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Prisons and Corrections · Inside the Criminal Process

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: How is it possible for people to commit crimes in prison?
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Is prison life really as it is portrayed in the movies?
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Are certain inmates, like sex offenders and ex-cops, really abused and bullied in prison?
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to Inside the Criminal Process, a podcast where I discuss and explain the criminal justice system in America using real-life examples and true crime cases.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Scott.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a 29-year veteran law enforcement officer and a former attorney.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: I've worked as a patrol officer, a crime scene investigator, a field training officer, a detective, a parole officer, an investigator, a polygraph examiner, a crisis negotiator, and an administrator.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: I've also taught college-level criminal justice classes, and I'm an Army veteran.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: Today's subject: corrections and the prison system.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: If you remember, back in my introductory episode, I said that the American criminal justice system has three components: cops, courts, and corrections.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: Police, courts, and corrections.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Today we're going to focus on corrections.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: The primary role of corrections is post-conviction custody and supervision of people who've been found guilty of felony crimes.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: When we think of law enforcement, we generally think only of the police.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: But in the criminal justice system, the term law enforcement is a broader term that includes all agencies that are given the authority to enforce laws, and that includes corrections.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: So corrections agencies, well, in this state we call it the Department of Corrections.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's probably the most common name for it across the country.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: I think California calls it Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: Texas combines it with other law enforcement agencies, and they call it the Department of Public Safety.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: The feds call it the Bureau of Prisons.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: I think New York combines it with their Department of Human Services.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: So it just depends on the organization of the government.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: But regardless of what it's called, correction to agencies or state agencies authorized to enforce court orders, maintain public safety, and they've been granted a certain level of statutory authority.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: For example, correctional officers in this state have law enforcement authority per state law while they're on duty and performing their function as a correctional officer.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: They have the authority to arrest, search, detain, and question inmates in the course of their employment.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: The key difference is that law enforcement in the police world involves crime prevention, investigations, arrests, and initial enforcement, while the functions, the function of corrections law enforcement is to enforce court-imposed penalties, custody, and supervision after conviction.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: So I started my law enforcement career working as a street cop.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: I worked at two different police departments and then switched careers to work as a parole officer.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: And in this state, the parole division is part of the Department of Corrections, and parole officers are employees of the Department of Corrections.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: I then became an investigator in the investigation division within the Department of Corrections.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: And while working for the investigation division, I worked as a polygraph examiner, crisis negotiator, supervisor, and then eventually an administrator.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: So investigators' authority, it's broader than correctional officers, in that they have the authority to investigate criminal activity.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: They have the authority to investigate employee misconducts and complete pre-employment background investigations and complete audits of different operations within the prisons.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Parole officers have the same authority as investigators, but their main focus is on ensuring parolees comply with the conditions of their parole.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: The director of the investigation division reports directly to the head of the department and is authorized by statute to appoint investigators.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: So when I started with the division, all of the investigators were prior cops.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Most of them retired from departments or sheriff's offices, and the investigators were all certified by post, which stands for the Peace Officer Standards and Training Board.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the state entity that governs peace officer certification.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: The statute that created the investigation division within the Department of Corrections only requires that the head of the division be post-certified.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: While individual investigators aren't required to have the certification, that's usually a prerequisite for hiring.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: So in reality, all of the criminal investigators that were there when I was there were all post-certified.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: They do have compliance investigators that aren't certified peace officers, and they investigate allegations of policy violations within the department.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: So moving from a police agency to the Department of Corrections, I found that conducting criminal investigations in the prisons was a little easier than street-level investigations.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: You rarely have a true whodunit.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: There's usually an identified subject, and that's just because of the controlled environment.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: There's cameras everywhere.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: There's a number of witnesses, both staff and inmate.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, inmates do sometimes report what they saw or heard.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: If that creates a problem and gets them labeled as a snitch or a rat, the department can move them or place them in protective custody if warranted.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: The investigation division for the Department of Corrections is responsible for investigating crime that occurs within the prisons and on state property managed by the Department of Corrections.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: So as long as the crime has a nexus to the prison system or a connection, the investigators have jurisdiction to investigate crimes.