Matt Reports To Marion Prison Camp

Matt is a prisoner who was scheduled to self-surrender to Marion prison camp in February. He discovered my writings through an internet search and wanted to know how I was able to publish while I served my own prison term. Matt also requested information on prison life and what he should bring with him when […]

Prison Administrators Should Encourage Prisoners To Nurture Community Ties

In the federal prison system of early 2009, a huge disconnect exists between administrative platitudes and the policies by which prisoners must live. Often, those discrepancies hinder individuals who are striving to prepare for law-abiding lives upon release. Prison reforms could and should bring the expressed concern for rehabilitation into harmony with the rules that […]

Gang Banger and Lifer Show Model for Reform

I met Walter Jones at Taft Prison Camp. Many of the prisoners at Taft were serving time for white collar crimes. They were well educated, serving sentences that rarely exceeded five years. Walt was different. He was a former hardcore gang banger with more than 12 years of incarceration behind him. Walt’s time in prison […]

Prison Policies Block Families from Nurturing Ties with Loved Ones in Prison

In the Second Chance Act of 2007, Congress found that although close family ties represent one of the most effective resources to help offenders in prison transition to society successfully upon release, prison administrators under utilize the resource of families. As a long-term prisoner, I know that Congress missed the point. Administrators not only fail […]

They’re Prison Guards, Not Correctional Officers

Readers have sometimes criticized me for referring to those who staff prisons as prison guards. They don’t like the term prison guard. They would prefer that I used the term Correctional Officer. When I was living in Lompoc’s Federal Prison Camp, Officer Smith told me that he found the term prison guard demeaning. He said […]

Lowering Recidivism Rates Through Liberalism

Josh is a recent graduate from Yale University who responded to an earlier article I wrote about prison guards. In my article, I had given my perspective on why they were guards rather than correctional officers, and Josh wrote about lessons he had learned through a course in political psychology. According to findings from an […]

Seven Habits of Highly Successful Prisoners–Article Seven

Prisoners Should Embrace Accountability Highly successful prisoners see themselves as a part of the broader community. Prison boundaries may separate them from daily interactions, but their sense of connectivity never wavers. To the prisoner focused on emerging successfully, nurturing that connection drives his every action and thought. An essential component of that plan requires that […]

Support Senator Jim Webb’s Call for Prison Reform!

The article below appeared in The Washington Post. Contact your elected Congressional officials and: 1) urge them to learn the facts about America’s failed prison system, 2) tell them to support legislation for national prison reform. Click here to find your legislators and their contact information: United States Senators, US House of Representatives Webb Sets […]

Seven Habits of Highly Successful Prisoners–Article Six

Prisoners Should Synergize By practicing each of the seven habits of highly successful prisoners, remarkable goals can be achieved. When prisoners apply the strategies consistently and deliberately over time, however, a synergy ensues. Synergy creates conditions that make the total effect greater than the sum of the individual effects. When people in prison launch proactive […]

Prison Reform Should Include Work-Release and Study-Release

How does society benefit by locking nonviolent offenders inside prison boundaries for years, decades, or multiple decades? I’ve heard the term justice, yet I’m not quite convinced that we serve justice by simply watching calendar pages turn while separating an offender from society for such long periods. As leaders contemplate appropriate prison reforms, I hope […]

Prison Reforms Should Bring E-Mail Access to All Prisoners

Recidivism rates for prisoners in the United States exceeds 60 percent. That number ought to appall all Americans. Many factors contribute to the reasons so many people fail upon their release from confinement. I know because I have been locked inside prisons of every security level since 1987. During those 21-plus years, I have made […]

Why I Write About Prison

I’ve written more than a million words about the prison experience. Through the pages of several books my publishers have brought to market, and countless articles, I describe prison from a long-term prisoner’s perspective. Administrators don’t like that I work so tirelessly to expose this creepy underbelly of society. Like the boundaries that separate prisoners […]

America’s Prison System Represents a Tribute to Marxism

During the more than 21 years that I’ve served in prison thus far, I’ve read a fair amount of books on political philosophy. As I read the work of Karl Marx, I was struck by how the American prison system models itself on Marxist principles. Prisons, I am sure, are as close as we come […]

The Poor Get Prison, The Rich Get Pardoned

David Muniz serves a prison term with me at Taft Camp. He is a 28-year-old father of two who is serving a sentence of 11 years. During the three years that David has served thus far, he has earned his GED and he has begun accumulating college credits that will lead to his associate’s degree […]

Reforms Should Facilitate Ties Between Prisoners, Family, and Society

According to Congressional findings in The Second Chance Act of 2007, the Bureau of Prisons’ own metrics show that strong family and community ties represent “the most important factor” in helping those who have been released from prison to succeed upon release. That same Congressional Act found that “families are an often underutilized resource in […]