Their eyes and the stench. That’s what remains seared in my brain having been given fairly open access to Delaware state penitentiary in my undergraduate years. No prison footage can ever bring out the lingering smell of bad food, urine, feces, sweat and decay that typifies the vast majority of US prisons. Or eyes that reflect a mixture of hatred, boredom and hopelessness. That would also include massive city jails, where those standing trial are mixed with those serving misdemeanor time (less than a year). The so-called “country-club” prisons are really minimum-security houses of incarceration for prisoners with short sentences or near the end of longer sentences, where escape is unlikely and bad behavior merely increases the time behind bars. They are less harsh but thoroughly unpleasant, nonetheless.
Maybe we don’t have anything comparable to the recent explosion of violence that occurred in late June in a Honduran prison for women, where a well-armed contingent of gang members literally killed 41 members of a rival gang, shooting or hacking them to death or locking them in their cells, pouring gasoline on them through the bars, and incinerating their screaming and hapless victims. Guards obviously looked the other way as those weapons were smuggled into the penitentiary.
But we have our share of guards beating inmates and, most of all, inmate on inmate violence of inexplicable cruelty. Hardly isolated instances. More the rule than any exception. Punishment by taking away freedoms of movement in an austere environment is what “sentencing” imposes in criminal convictions. If only that were all a regular prisoner in state and federal penal institutions faces. Unending noise is unpleasant. Bad food and disgusting smells are routine. Severe regimentation is expected.
But knowing that you could be stabbed, beaten or raped at any moment should not be part of the punishment. Forcing inmates to join ethnic or racial gangs for protection is equally absurd. But being incarcerated in an American prison or major jail carries a serious risk of such dehumanizing risks… and most Americans truly do not care. They have simply written off those in prison. And for gang members, it is nothing more than their equivalent of boot camp or advanced training. Street cred is born of incarceration.
The June 24th Los Angeles Times (Keri Blakinger reporting) provided prison video security camera recordings that emanated from thumb drives carelessly tossed in the trash: “The attack begins after less than a minute. Two dozen men are milling about a rec room in Men’s Central Jail when one of them takes a swing.
“Others pile on, and soon half a dozen people are punching, kicking and stabbing. There are no jailers in sight — and no sign they even notice. Suddenly, after roughly a minute, the violence stops. The attackers seem to have grown bored, or maybe tired… For the next 10 minutes, the victim paces and tries to clean up his own blood. A few onlookers go back to working out in the corner — until suddenly the beating resumes… Finally, roughly 14 minutes after the attack began, deputies show up and order everyone to the ground.
“The brutal, 20-minute clip is one of a few dozen graphic videos from the past six years saved to a thumb drive picked out of the trash by one inmate and later secreted out of the jail by another. Together they paint a picture of a jail system awash in far more violence and disarray than previously revealed to the public.
“Several of the clips recently reviewed by The Times show stabbings and fistfights. One shows an inmate trying to kill himself, and another shows several jailers punching a man in the head as they try to subdue him. Still another shows a woman giving birth in the middle of a hallway, where her newborn falls out onto the jail floor in a puddle of blood.
“Some of the videos, all apparently taken from the jails’ surveillance systems, show men so inured to violence that they continue on with their daily routine, working out and reading even as bloody brawls and beatings by deputies unfold feet away. Other clips highlight a troubling inattentiveness from jailers, who are slow to respond or leave vulnerable inmates unattended.
“After learning of the thumb drive and reviewing two of the videos, Michele Deitch — a senior lecturer in criminal justice at University of Texas at Austin — said she was ‘utterly stunned’ by the brutality and lack of oversight, particularly after watching the 20-minute clip… ‘There was absolutely no supervision,’ she said. ‘That that could be happening with cameras on and no one comes is mind-boggling.’
“According to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, that was partly because the lengthy attack happened to take place between the guards’ regular rounds and partly because the cameras’ video feeds were not always monitored in real time…
One of the earliest video clips, dated April 2017, shows a common room in the jail’s dorm for gay and transgender inmates. Two deputies are standing in the crowded room, talking to an inmate who is leaning over a card game. It’s not clear what the problem is, but suddenly one of the deputies moves to grab the inmate from behind. Seemingly surprised, the inmate tries to squirm away… The deputies tackle him, and begin throwing punches. One appears to punch the man in the head repeatedly, as several other jailers join in the fray. After wrestling him to the ground, a deputy holds down his head, while others work to restrain his arms and legs as he bleeds onto the floor.
“The video was one of two the former inmate who obtained them allowed The Times to share with experts. Lance Lowry, who spent 20 years as a corrections officer and sergeant in Texas prison system, was shocked by jailers’ response to such minor provocation… ‘If you’re being assaulted, then that’s OK, and staff should try to defend themselves,’ Lowry said. ‘But this isn’t MMA fighting, you’re not trying to knock them out.’… Jailers’ use of so-called ‘head strikes’ — the term typically used in court filings to describe deputies punching inmates in the head — has long been a sore point for the Sheriff’s Department.”
Snitch or ask for help from the prison, and your life expectancy faces immediate retribution. Once out of prison, felony records often prevent the “I paid my debt to society” felon from finding the kind of work that allows life and dignity to return. It happens. It just does not happen frequently. It’s so much easier to make money the old-fashioned way: crime. Recidivism rates remain staggering.
I’m Peter Dekom, and taxpayers are literally funding the release of angry ex-inmates, well-schooled in crime, into a society that continues to heap a lifetime of additional punishment on them… what’s in it for society again?
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