News FeedFamily Ties Lower Prison Recidivism
Asha Nettles asked me how I thought family ties, and personal commitments such as marriage influenced whether prisoners would revert to crime upon release. She also asked whether I thought prison administrators should limit their hiring to those who believed in the power of rehabilitation. I’m grateful that Asha has given me this privilege of contributing to her education.
Those charged with the unenviable challenge of managing our nation’s prison system could serve society better if they encouraged those in prison to nurture strong family and community ties. In the Second Chance Act of 2007, the U.S. Congress published findings indicating that strong family and community ties were the best indicators for success upon release. Unfortunately, the members of Congress also found that prison administrators did not make use of this resource. My experience has been that Prison Policies Block Families From Nurturing Ties With Loved Ones in Prison.
I was married in a prison visiting room in 2003. I had been incarcerated for 15 years before Carole and I married. She was the inspiration that drove me to educate myself and prepare for a law-abiding life upon release. I worked hard to achieve goals that I set, as I wanted to prove myself worthy of the woman to whom I would pledge my life. It was the thought of marriage that gave me the strength to discipline myself. Since Carole became my wife, I have felt even more motivated to live as a contributing citizen.
Prisoners who lack family support sometimes adjust in negative ways. They shut themselves off from society and become one with the prison community. They hang out with “the homies” and embrace the us-versus-them culture of the penitentiary. The more difficult administrators make it for those in prison to sustain strong family ties, the more they simultaneously condition prisoners to fall susceptible to the pernicious influences of the penitentiary. Frequently, those influences lead to high recidivism rates. The administrators who run the prison system set the policies by which all prisoners must live. They also establish the culture or ethos of the prison staff members. The more oppressive the atmosphere, the more difficult it becomes for a prisoner to muster the strength and will necessary to maintain a positive attitude. Prison administrators can lead more prisoners to adjust in ways that will help them emerge successfully if they encourage the people who work in prisons to support positive adjustments.
My personal experiences, together with what I have learned from other prisoners, convince me that those who strive to build strong community support and to educate themselves stand the best chance of successful re-entry. Prison administrators ought to encourage such adjustments.
How prison broke the child
My son is a convicted pedophile. Yes this is the lowest form of prisoner in your mind or most minds. I understand that and he does need to fix this. Prison is his opportunity to change his life and he needed this time out. I will not disagree with this.
This story however is about his child. In the visiting room of probably all prisons are multiple cameras, and possibly even listing devices but if you are convicted of this crime you cannot have your kids visit. Funny thing is you can be in the visiting room with all other kids just not your own kid. Yes I know you will say he doesn’t deserve it. But what about the child that can write to the father, can talk to the father on the phone but is not allowed to visit? This kid is in a prison too. This kid is old enough to need a dad just like any other kid and this system will not allow her this privilege. This kid is breaking. This kid has a need for a dad in life. This kid cries for the missing hug. This kid does not understand that everyone can visit except the kid. This kid was not the victim of anything other than the system.
We punish the family in all ways. If 1 in 100 of us in America is in prison think about all the new generations that we have put on this path to destruction by punishing the entire family not just the criminal. What about the kids?
Brenda, I feel for you and what you’ve been through, what you’re going through.
I feel, as the mom of a convict, the family suffers tremendously. Particularly an inmates child or children. But mom’s and dad’s suffer too. We’re accused of horrible things, when in fact it’s the adult who makes a mistake, breaks the law, and goes to prison. I don’t take this stuff lightly. But it’s a burden we carry, and try to do so with some modicum of dignity. It ain’t easy!
It seems cruel and unusual punishment to me, that your son is not allowed visits with his child. Tremendously sad situation…this kiddo needs his dad, loves his dad, and deserves to see his dad. Is there any way a judge could be petitioned about this?
What I wanted to say, however, is that while this is true, it does take commitment. I did a study of this in grad school a few years back. The wives who stuck by their husbands throughout their imprisonment were often divorced within the first 5 years after their release, even if the man did manage to stay straight. We should be doing more to prepare families for reintegration. Often families minimize the reality that those who are in prison are not just (for the most part and my apologies to present company, but I have lived with this long enough to know it’s tru)normal people who made mistakes. They are people with BIG problem. And unless both people are willing to stick it out till the big problems are worked through (things like seeing y our father murder your mother or being left alone for days as a child while your drug addicted mother worked the streets, you know, that would tend to scar a person). And it ain’t easy, believe me, this committment. I have been backed into a closet with a knife at my throat. I have had a loaded gun pointed at my head and heard the trigger pull back. Yet in all those things God graciously intervened because he knew my husband was a better man that what life so far had given him a chance to be. I could be dead, but we both are alive. Thankfully I don’t have to live with him any more. He still is a borderline, with those ups and downs, ins and outs, but functional. Life is calmer now. You know, but it was worth it. I would do it again, even if it killed me, I would do it. I’m very glad it didn’t. But even more, I am glad he doesn’t have to suffer any more. I see the title of Michael’s book Inside. I see what’s inside the orange jump suit. Flesh and bone, a heart, behind brick walls. “I will take from you a heart of stone,” says the Lord, “and make a heart of flesh.”
Nobody can ever be free if they don’t repend of the person they were and reject those evil ways.
One of the most amazing documentaries I saw in the Locked up series was on Angola. If you haven’t had the chance, see it.
In trying to rehabilitate (punish) some one, most always the system wrecks many other lives in this process, locked away takes everything but your right to breath,and it’s very sad that the innocent families must also pay a price. Prison is punishment all in itself, why create punishments for an offender that effects an offenders child or family ties, after all the offender is already taking punishment for thier crime every day in prison. Stop Punishing the families!
Chris, In California if I understand the system correctly according to the visitation guidelines published by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation the only way a child can visit the offender is with a court decision. My grandchild will be going to court for this right. However the visit regardless of this court order will not be a contact visit. Inmates visit in California in a large room with vending machines, games and flexibility and the visit is several hours long. In these situations the visit is a one hour scheduled visit and it is conducted via a glass partition on a phone. This child cannot hug the father. This child has nothing to do with the crime. This child’s rights are reduced and this child has been victimized by the system. As I understand it even if the judge agrees to a contact visit the decision is up to the prison and all prisoners I know have had this right overruled by the prisons in California. The prison gets the final say not a judge.