Aaron Sandusky was sentenced to ten years in prison for owning and operating three medical marijuana dispensaries in southern California. Despite complying with state laws, he got nabbed because of a competing federal ban on medical pot. District Court Judge Percy Anderson gave him the mandatory minimum sentence.

Since the annual living cost for California inmates is roughly $45,000 per person, the total cost of Sandusky’s ten-year incarceration sentence will amount to about $450,000 in today's dollars. That's in a state with the worst budget deficit in the country. Sound like a good use of money to you?

The price of incarceration in some states reaches as high as $50,000-$60,000 per person. And Sandusky's not the only man in America with such a case; check out three similar ones.

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