Life in Prison

Safe and Orderly Environment In any prison, special security precautions are directed toward certain locations because of their importance to maintaining order. Those locations include: Front Entry Control Room Cell Blocks Dinning Area Record’s Area Recreation Yards Sites where inmates work

Custody Levels Protective Custody: segregation of inmates for their own safety Administrative Segregation: keeping of inmates in secure location so that they cannot harm others

Contraband During the course of daily activities, staff routinely count the inmates; searches of inmates clothing and bodies and shakedowns of their cells are commonplace in an effort to control contraband. The mail and phones may be monitored and inmates may only visit and designated times with approved people.

Contraband Items Left side: Shanks, Shivs Above: White Lightening, Hooch, Toilet Wine

Snitch Systems There is also an informal structure of norms and relations that is vital to the operation of the facility. Most institutions have an elaborate snitch systems in which staff learn from inmate informants about the presence of contraband, potential for disruptions, and other threats.

Discipline Staff members typically have broad discretion when they detect rule violations. Options include: overlooking the infraction may issue an informal warning file a report

Services for Inmates At minimum, inmates must be fed, clothed, and provided with basic shelter. Institutions make an array of services available to inmates for their leisure time like: mail, phone, visitations, commissaries, recreational facilities, legal resources, and religious services.

Rehabilitation Inmates hoping to better themselves during their incarceration normally have the opportunity to participate in a number of rehabilitation programs. Examples are: Self-Improvement Programs offered by religious and civic groups Work Programs Educational and Vocational Trainings Counseling and therapy

Positives of Institutional Programs: Give inmates a way to occupy themselves Help inmates manage time Help the institution achieve control over inmates Problems that plague programs: Work assignments don’t parallel work in the free world Little concern for the quantity and quality of work Some of the jobs lack any real counterpart in the free world Educational programs suffer from a lack of funding Prepares inmates to enter job for which there is already competition Less-Eligibility Principle: position that prisoners should receive no service or program superior to the services and programs available to free citizens without charge