There is a plague in the prisoners’ rights community that will destroy us all, from the inside out, if we don’t find a cure. Slowly it creeps into our minds, then our interactions and advocacy, and finally, our organizational policies. It’s like institutional racism, just of a different breed. This is the disease of selectivity,
By Christopher Zoukis Image courtesy newblackman.blogspot.com
For many years prisoners and their families have bemoaned the exorbitant rates charged by companies that provide telephone services to the incarcerated. Prisoners and their families, two groups chronically economically disadvantaged, have been abused and taken advantage of time and time again when merely trying to stay in contact. This is plainly unacceptable from a prisoners’ rights standpoint and a social morality standpoint, too. But it gets worse. As we delve into the murky waters of prison phone contracts, those who do not yet understand how insidious and extortionate these contracts truly are, will come to demand for change, not for their own sakes or for society’s, but based upon a moral conviction and the desire to help keep families together, a term of incarceration notwithstanding.
The problem with prison phone contracts ironically enough doesn’t hinge on the various departments of corrections or the Federal Bureau of Prisons. It isn’t even promulgated by prison phone providers either. The issue, instead, has to do with the awarding of prison phone contracts.
Prison phone contracts are awarded based on a profit share model. Companies such as Global Tel Link agree to charge prisoners and their families high phone rates and to share profits with either the local jail or prison, or the central administration of the prison system. As such, the incentive to lower phone rates is actually reduced. Instead, both corrections’ departments and prison phone providers strive to tack on as many fees and increased prison phone rates as much as possible to increase profits, as has been reported frequently in Prison Legal News and at the Prison Law Blog. Often, these contracts are awarded to the prison phone company which offers the largest kick-back rate. In fact, prison phone companies are known to also give premiums away to encourage contracts. Local jails have been known to receive free booking computer systems. Sheriffs have been known to receive campaign donations. And police departments have received free police cruisers.
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) has been granted a two-year extension to comply with court-ordered inmate population reductions. This order came from the federal, three-judge panel overseeing the case. This extension will alter the manner in which the state of California spends funds on reducing the CDCR’s inmate population. Previously, funding would
In a surprising move, Attorney General Eric Holder has teamed up with Tea Party-backed Senators Rand Paul and Mike Lee to fight against felon disenfranchisement — the reality of a person convicted of a felony subsequently losing certain civil rights due to the felony conviction. This group of strange bedfellows is primarily concerned with the
Even in the darkest of nights, the moon gives off a faint glow. The same is true of the world of American corrections, even in Florida’s private prison paradise. This light — and the hope it brings — comes from an unlikely source with an unusual mission: Open Books’ Prison Book Project. The Prison Book
There is good news about the condition of America’s criminal justice system. Both conservatives and liberals are agreeing that the time has come to revamp the prison system. Everyone is on the same page about how mass incarceration is costing the country too much money. For some reason when an out of control problem hits people’s pocketbooks, collaboration happens. When incarcerating a prisoner for a year reaches the same cost as student tuition at Harvard University, it is time to make a change.
Realization that American prisons are being financed to perpetuate social insufficiency, recidivism, and desperateness has caused legislation to reconsider the high cost of incarceration. The result is crime rates have decreased and the public is beginning to support non-violent offender reform as opposed to long-term prison sentences.
Over the last three years prison doors have been shutting on the outside instead of the inside. The prison population is not large enough to fill America’s prisons and they are gradually going out of business. From academics, progressive law enforcement groups, innovative rehabilitation programs and victim crime advocates to even fundamentalists, all have been struggling to repair our broken justice system, which has turned into a perpetual misery machine.
America’s mass incarceration dilemma has forced society to take a long hard look at what can be done to transform criminals into productive citizens.
Even states that use punitive law-and-order approaches in an attempt to conquer crime are now desperate enough to embrace tolerant rehabilitation programs once thought of as bleeding heart liberalism alternatives only a few years ago.
American prisons are currently experiencing a shortage of space and an abundance of prisoners; in a word, overcrowding. The United States incarcerates 25 percent of the world’s prisoners despite accounting for only 5 percent of the world’s population. The Federal Bureau of Prisons alone is experiencing overcrowding at a rate of 40 percent in its
By Dianne Frazee-Walker Image courtesy kpho.com
Maricopa County Sherriff Arpaio has a new approach up his sleeve for solving cold cases.
Who could be better to help solve cold cases than an inmate? After all, they have plenty of time on their hands and plenty of available card playing buddies.
Silent Witness is a resourceful program that uses playing cards to publicize cold cases. The cards reveal pictures and details about 52 local unsolved cases.
Phoenix Police and the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office are joining forces with Silent Witness handing out 3,000 of these decks to Maricopa County inmates in hopes that some of the prisoners will have helpful information that will help solve some of these cold cases.
One good hand in the right inmate’s hands could be a lucky draw for a grieving family.
The program is graciously funded by an anonymous individual who was fortunate enough to have their case solved by a Silent Witness card that was dealt to the right hand.
Silent Witness, Sgt. Darren Burch pronounces how each card has significant importance.
By Christopher Zoukis
The American criminal justice system is broken. Wrongdoers go to prison, become hardened by the experience, only to be released and commit additional crimes, thus reentering the criminal justice system. This cycle of crime, punishment, crime, and then back to punishment is often continual, and it is intergenerational, too. According to the latest RAND Corporation/Correctional Education Association study, 43 percent of released prisoners will recidivate within 3 years of their release from prison. While this is in line with several Pew Center on the States’ studies, the Bureau of Justice Statistics actually states that the 3 year recidivism rate is in the 50th percentile. Something clearly needs to be done.
Prisons: The Warehousing of People
While there are many causes for such a high recidivism — or failure — rate, in my mind they all come down to one component: wrongdoers are going to prison and are not being transformed by the experience. This is quite a sad statement considering that the American taxpayers spend tens of thousands of dollars per year to incarcerate each offender. We are essentially paying for the state to house people in concrete and cinderblock rooms, wait the prescribed time, and then release them as the same people they were when they went in in the first place. To call this ineffectual and simpleminded would be a gross understatement.
A Transformational Experience
What is needed is to manufacture a transformational experience for those Americans we incarcerate. We need to come up with some way to change people, not merely warehouse them. The research indicates that prison education, substance abuse and mental health treatment, as well as a structured reintegration plan, will make all the difference in the world. Let’s take each in turn.
Our friends over at PrisonerAssistant.com have recently launched a new venture called the Reentry Reform Roundtable. This website is designed to be the go-to forum for prison reform advocates the world over. Here users can create profiles for themselves and their organizations, share the work they’re engaging in (via blogs and forums), and connect with