Alcatraz CellPrison in Deer Lodge Montana

(photo by Ann Kramlich)

The Prison Environment

"Every time you build a prison, you close a school.”-Victor Hugo

"No matter what the question has been in American criminal justice over the last generation, prison has been the answer.”-Franklin E. Zimring

We are tracking one group of kids from kindergarten to prison, and we are tracking one group of kids from kindergarten to college." - Lani Guinier

Some Quotes

California has built 21 prisons since 1980. In the same period, the University of California system has opened one new campus. Although California's prison population has declined in recent years, the state's spending per prisoner has increased 5 times faster than its spending per K-12 student in the last two decades. The Huffington Post  |  By Saki Knafo Posted: 08/30/2013 1:50 pm EDT

From BJS at: http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/rpr94.pdf

Recidivism Rates

Emerging Issue ---The Rise of For-Profit Private Prisons

We believe the long-term growth opportunities of ourbusiness remain very attractive as insufficient beddevelopment by our customers should result in a

return to the supply and demand imbalance that hasbeen benefiting the private prison industry.

~ Corrections Corporation of America 2010 ANNUAL REPORT

In 2012, CCA sent a letter to 48 states offering to buy their prisons as a solution for "challenging corrections budgets” faced by states. In order to do so, CCA asked for a 20-year (or longer) contract plus:

• A minimum rated occupancy of 1,000 beds; • A structure age of no more than 25 years;• A designation that the structure is suitable for immediate occupation or is already occupied by an inmate population; and• An assurance by the agency partner that the agency has sufficient inmatepopulation to maintain a minimum 90 percent occupancy rate over the term of thecontract.

The Federal Prison Industries (commonly referred to as FPI or UNICOR) was established in 1934 by Franklin D. Roosevelt to employ federal inmates for production of goods needed in the government. It is the mission of Federal Prison Industries, Inc. to employ and provide skills training to the greatest practicable number of inmates confined within the Federal Bureau of Prisons; contribute to the safety and security of our Nation's correctional facilities by keeping inmates constructively occupied; produce market-price quality goods for sale to the Federal Government; operate in a self-sustaining manner; and minimize FPI's impact on private business and labor.

Adapted from the Unicor web site[ http://www.unicor.gov/index.cfm]

Prisoner Labor

• Combat uniforms, ammunition bags • Battery boxes, battery box assemblies and non-rechargeable batteries• Electrical and electronic components are used in guided missile seekers; electronics for missile launchers, propulsion systems, antenna mast groups, guidance processors and warhead detonation• Helmets for advanced combat, ballistic, paratrooper, Special Forces and riot control• Office furniture• Cable assemblies• Electro-optical and circuit board assemblies, and electrical connectors for a wide range of military, agency and commercial applications • Lighting products are used in lighting runways, base camp living quarters, kitchens and hospital tents • Semi-rigid co-axial cables (for radar), radio-frequency and microwave communicationsSource: www.unicor.gov/

Sample of Products

At the end of FY 2005, the Federal inmate population was almost 188,000. Today (September, 2013) the total number of federal inmates is 219,218. Source: http://www.bop.gov/news/weekly_report.jsp

Work Programs

Sentenced inmates are required to work if they are medically able. Institution work assignments include employment in areas like food service or the warehouse, or work as an inmate orderly, plumber, painter, or groundskeeper. Inmates earn 12¢ to 40¢ per hour for these work assignments.

Approximately 16% of work-eligible inmates work in Federal Prison Industries (FPI) factories. They gain marketable job skills while working in factory operations, such as metals, furniture, electronics, textiles, and graphic arts. FPI work assignments pay from 23¢ to $1.15 per hour.

Source: http://www.bop.gov/inmate_programs/work_prgms.jsp

Dell to Stop Using Prison Workers July 4, 2003 By LAURIE J. FLYNN Responding to concerns from both customers and environmental advocates, Dell Computer announced yesterday that it would no longer rely on prisons to supply workers for its computer recycling program.Dell, the world's largest seller of PC's, said it had canceled its contract with Unicor, a branch of the Federal Bureau of Prisons that employs prisoners for electronics recycling and other industries.

Prison Labor Used for Packaging for Starbucks and Nintendo[http://www.seattleweekly.com/news/0152/news-barnett.php]

Thanks in part to overcrowding, governments are turning to private companies to build and manage prisons. Here's how to pick the right time to buy into the trend.