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: For example, an assault that occurs in a parole office or building that could be investigated by DOC investigators because the Division of Parole is a division within the Department of Corrections.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: I was always told that it was difficult to get inmates to talk or act as a witness in criminal cases.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: And while that's certainly true in some cases, I found that in the in the majority of cases, inmates would talk to investigators.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: They may be lying through their teeth, but they would typically talk.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes inmates talk just because they have a conscience and they don't want someone getting away with heinous crime.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: I had an inmate once that reported another inmate had a cell phone and was planning on using it to escape.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: I might have talked about this in a previous episode, but basically the inmate with the phone was going to fake a medical emergency and then was going to call somebody while he was being transported to the hospital.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: And that person or people would assault the transport van or the ambulance in which the inmate was being transported and he would escape.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: So uh the inmate that reported this said he didn't want officers or medical personnel to be get injured or killed.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: There's all sorts of issues and problems with that plan.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but as you know, people don't always consider all possibilities when they're desperate and uh more importantly, not so bright.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: So I have a hard time believing that uh there were people on the outside that were willing to risk so much just to help this guy escape.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't like he was a big crime lord or anything.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um whatever.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: We got the phone, he was moved to a higher custody level, charged with a felony, the possession of contraband, and labeled an escape risk, which basically means there would always be multiple armed people escorting him anytime he was taken out of the prison.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: Probably the most common crimes in prison are assaults and drug cases.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, we're all human, inmates have bad days, assaults occur for any number of reasons.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: And when you put violent people together in a limited space, assaults and fights are bound to happen.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Many of the assaults would be revealed during the investigation to actually start as a fight, and then the loser of the fight would report it as an assault.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: So just so you know, just because you lose a fight doesn't make you a victim of an assault, especially when you're seen on video starting the fight, right?
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I mean, I don't know that it was more common or or if it was common, but there were were times when a fight would start, the the person starting the fight would get beat up, and then he would report it, he or she would report it as an assault.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: And um, it doesn't work that way.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: As for drugs, inmates are great at identifying vulnerabilities, and they're able to figure out ways to get drugs into the prisons.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: Probably the most common way is for inmates to get staff or their visitors to bring the drugs in.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh staff know it's a felony to bring drugs into the prison for an inmate, but they do it, and it's usually because they've been compromised by an offender.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: And this is not certainly not the majority of staff.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we're talking a very small percentage of staff that will actually uh commit felonies for the offenders.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, so when I say staff has been compromised by an offender, that could be many things.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: The the inmate could have charmed a person into a relationship or they got them to violate policy somehow, like they talked the staff member into mailing a letter for them or or letting them use the phone, something like that.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then they just kind of groom these staff members, and then at some point they approach the staff member and say, Hey, you need to meet my cousin downtown here at this the 16th in Maine and get this package from them and bring that to me.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: And the staff members like, no, no, no.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: They're usually uh reluctant, or at least that's what they say, anyways.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: And then the the inmate says, Well, you know, I've got I've got this list of things that you've done for me, and I'm gonna turn you in, and you're gonna get fired if you don't do this.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not even gonna tell you what's in the package, so just go down and get it and bring it in.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's how a good number of those cases uh come to fruition.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I always felt that the saddest cases were where inmates manipulated their own family, friends, or loved ones to bring drugs into visiting.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: So inmates have told their visitors that that they're gonna be killed or assaulted if the visitor doesn't agree to meet somebody and bring the package that they get from that person into the prison and give it to the the inmate during visiting.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: I have a friend whose brother is in prison, and she said that if her brother told her mother he was gonna be assaulted or killed if she didn't do something for him, she would do it, even if she knew it was a felony.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: So introducing drugs into the prison is a felony, by the way.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and so is sexual activity for that matter between staff and inmates.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh anyway, it wasn't uncommon for a mother, father, sister, girlfriend, wife, etc., to be caught bringing drugs into the prison and and getting a felony charge.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: Many of them had never been in trouble before, and and I thought that was one of the most evil things somebody could do is guilting their loved one into committing a felony, knowing that there was, you know, that there was a chance that they would get caught.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they'd even tell the loved one that the package didn't contain anything illegal.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, some of these loved ones are so naive and have been manipulated and abused by the inmate, uh, and they just keep allowing it to happen.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: It still makes me feel bad for them though, especially when it's an elderly person that's just trying to save their grandson or daughter, and they think that they're gonna get hurt or killed if they don't do this for them.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: Lots of these cases are initially identified by staff that are monitoring inmate phone calls.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: All inmate phone calls are recorded and intel people and investigators.