CONCORD (AP) — Young adult prisoners in New Hampshire would get a chance to shave 13 months off their sentences under a bill heading back to the state Legislature. Lawmakers narrowly defeated a bill two years ago that would allow inmates between 17 and 25 to earn time off their sentences for completing education and
By Dianne Frazee-Walker
Most people can remember when Christmas meant getting up at dawn and running to the Christmas tree in our pajamas excited to see what was under the tree and in the stockings hanging on the mantel.
For children who have parents who are incarcerated, Christmas is not filled with visions of lollipops dancing in their heads; in fact, December 25th is just another day without their parents and can be even more depressing than any other day of the yeImage courtesy www.oklahomawomenscoalition.org ar.
Children who are missing a parent because they are spending time in prison are not only left to deal with loneliness they feel from having an absent parent, but also face ridicule and stereotyping. Many of these lost children are told they are going to turn out just like their parent that is incarcerated.
New Hope, a program created about 20 years ago by the Episcopal Diocese of Oklahoma is taking a more positive approach for addressing the needs of children who have at least one parent in prison. Instead of reminding children they have no chance of turning out to be productive citizens, they are encouraged to pursue an education. The children are led down a different path than their parents followed.
On Dec. 21, New Hope hosted a Christmas party at Trinity Episcopal Church in Tulsa. Children whose holidays would have been filled with sadness gathered around a table arranged with decorative trimmings and assembled their own wreaths.
The church hall was filled with fun, playfulness, and laughter. Toys, gifts, and food were plentiful. The kids were entertained by making their own reindeer and treats.
By Max Kenner Dear Readers, Twelve and a half years ago, I spent the summer driving across New York State, from prison to prison, looking for some good news and partners to help establish Bard Prison Initiative. Those were the bad old days. Just a few years before, the federal government eliminated funding for college
By Matt Stroud
A few months back, when I first started with In These Times, I had a talk with Logan Sachon at The Billfold about what I intended to do with The Prison Complex and why I find prisons so infuriating and fascinating. It was an enjoyable discussion. But when she asked me, “What do TV and movies get right … and what do they get wrong” about prisons, I admitted I didn’t really know; I’ve never served time in a prison, and anything I possess approaching a journalistic expertise about incarceration comes from what I’ve read, conversations I’ve had, and policy discussions I’ve followed.
So I decided to get in touch with some prisoners to see how they’d answer Logan’s question.
In a partnership with Between the Bars — a fascinating site that allows prisoners to blog about whatever they want — this is the first in a hopefully recurring series of posts by prisoners about their daily lives behind bars. Since we’re just getting started here, the prompt is simple: “What do TV and movies get right and what do they get wrong about prisons?” Our first response comes from Jennifer Gann, a prisoner at Kern Valley State Prison in the desert of Southern California about 45 minutes by car northwest of Bakersfield. Kern Valley is a maximum security facility for men with just about 4,100 prisoners.
Jennifer’s letter has been scanned and posted here. The text of her letter follows:
I’m a 44 year old transgender woman activist and prisoner in California. I have been incarcerated for the past 24 years, and I’ve witnessed every imaginable aspect of the prison system from the inside.
Initially, I was sentenced to “seven years” in state prison after being convicted of a robbery charge. I’ll admit that I’m no angel, but I served the time which fit the crime. I’m a drug addict and ex-gang member who has made a lot of mistakes which I now regret.
It is with great pleasure that I share with you — the Prison Education News readers — some recent developments in our prison education advocacy efforts. This news concerns several long-term projects that we have been working on behind the scenes and several new projects that we are preparing to engage in. It has been
By CapeCodToday.com Photo courtesy Barnstable County Correctional Facility In a effort to help make a better transition to life outside the bars, the Barnstable County Correctional Facility (BCCF) offers re-entry skills courses for inmates. Among those classes is a financial literacy class taught by Patricia Walsh and Kathy Moorey of Cape Cod Five. “Having financially savvy
By Christopher Zoukis
Prisoners incarcerated in both federal and state correctional systems are subject to prison disciplinary codes of conduct through which they can be sanctioned for committing disciplinary code violations. Often these disciplinary processes are nothing more than a proverbial kangaroo court. The prisoner is charged with misconduct, issued an incident report (sometimes called a “Disciplinary Report” or informally known as a “Ticket” or a “Shot”), brought before a hearing body consisting of the reporting officer’s peers, found guilty of the alleged prison disciplinary code violation(s), and sanctioned for the alleged conduct. Sadly, this is not an exaggeration as the process truly is this simple, straightforward and unfortunate. There are no true judges and juries present, only a colleague or two of the reporting officers who make the guilty/not guilty determination.
With the understanding that almost every prisoner who is charged with disciplinary misconduct will be found guilty of the alleged disciplinary code violation, it is vital for prisoners to know what to do when such issues arise. They must know what steps to take before even being issued the incident report for the alleged disciplinary code violation and how to intelligently proceed through the various hearings and stages in the disciplinary process. This article strives to provide a crash course in what to do when faced with a prison disciplinary proceeding and how to slant the odds in the accused’s favor. The United States Supreme Court has ruled that prisoners have a Due Process Clause right to a fair tribunal of disciplinary matters, vesting them with certain rights, including the right to written notice of a hearing, the right to an impartial tribunal, the right to present evidence, and a written statement of the evidence and findings made at the hearing. Each prisoner should be aware of these rights and should exercise them whenever they are facing such misconduct allegations.
Tip One: Remain Silent When Charged With Inmate Misconduct
The most important rule of thumb when faced with a prison disciplinary proceeding is to remain silent. As with traditional law enforcement, prison guards investigating inmate misconduct are not the prisoner’s friends. They are not there to search for the truth. They are not impartial fact finders: their job is simply to gather evidence for a conviction of the alleged misconduct. The best way to handle such prison guards is to remain silent or to only point out facts which support an acquittal. Most prisoners acknowledge some amount of guilt when speaking with such prison investigators and really hurt their chances at a favorable outcome by doing so. By remaining silent, this potentially crippling problem can be sidestepped in its entirety. A mere “I wish to remain silent,” “I have nothing to say at this point in time,” or “I reserve the right to remain silent” is all that needs to be said when confronted with prison disciplinary proceedings.
If a Texas state prisoner dies or is executed, relatives or friends can pick up the body. If they don’t, he or she is buried in the largest prison graveyard in the United States – the Captain Joe Byrd Cemetery in Huntsville, Texas. Such burials occur around 100 times each year. Named after an assistant
America’s prisons are quickly becoming a drain on local, state, and federal budgets. It’s estimated that as many as 30% to 40% of federal prisons are now over-capacity — a number that some believe will exceed 50% within the next 10 years — with state prisons suffering from similar problems. Many believe this overcrowding is
By Times of Trenton Editorial Board Amid all the reports of diminishing opportunity for urban youth, increasing rates of arrests, and frustrating levels of recidivism is an encouraging program at the Albert C. Wagner Youth Correctional Facility in Bordentown. Part of the New Jersey Scholarship and Transformative Education in Prisons Consortium, the program allows certain