When Jeannette Brown first got out of prison in April 2000, she had nowhere to go. With felony convictions for battery and gun possession, and little education or special skills, Jeannette couldn’t find a job to support her five kids. Had she found one, she still wouldn’t have had a driver’s license or a car to get there. Jeannette met regularly with a parole officer, but their relationship was hostile from the start. Eventually, Jeannette moved in with her boyfriend, who, like some of her past boyfriends, physically abused her because of this Jeannette started abusing alcohol. Within four years, she was back in prison for violating her parole.
“I was a two-time loser,” she says. Jeannette’s situation and others like it are one of the biggest problems in corrections. When people like Jeannette get out of prison, they can’t seem to stay out because they have not made the lifestyle changes needed to be productive society members. Jeannette enrolled in the reentry program in 2005, and landed a work release job at a bakery.
When she finally walked out of prison in June 2007, she was greeted at the gates by four reentry staffers who took her to her new apartment. It has not been a smooth road for Jeannette, but now she explains, “parole officers used to try to put me back in prison, now I feel like they are trying to keep me out.” These days Jeannette is training to be a supervisor at the bakery.She has regained custody of her children and has moved into a three-bedroom apartment.
She has sworn off booze and men, and has signed up as a volunteer to convince prisoners that reentry works. “If you see someone who has walked that line,” she says, “it helps you realize things can change” (Sharrock, 2008). As convicted felons, people are targeted as failures, and are not given opportunities during post-prison rehabilitation. Americana has giving up on trying to rehabilitate these people and the after math of that choice is a record high crime and incarceration rate. Most people do not realize that 1 out of 15 people will go to prison in there lifetime. People are coming out of prison drug addicted, mentally ill, and better adjusted to the criminal lifestyle.
So, of course they are going to fail parole. Even though some people believe that convicts are simply criminals and there is no rehabilitating them, some criminals can turn their lives around with the right tools. Some groups of people claim that rehabilitation programs for offenders are useless because these individuals have no hope of rehabilitation. They believe it is embedded in their nature. They also feel that you cannot restore an individual into someone that they never were.
Some believe that America has already tried and failed at rehabilitation programs. In 1974 sociologist Robert Martinson stated, “That correctional treatment had no effect on the recidivism rate.” Five years later he changed his mind and stated, “Some programs do have an effect on recidivism” (Katel, 2007). However, the damage had already been done.America clung onto Martinson’s first statement claiming treatment does not work.
Ever since then people have been skeptical about rehabilitation programs. In the 1980s, America designed a variety of intensive supervision programs (ISP), including boot camps, day reporting, and electronic monitoring. The hope was that some offenders that were heading towards prison would be involved in intensive community programs that could keep a closer watch on them and offer more support services. Other offenders could be released early into community programs. Joan Petersilia was the co director of the Corporation’s national evaluation of ISPs (RAND) in the early 1990s. She says, “Despite all the good intentions, most of the ISP dollars wound up being used to fund more drug testing, parole agent contacts, and electronic monitoring rather than enhanced social services.
”She also states, “The main result was that offenders who violated court conditions by using drugs, for example, were identified more quickly and sent into custody.” Most of the programs were cancelled by the late 1990s. Some officials announced that alternatives to prison has been tried and did not work. But the RAND study found that in places where efforts were implemented according to the original design, they were rather effective. Offenders who participated in drug or alcohol treatment, community service, and employment programs had recidivism rates 10 to 20 percent below those of nonparticipating offenders (Petersilia, 2011).There is statistical evidence that prison and parole programs can reduce recidivism.
It is not easy to make these changes, but it is possible. For decades, America’s defense to crime has been to put more criminals behind bars for longer. Today, that approach of dealing with convicted criminals is simply not working because the prisoner recidivism rate is 61%. America’s 2.
2 million prison and jail population represents a 700 percent increase from 1970. Our prison population has expended every year for 38 years. America has more people in prison than any other county in the world. And over the next five years, the number of prison inmates is projected to grow three times faster than the national population. America is ranked 24th out of 62 nationally for murders committed every year and it is not the county with the highest population (Katel, 2007).That means it must be a problem in our criminal system.
There is not another answer to why there are more people incarcerated in the states than any other place in the world. Many prison officials will acknowledge that the criminals come out more corrupt than before they enter the system. They are better adapted to the crime lifestyle. The average level of school for offenders is eleventh grade, which means they never graduated high school.
In today’s world a future of success usually requires a collage education. People that come from challenging backgrounds actually find being incarcerated less of a hardship. In prison they have shelter, food, and water; these are necessities they have a hard time sustaining for themselves on the streets. These people usually have long criminal records, history of alcohol and drug abuse, long periods of unemployment and homelessness, and a physical or mental disability.
They have a hard time conforming into society.Crime is a lifestyle choice for these people. Statistics show that 61% of all felons are repeat offenders (Katel, 2007). I believe this is partly because we’ve allowed them no choice.