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, some of them love to scan through calls while they're sitting at their desks writing reports or whatever, and they get pretty good at identifying suspicious calls, like when someone's talking about the tires or whatever word they use for drugs that they're going to bring into visiting on such and such date.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: It raises some red flags and it's it's a clue that they might not be talking about tires.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: So uh several years ago, the largest county jail in this state had a pretty major drug problem.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: So the sheriff actually stopped all in-person and contact visits.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: So the visitors would use televisions in the lobby of the jail and they'd visit with inmates who were in the jail visiting room in front of a television monitor.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, drug introductions decreased there, but not as much as the sheriff thought they would, which revealed that staff were actually bringing in a large percentage of the drugs that were in that jail.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, the the I'm not even gonna get into like other methods of of people introducing the contraband.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: There's I'll probably do a whole podcast on just real clever uh and inventive ways that people have gotten drugs into the prisons, but um especially now with drones and stuff of that nature, um prisons that are that border a main road, you know, there's a lot of different ways to get drugs into the prisons.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_00: So other than assaults and drugs, there's no other crimes that occur regularly.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um in this state, prison investigators only investigate felony-level crimes.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: Misdemeanors and petty offenses are addressed through the COPD process.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_00: COPD stands for Code of Penal Discipline, and it outlines the rules that govern inmate behavior in the prisons.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, dealing with less serious offenses with the COPD process is a more efficient way to address those issues because in the areas of the state where the prisons are, those DA offices, the district attorney's offices would be swamped with prison cases if they took all the petty offenses and misdemeanors and felonies.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: COPD convictions can result in loss of good or earned time, fines, loss of privileges like recreation or yard time, visiting privileges, phone privileges.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: Although I do think now that the legislature in this state has granted visiting as a right instead of a privilege, so inmates can't lose that when they lose privileges.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: Back in the day, though, the only real punishment that inmates got or that got the inmates' attention was taking away visiting or phone privileges.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: Any staff member can write an inmate up for a violation of the code of penal discipline.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: And along with the loss of privileges, they they can be reclassified or moved to a higher security prison.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: And prisons are like little cities.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: They have laundry service, medical clinics and infirmaries, dining facilities, recreational facilities, canteen services where inmates can buy food, clothing, and other necessities.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: Inmates can get jobs in the prison.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: All these areas need employees to oversee and supervise the inmates.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: When you begin working at the Department of Corrections, every person, regardless of their role, has to attend the basic training academy.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: Doesn't matter what role they're in, everyone from executive team members, correctional officers, parole officers, investigators, support staff, medical staff, all employees have to attend the basic training class.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I think now it's four weeks.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: It was four when I went.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: And it covers everything from administrative regulations, which are the policies and procedures that govern everything every employee does.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: Required paperwork.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's a government agency, so of course there's a ton of paperwork that has to be completed every day.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: There's tool and key control classes.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's basically how you account for tools and keys within the prison.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: There's classes on cell searches, PAT searches, first aid.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: Employees are exposed to pepper spray and learn defensive tactics, which is basically how to physically control, arrest, and handcuff somebody.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: The academy in this state has uh lots of training on inmate manipulation as well.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: There's a great book titled Games Criminals Play and How You Can Profit by Knowing Them.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: It was written by Bud Allen and Diana Bosta.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: They actually had a bunch of copies and let us read them while I was in the academy.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: The book is a really easy read, large print.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not a great reader, but I read it in a couple of days.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it was intriguing.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: And even today, the book is relevant as far as manipulation and how inmates compromise, groom and compromise people.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the authors discuss how the inmates identify vulnerable staff and work on them, getting them to do small favors for them that violate policies, and then they use that against staff when they decide to ask them to commit a crime for them.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the book is also good for people who don't work in the prisons.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: It exposes how people can manipulate and use people to get them to do what they want.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's I encourage you to read that book.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's a it's a good book.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: I think I got it on Amazon.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: Another good book written by Dr.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_00: Stanton Salmonel.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's titled Inside the Criminal Mind, and it gives the reader insight into how criminals think and act.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, Dr.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: Salmonel bases his writing on interactions he's had with numerous inmates and observations that are sensible, accurate, and hard to refute.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: In my opinion, Inside the Criminal Mind and games criminals play should be mandatory reading for everyone who works at the Department of Corrections and those that interact frequently with criminals.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Near the end of the Academy, the Academy training, ex-staff members who've been convicted of crimes related to their Department of Corrections employment are brought in to talk to new staff about being compromised and how it happened.