“Wake the f#%k up B!tc#es or y’all ain’t gonna eat sh!t” was the first thing I heard the correction officer scream as she banged on my cell door. It was my first night in my jail cell and the first of many where I would wonder how to keep my cool and stay positive until I was free again. Our everyday ritual: wake up to verbal assaults, eat deplorable food, roam a confined area while avoiding trouble, get locked back into a cell for “count”, return to roaming, and repeat. Through this daily routine, I mostly stayed quiet and tried to avoid trouble. Staying out of trouble was hard when there were about 130 women confined into a multi-purpose room. Not to mention, there were no resources offered to help them deal with whatever issues and actions that led their imprisonment. “G-Unit” was filled with a few Correction Officers and a variety of inmates-mostly women of color, and a lot of pride, anger, and fear from both groups, just masked in different uniforms.
When I was first assigned to “G-unit”, I had no idea what to expect. I soon realized that it was a predator and prey environment, and I was the prey. The new inmates in the unit were deemed as “fresh meat,” and we were hazed by the older inmates. That’s when I was introduced to my predator; I’ll refer to her as Chrissy. She was 19 years old and had a high-pitched, squeaky voice. Like prison norm, she tried to intimidate the new inmates with her tough demeanor, but in doing so all of her insecurities were obvious. We exchanged heavy words on my 2nd day over hot water, but interestingly enough she left me alone when I did not back down. Chrissy was released and came back just three days later, and from the looks of it she was happy to be back in the place where she had a bed and food. I soon noticed a cycle that was prevalent and would unfortunately continue.
My cellmate was great example of someone stuck in this cycle, lets call her Tish. Through hours of talking, I found out that she was a 47-year-old woman who had been in and out of jail since she was 19. When she was younger she used drugs to cope with some very deep issues, and in her “escape” she found herself in a bad situation with a cop that resulted with her being arrested for the first time. She was funny, battled with depression, and had found herself in custody a number of times since her first arrest.
Looking at these two women with almost three decades in age difference, (my predator Chrissy and cellmate Tish) I started to pay attention to the system that does not correct these woman, but instead makes them slaves to the system. Tish, since her first time in custody, was never thoroughly evaluated nor understood the issues that led to the petty crimes she committed. Instead, she was locked up and not offered services or resources that could’ve helped her rejoin society and prevent her return. She could’ve become a productive member to society with a future that wouldn’t have included repeat offenses. Tish needed help at 19 and she needed it when we shared a cell at 47. Regrettably, the system was not built to help correct her behaviors or handle the emotions that led to crime. However, it has provided a space for her to continuously harbor ill feelings and practices that have inevitably led to her prevalent cycle.
The prison system in the Unites States brings in inmates like Chrissy and keeps them like Tish. The environment promotes complacency with no opportunity to improve. An inmate like Chrissy has found a place that unlike the outside world will feed, clothe, and provide shelter for her. It doesn’t teach her how to obtain these things for herself. Therefore, for her jail is a good option as it gives her what she needs. On the other hand, it’s a heavy burden on taxpayers, and it doesn’t reap the necessary benefits. Three decades from now, Chrissy and Tish might be cellmates. They’re both caught in the prevalent cycle, and it doesn’t seem like they’ll find their way out of it. The Department of Corrections does not “correct” anything. In fact, it prevents individuals from understanding their underlying issues, addressing those challenges, and changing their behavior and mindset to become productive members of society. Either we redefine what the “Department of Corrections” looks like, or we change the name to something that is not a lie.
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A name change is by far the least of the problems with the system.
Our entire Justice system needs a complete overhaul. It does not serve “Justice”, one could argue that it never has.
It’s simply a means of monetizing what government deems to be society’s problems.
In our society, there are three philosophies that guide corrections and judicial systems- warehousing, punishment, and rehabilitation. Warehousing is just as it sounds- let prisoners pass the time, don’t offer any chances to grow while incarcerated, and let them manage themselves (in social hierarchy). Punishment has a large focus on retribution- think long sentences in prisons with hard labor, unpaid prison labor, harsh conditions and harsher treatment. Rehabilitation, on the other hand is focused around reducing recidivism and growth of individuals. It sounds like you were in a warehousing type of situation, which doesn’t surprise me. The problem is prisons are a billion-dollar industry in this country, a huge supplier of jobs and goods, and very popular with the war on drugs and tough on crime folks. It took a lot of policy to get us in this mess, and it will take years of fighting for policy changes to reverse the trend. Prisons have exploded since the war on drugs and war on crime hit the scene in the 80’s. So we are almost 40 years into this trend of mass incarceration for profit. I’m glad you made it out, and am interested to hear your ideas about how to reverse this on the ground (with the Tish’s and Chrissy’s of the world) as well as in the policy world. Thanks for sharing!