If you had the opportunity to help turn around the lives of
those who make society unsafe, would you take it? If you were told that
by performing certain duties that you would in fact be safeguarding the
general public’s safety, would you do it? Most would. But,
then things get a little weird. The "correctional environment"
is not what it seems. Those who hired you did not prepare you for what
you have to do. Those that hired you also do not care much about the
environment you work in. Suddenly, your job of helping to turn
around those who are criminals has turned into a job of personal and emotional
survival. Welcome to the world of Correctional Officers.
One of the lowest paid of all the protective service
employees, and one of the most maligned, Correctional Officers are civil
servants who provide care control and custody of those who have been
incarcerated. By doing so, they protect the public. So why not are
these men and women who walk the toughest bet without a gun looked down upon so
much in our prevailing culture? What is it that the general
public hates crime so much and has a "lock em up and throw
away the key" mentality when it comes to criminals, yet become extremely
supportive of a convicted felon once a his or her particular case is in the spotlight?
The answer is not simple, as over simplification has become
a large part of the problem. Publications and budget committees
unwilling or unable to provide the necessary budget to create a real
correctional environment, agency administrators who turn a blind eye to the
needs of both staff and inmates because funding is simply not available, and
the unwillingness of administrators to give correctional employees the
legitimate tools to control and demand respect from the incarcerated
population.
Under funding is a fact of life for prisons and
has always been that way. The general public wants to be safe at the
lowest possible price. I can't blame them as I too am a tax payer. Also,
for prisons that have been well funded have received a backlash from the public
for being too soft on criminals. Damned if you do and damned if you
don't.
The underfunding of prisons has left prison
officials with little or no choice of trying to cut costs at every
opportunity. The biggest expense for prison is staff. So to save
money, agencies try to operate with as few staff members as possible.
Whether it be security staff (Correctional Officers) or program staff,
the positions are cut to the bone.
Liability is also a big issue in prison as agencies are
often sued by inmates or their families for one thing or another. In the
not too distant past is was not uncommon for an inmate to sue an agency over
something as mundane as his dessert cookie being too hard! While the
courts have formed legislation that effectively removes such frivolous lawsuits
from the system, inmates and their supporters are ready and willing to sue for
everything under the sun given the opportunity. Scams have been uncovered
in which inmates willing set up a situation and manipulate staff for the sole
purpose of filing and winning a lawsuit. For this very reason,
administrators have taken a "hands off approach" to inmate
management. What is the Hands off approach? It is the
administration's policy to informally punish staff with tons of paperwork
whenever the need to use force on an inmate occurs. In turn, the staff
gets the message and decides to loosely enforce the rules, if at all.
As long as the inmate stays inside the prison and are not killing too
many of each other or staff, then the goal of the Hand Off approach is
working just fine -- in the eyes of the administrators.
But some staff members will find a work around. What
has been greatly underestimated by those in charge is the need for
employees to maintain respect from the inmates which directly leads
to their ability to maintain control of the inmate population. The Hands
Off policy and policies which do not allow for staff to maintain respect from
the inmates, directly contributes to corruption by prison staff. For
example, if an inmate who is already locked up in a confinement cell
constantly verbally abuse staff by cursing at them, treating them is
allowed to do so with impunity, and then other inmates will see what that
inmate can get away with and will do the same. Staff must provide
services to this inmate all the same such a giving him a shower, bringing him
is meals three times a day, giving him recreation privileges ever so often, and
so forth. As staff carry-out these functions, the inmate continues to
verbally abuse the staff. Administrators will simply tell the staff that
they should be professional and not lower themselves to the inmate's level, completely
ignoring the need for respect by security staff. Ignoring that need is
easy when you get to sit in an air conditioned or heated office all day.
So, at some point, security staff decides to retaliate against the inmate
by planting contraband in his property when the inmate is in the
shower or they may even physically abuse the inmate when and if they are off
camera. There is an assortment of ways for security staff to retaliate
against an inmate such as fabricating a bogus disciplinary report or not delivering
his mail. The point is that security staff needs legitimate ways
of maintaining respect.
