass Incarceration Doesn��t Make Us Safer

For that, you get measures including ballistic grade doors capable to blocking bullets, hidden security cameras and a gas canister system originally designed for the prison industry, which drops temporarily debilitating blankets of chemicals.

FORBES: Platinum Protection

East Londonderry MP Gregory Campbell said the employment of more than 400 prison staff - as well as jobs in the construction industry - were big factors in wanting to keep a jail at Magilligan.

BBC: New prison to be built at Magilligan, County Londonderry

Wackenhut, which describes itself as a world leader in this growing industry, has already won contracts to manage more than fifty prison, detention and mental health facilities in North America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.

BBC: Criminal justice reshaped