By The Associated Press KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — Wyandotte County law enforcement officials have endorsed a plan that calls for investing in early childhood education as a way to cut down on crime and prison costs. Sheriff Don Ash, District Attorney Jerry Gorman, and jail administrator Jeffrey Fewell endorsed a proposal from the Obama administration
For the past several months, we at the Prison Law Blog have been searching for ways to better answer your questions about the Federal Bureau of Prisons, prisoners’ rights, and prison survival. We have been seeking ways to delve more comprehensively into the realm of prison life so that those soon-to-be-incarcerated, those already incarcerated, and
Dianne Walker still recalls the moment she had a revelation about taking action with the criminal justice system. August 13, 2004, Walker concluded a four month ordeal dealing with a false allegation against her. Prior to the incident Walker owned and operated a nail salon in Salida, Colorado. She had no knowledge of how the justice system operates and had never been arrested. Dianne Frazee-Walker / Image courtesy plus.google.com
Walker’s eyes were open to what actually happens when an individual is accused of a crime. A plea-bargain was made, Walker was sentenced to two-years probation after coming extremely close to spending time in jail. She was rushed out of the court room and that was that.
The baffling veracity of the criminal justice system became clear to Walker. The truth is not a priority nor are the victim and offender encouraged to interact with each other. The main objective is to ensure the offender is punished and pays by either probation fees or incarceration time.
Walker was bewildered with the entire process and knew she could not merely walk away after experiencing the reality of what goes on within the justice system. In Walker’s mind, the day she gazed at the court document stating her decree, marked the beginning of a life-long quest to advocate for a more authentic way to process cases through the justice system.
Full Circle Restorative Justice was founded in 2006 for the purpose of enhancing the safety of the community by holding offenders accountable, and empowering victims through a supportive conflict resolution process.
The legal system asks: What laws have been broken? Who did it? What do they deserve?
Restorative Justice asks: Who has been hurt? What are their needs? Whose obligations are these?
Prison Education News, Prison Law Blog’s sister website, is in the process of updating a text which profiles various correspondence education programs that prisoners can enroll in. The text — “Education Behind Bars,” which I authored — has been substantially revised and will be published in a different form in 2014 by Middle Street Publishing.
We are currently in the process of researching correspondence programs that are accessible to state and federal prisoners. These correspondence education programs are going to be included in a book focused on prison education being published by Middle Street Publishing. If you are affiliated with or know of any correspondence education programs which can be
A growing and troubling trend has emerged within the prison consulting industry: persons spending time in prison, being released, and opening their doors as prison consultants when they really have no business doing so in the first place. This also applies to attorneys who have no real experience with the Federal Bureau of Prisons or
By Diane A. Sears Image courtesy D. A. Sears
Fourteen years ago, immediately after the launch of IN SEARCH OF FATHERHOOD(R), something very profound happened. I began receiving letters from young men — Our Sons. Their letters enclosed brilliantly crafted essays and soulful poems. They asked me to publish them. And I did. In exchange for their essay or poem, they received a free copy of IN SEARCH OF FATHERHOOD(R). A number of these young men continued to send essays and poems. And they sent letters. These were young men — Our Sons — from, among other places, New York, California, Texas, Alabama, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Indiana. So, what was profound about receiving poetry, essays, and letters from these young men? Each letter had a similar introductory sentence: “I am 23 and I have been incarcerated since I was 18. Will you publish my essay? Can I get a free copy of your publication? “ or “I am 28 and I have been incarcerated since I was 16. I’m sending you a poem I’d like you to publish.” Many of these young Men — Our Sons — are Fathers — Fathers of daughters and sons. They do not tell me how or why they embarked upon a path that led them to a maximum security correctional facility. Nor do I ask. But I do have questions: What is going on with Our Sons? What is going on in Our Sons’ homes, schools, and communities? And how do we fix whatever is going on that is driving Our Sons down the path to prison with all deliberate speed?
By the Editorial Board of The Daily Campus
Recently, Eric Bolling of “The Five,” a Fox News program, was under well-deserved attack by the illustrious Stephen Colbert for the former’s comments regarding the suicide of Ariel Castro, convicted for 937 criminal charges among which included rape, kidnapping, and aggravated murder. While this article isn’t quite a defense of Castro, it is an attack on Bolling’s statements which posited that taxpayers saved $780,000 by his suicide. Bolling’s argument here is insensitive, even when one considers the magnitude of Castro’s crimes, and is indicative of the negative attitude towards criminals and their opportunity for reform. America wholly believes once a criminal always a criminal, and this social stigma prevents them from re-entering society successfully. Image courtesy twitter.com
With this in mind, it’s clear why recidivism, or the term to describe former felons re-entering prisons or re-arrested for similar previously committed crimes, is so high in this country and why rehabilitation programs struggle to take effect. When one in thirty-two Americans is on probation, parole or in prison and America has that largest population of criminals (you know, that popular statistic, 5 percent of the global population, 25 percent of its prisoners), one would think that the public attitude towards criminals would be more supportive. Instead, America has collectively decided to abandon these people with the idea that they are a lost cause and deserve the barest of dregs we can throw at them, leaving them to struggle both in and out of the prison system.
While an odd thought to present, ever since the Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBOP) implemented the TRULINCS computer system — and followed it with the MP3 player program — the FBOP has appeared to be on the right track in terms of communicating with the federal inmate population. This idea has presented itself through more
The first people to visit Alcatraz Island were native peoples who arrived between 10,000 and 20,000 years ago. Two major groups lived around the bay: the Miwok, who lived north of the bay in present-day Marin County, and the Ohlone, who lived in the coastal areas between Point Sur and the San Francisco Bay.
Early use of Alcatraz by these indigenous people is difficult to reconstruct, since most of the tribes’ oral histories have been lost. Historians believe that Alcatraz was used as a camping spot and an area for gathering foods, especially bird eggs and marine life. One tradition implies the island may have been used as a place of banishment for tribal members who violated tribal law. Alcatraz / Photo courtesy www.citymama.com
By the time the first Spanish explorers arrived in 1769, more than 10,000 indigenous people lived around San Francisco Bay.
• On August 5, 1775, Spanish Lt. Juan Manuel de Ayala sailed his ship into San Francisco Bay and spent several weeks charting the harbor. During his surveys he described a rocky, barren island and named it “La Isla de Los Alcatraces” (Island of the Sea Birds). Historians debate which island Ayala actually sited, but the name eventually was given to the 22 acre rock today called Alcatraz.
• California became a possession of United States on February 2, 1848 in a treaty with Mexico that ended the Mexican War. A week earlier, on January 24th, gold had been discovered in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Within three years, the population of San Francisco would explode from around 500 to more than 35,000 as gold seekers poured into California.