By Michael Brush

In what might be a revealing commentary on our country's state of affairs, the nation's private prison companies look like solid investments for the next several years

Company Focus3 prison stocks poised to break out

Source: http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/P105034.asp

News Story

ParticipantsOriginally 70 volunteers (via newspaper ads)Screening: Diagnostic interviews and psychological test administered, existence of medical problems, criminal background, substance abuse

Total of 24 participants

12 Prisoner

s

12 Guards

Stanford Prison Experiment[Web-based slide show of prison simulation study -

Click here]

Random assignme

nt

Overall purpose of the study: To investigate the psychological effects of prison -- for both prisoners and guards

Paid $15/day for

participating

Procedure of the Study

“Prisoner recruitment -- Picked up at home by a police car

• Booked, fingerprinted, sprayed, blindfolded and put into holding cell

•Uniforms [dress, or smock worn with no underclothes. Prisoner ID number was on front and back of the uniform]. Made to wear a heavy chain on their right ankle’s at all times and a stocking cap over their heads

Stanford Prison Experiment (cont.)

Stanford Prison Experiment (cont.)

Construction of the Prison Environment (to ensure realism) • Use of consultant team including a former prisoner

• Input from prisoners and correctional personnel involved in course entitled “The Psychology of Imprisonment”

• Cells were small; enough room for only three cots with room for little else

Prisoner Treatment -- Some Examples• Use of "counts" to familiarizing the prisoners with their numbers and exercise control over the prisoners (counts took place several times each shift and often at night)• Punishments (e.g., push-ups) -- sometimes stepping on prisoner’s backs or having others sit on top of the backs of prisoners while doing push-ups• After an early prisoner rebellion ---

• Guards used a fire extinguisher to shot a stream of skin-chilling carbon dioxide on the prisoners. • Guards broke into cells, stripped the prisoners naked, took beds out, forced the ringleaders of the rebellion into solitary confinement• Going to the toilet became a privilege which a guard could grant

or deny at his discretion

• After the nightly "lock-up," prisoners were often forced to urinate or defecate in a bucket in their cells. Sometimes the guards did not allow prisoners to empty the buckets• Forcing prisoners to perform degrading, repetitive work such as cleaning out toilet bowls with their bare hands

Behavior of the “Prisoners”

• Negative Affect (e.g., anxiety, depression, rage)

• Learned Helplessness

• Conversation between prisoners

• Use of numbers to refer to themselves (in conversation with a Catholic priest)

• Loss of group unity

• “Parole Board” -- Most prisoners willing to forfeit the money they had earned up to that time in order to be paroled • Several behavioral reactions of prisoners (e.g., emotional breakdowns, psychosomatic rash)

The “Guards”

• Wore khaki uniforms, carried a whistle around their neck and a billy club and wore dark sun-glasses• Worked eight-hour shifts• Use of arbitrary control by the guards (e.g., Privilege cell)• Most aggressive “guard” viewed as role models• Overall, three types of guards emerged (1) tough, fair ones who followed prison rules, (2) "good guys" who did favors for the prisoners and never punished them, and (3) guards (about 1/3) who were hostile, arbitrary, and inventive in humiliating prisoners; they appeared to enjoy the power they possessed• No guard ever came late for his shift, called in sick, left early, or demanded extra pay for overtime work

Christina Maslach, a recent Stanford Ph.D., was brought in to conduct interviews with the guards and prisonersAfter viewing prisoners being marched on a toilet run (bags over their heads, legs chained together, hands on each other's shoulders) she strongly objected in an outrage by saying, "It's terrible what you are doing to these boys!”

The study was stopped after only 6 days --- the plan was for a 2-week timeframe

Premature Ending

11:25 p.m., Nov. 12, 2003. The detainee is covered in what appears to be mud and human feces.*

8:59 p.m., Oct. 18, 2003. Detainees is handcuffed in the nude to a bed and has a pair of panties covering his face. The photograph is taken from inside the cell and at a downward angle

11:50 p.m., Nov. 7, 2003. SPC HARMAN has camera or video camera in hand as she stands behind the detainees nude. SOLDIER(S): SPC HARMAN

*All caption information is taken directly from CID materials

Abu Ghraib[Ted Talk: Philip Zimbardo, The Psychology of Evil – Click

here]

• 9 Army soldiers (all enlisted) have been court-martialed and convicted of crimes at Abu Ghraib. Accountability stopped at the rank of staff sergeant -- no commanding officers have been prosecuted• Commanders are legally responsible for orders given and "if he has actual knowledge, or should have knowledge ... that troops or other persons subject to his control are about to commit or have committed a war crime and he fails to take the necessary and reasonable steps to insure compliance with the law of war or to punish violators thereof.” [Paragraph 501 of Army Field Manual 27-10]