Many criminals will find themselves out of prison with their time served, and not able to find a job. Most companies will refuse to hire someone with a felony on their police record. A lot of offenders suffer from chronic drug abuse as well, and without treatment while in prison, a high percentage will relapse to drug use and criminal behavior once released. Almost everyone who goes to prison, 93% of all offenders, ultimately gets released. The average offender spends 2.5 years incarcerated, but many terms are shorter.
Forty-four% of all those now housed in state prisons are expected to be released within the year. This year some 750,000 men and women will be released (Petersilia, 2011).Many, if not most, are not equipped to make successful, law-abiding lives for themselves than before they entered prison. The possibility of releasing prisoners who might be repeat offenders is a threat to social safety. The obvious purposes of any criminal penalty are to deter future violations, uphold the law, and possibly rehabilitate the offender. Currently our system is not doing any of this.
I believe rehabilitation for offenders could put a stop to this vicious crime cycle. Rehabilitation is a cost-effective way of controlling recidivism. People can debate whether our system now works or not, but they can not debate that it is way too expensive. The cost of just housing prisoners is projected to reach $40 billion by 2011 (Katel, 2007).
California spent nearly $10 billion on corrections last year, or about $50,000 per prisoner. The average cost of rehabilitation treatment per prisoner is $4,112 (French, 2003). In February Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said, “We have the highest recidivism rate in the country because there is no room for rehabilitation.” The enormous prison population takes up most of the prison’s resources into housing, feeding, and guarding prisoners, and that leaves little for programs that help convicts turn their lives around.
In 2007 the panel found that California spent less than $3,000 per year on rehabilitation programs, and that 50 percent of all prisoners released the year before had not participated in a single program (Petersilia, 2011).The rest of the county will soon be in the same situation California is in, and rehabilitation will no longer be an option. A high-risk youth who becomes a chronic offender costs society between $4.2 and $7.2 million. On average, rehabilitation programs economic return ranges from $1.
91 to $2.69 per dollar invested. Everyday a rehabilitated offender stays out of prison the state saves an average of $80 (Katel, 2007). Treatment is the most cost-effective for the high risk inmates. In the long run rehabilitation pays for its self by reducing future crimes and corrections costs. America does not just save money with rehabilitation.
We are also gaining lower criminal activity, and that is a huge economic benefit. If rehabilitation is executed properly it has a high success rate.If we had effective programs throughout the United States we could expect to reduce recidivism by 15 to 20 percent (Petersilia, 2011). Many prisoners suffer from chromic substance abuse, and without treatment a very high percentage will relapse to drug use and criminal behavior after released. Drug abuse programs that have in-prison and aftercare treatment are very successful.
A lot of prisoners have not graduated high school. Research found that offenders who earn a high school equivalency diploma while in prison are more likely to get jobs once released, and the ones who received vocational skills training are more likely to get jobs with higher wages once released (French, 2003). A prison in Kansas uses a prisoner education program in skilled labor.They teach the prisoners how to weld and do carpentry. In 2006, there were 401 fewer people in prison in Kansas than expected, and that saved the state $13 million in operating costs.
Since the in-prison treatment had such a high success rate the state used $7 million of that for new community programs such as job training and drug treatment (Sharrock, 2008). For treatment programs to function the prisoner has to volunteer, and cannot receive any special treatment over prisoners who do not participant. This approach guarantees the prisoners who choose to get treatment are motivated to succeed and not just trying to impress the parole board or other prison officials. A faith-based program in Virginia uses video visitation which has been an overwhelming success.
Reverend Owen Cardwell uses the visitor center at his church for families to have a video visit with an inmate. Wallens Ridge State Prison Warden Bryan Watson said, “ In order to allow inmates to maintain important ties with family and friends, video visitation allows face-to-face real-time video contact, and family and friends do not have to spend a lot of money or drive many hours.” The program also keeps inmates out of trouble in the prison because they have to remain at least six months with no behavioral problems. Not every prisoner can be rehabilitated, but we should give the ones that want to try a fighting chance.Rehabilitation is both cost-effective and effective in controlling recidivism. Prisons that have treatment programs in them have a better atmosphere for the inmates and the staff.
A lot of the negative things associated with prison like violence and behavioral problems are replaced with positive and productive behavior. Even though some groups of people believe rehabilitation for prisoners does not work and it is a waste of time, statistics show that rehabilitation programs do work. The three main arguments why rehabilitation programs should be part of every prison system are because our system now is not lowering crime levels by any means, the state would actually save money using rehabilitation programs, and when executed properly rehabilitation programs have a high success rate.Just look at the story of Jeannette Brown, when allowed the opportunity to turn her life around she took it, and now lives a successful crime free lifestyle.
It is time we take back control of America, and get it back to the American Dream our ancestors had for it which is freedom includes a promise of the possibility of prosperity and success. The definition is “Life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement, regardless of social class or circumstances of birth.” The American Dream proclaims that, “All men are created equal.” I believe rehabilitation programs are the best choice to accomplishing this dream in our correctional system, for prison staff, ex-convicts, and citizens of the United States.