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: They talk about their case and what they went through.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: Trainees have responded really positively to this course of instruction, and it's a great tool to have actual people who said, that'll never happen to me, explain how it actually happened to them.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh ex-staff agreed to do the presentations as a condition of probation that was usually negotiated between the DA and their defense attorney.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: So the the that the DA in one of the counties that has the most prisons in it here in Colorado, one of the deputies called me and and floated this idea to me and I told him I thought it was great.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: He went to the executive director, they sat down and they figured this out.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: And basically, when when somebody gets gets con uh is going through a case, either an inappropriate relationship or bringing in drugs or doing something else illegal, uh, the DA will will say, look, if you plead guilty, we'll ask for probation instead of prison or jail time.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then a condition of their probation is that they have to do so many of the presentations to the new staff during the academy.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's an excellent program.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's it's very popular and uh and it's very effective.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: So it used to be you had to be 21 to work for the Department of Corrections.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: That changed under the current leadership.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: The the current director changed the policy and decided that the minimum age for correctional officers should be set at 18 instead of 21.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: He tried to justify that decision by comparing it to serving in the military.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: He actually said, if I'm old enough to join the military and die for my country, I should be old enough to work as a correctional officer.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: So, hey, I was in the military.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that was kind of an absurd statement because it's totally a different environment.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: In the military, you live in a controlled environment in which you have constant supervision of senior members.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: There's adult oversight, so to speak.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas in corrections, once your training is complete, you're placed in a situation where you have frequent interactions with predators, criminals of all ages and backgrounds.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I just don't feel 18, most 18-year-olds aren't sophisticated enough to handle some of those situations.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: The director's decision was mostly driven because staff numbers had declined dramatically and their recruiting efforts were failing.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: I guess time will only tell if that was a good decision, but it doesn't seem like a good idea to me.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: Hell, there's some 40-year-olds that aren't emotionally mature enough to work in a prison.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: I can you imagine getting hired as a correctional officer as your first job out of high school?
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: I just I don't know.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: I guess we'll see.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: And not all inmates are manipulative or spend their time trying to figure out how to get around the rules and get over on people.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um there were many inmates I met while working for the department that I thought had I met this person on the outside, we could have been friends.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: Many inmates are very personable, friendly, respectful, they had good boundaries and weren't weren't trying to get over on everyone.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I used to ask staff when I'd have a compromised staff case or staff caught doing something for an inmate.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I used to ask them during the the interview if that offender was one of their favorite offenders.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: They always answered the same.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: I treat all inmates the same, fair, firm, and consistent.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have any favorites.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um I treated them all the same.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I was thought, I still do think that that's BS, because it's human nature to seek out people who are pleasant and easy to get along with.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: People that make your job easier, especially in a correction setting.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh many staff members would never admit to liking an inmate or preferring one inmate over another because they feared being a they feared being accused of misconduct.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so they go through their careers, never giving the inmates the benefit of the doubt.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's just unfortunate that a handful of inmates that are always trying to manipulate or compromise staff, they ruin it for everybody.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: So, on to the questions.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: How is it possible for crimes to occur within the prisons?
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: I used to wonder this all the time.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: It depends on the crime we're talking about, but just about any crime can occur in prison.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: Everything from simple theft, fraud, assault, harassment, escape, murder, uh, just about every crime in the statute book can occur within the prison or have a nexus to a prison.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: So we take these people who committed serious crimes.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Make them all live together in a small space where there's zero privacy.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: You can imagine there's a lot of stress and anxiety piled upon people who generally have difficulty regulating their emotions even when they're not in prison.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: And they have little control over their lives.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: So there can be lots of anxiety and stress within the population, the prison population.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: It seems that in such a controlled environment, crimes would not be as prevalent.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: But there are many opportunities for inmates to commit crimes against one another, against staff, by scamming people on the outside.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: And employees are way outnumbered by the inmates.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: So crime, crime happens.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes employees are the ones committing the crimes, as I talked about above.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes employees are not concerned about the crimes or couldn't care less about the crimes.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: So how do people survive in prison?
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's like not like what you see on television.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: Not everyone is controlled by one inmate that has an army of people he or she commands.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: People who do well in prison like the structure and being directed in every aspect of their life.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: Some people actually thrive in prison and have more difficult time in life on the outside.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, if you don't mind living like that, it's not such a bad place.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: You get free room and board, no responsibilities unless you want to work or attend classes.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have to worry about buying clothes or looking presentable.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, especially in some of the less secure prisons.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: You you have very few worries.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: Also, predators don't really mind prisons because they have a target-rich environment.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: And in my experience, what I found was um some inmates just hate being in restricted housing.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: We used to call it the whole or segregation, and they hate it.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason they hate it is because they need a population that they can manipulate and control.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: And if they're stuck in a cell by themselves, locked down 23 hours a day, they can't practice their skills.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: Their skills are going to waste because they don't have anybody to manipulate or control.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: I always felt that if I went to prison, I would prefer a single cell where I'm locked away from other people.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: I could work out.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you get recreation time regardless, so you have access to weights and fitness equipment, but you can do body weight workouts in your cell.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you get your food and books delivered to you, you can have a television, access to a phone, all of this without the responsibilities that go along with the normal life.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, question number three: are certain inmates like sexual offenders or ex-cops really abused and bullied in prison?
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's not really common for sex offenders to be bullied or beaten in the prisons.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but it's not as common as the media and the entertainment industry would have you believe.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: I think the more the ones that are at more risk are the ones that have family members that support them and send them money and and visit them a lot.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so sometimes it's just more about that, their support system that's willing to help them, than it is about the crime that they've committed.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: I can think of a handful of instances during my 20 plus years of working in the prison system where somebody was targeted because of his or her crime, his or her crime or status.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_00: Even then, the Department of Corrections is pretty good at documenting custody issues.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: And a custody issue is like like I talked about in the last podcast, the the young lady who killed her husband and was in prison with her husband's mother.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: That would be a custody issue.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: So any type of issue that may cause problems between two people is a custody issue.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and the department is good at identifying those and keeping people away from their enemies.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, the majority of custody issues revolve around gang membership or issues people had on the outside.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, for example, an inmate killed someone who has family, friends, or loved ones in the prison system.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes custody issues are revealed when a an astute employee overhears a conversation or hears a phone conversation in which people are talking about another inmate.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: So inmates usually disclose any issues they have with others in prison as well.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they try to manipulate the process by saying, Oh, I can't go to this prison because what happened to me at that prison previously usually doesn't work because of their classification.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_00: They can't go to a lower-level prison, or they're not able to name anyone they have issues with at that prison, or that person or people aren't even in the prison that they're headed to.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: So inmates need to be able to give verifiable facts to the prison staff so that the prison staff can determine if it's an actual custody issue, or if the person just wants to stay away from a specific prison or person.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: For example, an inmate being initially classified and he reports that he testified against so-and-so.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, that information can be verified and a custody issue can be entered into the computer to notify someone of the issue when housing assignments are made.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_00: So the department has been sued before for failing to properly protect people, but the times I can think of where that happened, the department was either unaware of the issues uh because they weren't revealed by the inmate or someone made a mistake in entering or failed to enter a custody issue or issues, or the issue or issues weren't foreseeable.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: Always something that went wrong that caused the department to pay out.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: And probably rightfully so in some of the cases.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um but in my opinion, the Department of Corrections does a pretty good job of staying on top of issues between inmates and and keeping inmates safe.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, look, thousands, thousands of people have entered prison, served their time, maybe had a few difficulties, uh, fight here and there, and then they they left prison, went on parole, got off parole, didn't have any major issues or problems, and um and went on with their life.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that bodes well for the Department of Corrections, even though sometimes I'm hyper-critical of the department and its divisions.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I think for the most part it's it's about as good as it's gonna be for the foreseeable future, anyways.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's it for this episode.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: In the next episode, I'm gonna discuss the court system.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: As always, thank you for listening and take care.