Merciless mistreatment

The following is an excerpt from Part Two:

Books Not Bars (www.booksnotbars.org) is a California based organization that campaigns for regional rehabilitation centers in lieu of warehouse-style prison systems. Tremendous results are being achieved. In Missouri’s model humane programming, they spend about half as much per criminal. The recidivism rate is around 15%, as compared to California Youth Authority’s 75% failure rate. In the preface to I Cried, You Didn’t Listen by Dwight E. Abbott, Books Not Bars writes that the criminal justice systems are:

“...inhumane, abusive, and counter-productive...prisons essentially institutionalize abuse, and add trauma to the lives of troubled... people. One of the terrible ironies...is that the very skills and socialization that are needed to survive inside these institutions are unacceptable— and even criminal— outside prison walls...there is no possibility of treatment or rehabilitation.”

Dwight tells the sad and horrifying story of growing up within the prison system. He tells of brutality and the struggle for survival. He reveals how systematic mistreatment perpetuates a cycle of criminal behavior...

Books Not Bars has a membership of around three hundred families with young people in the corrections system. They go on to point out that “within incarcerating institutions, violence in all its forms—sexual assault, cliques, crews, and gangs, emotional abuse—is essentially about power and control, both over others and over one’s own sense of self.” Prisons protect and punish. Society is protected from the threat that a criminal on the loose might present. Punishment associated with pain and suffering would seem a fitting response to an offender’s infringement on others rights. The crux of the issue is how to define that punishment. My personal experience at the ACI was that punishment involved merciless mistreatment.

The pleasure of punishment

The following is an excerpt from Part Two:

Everyone is happy with a scandal. That fact has not changed for hundreds upon thousands of years. Most of us do not come out and say that we are happy about it. We say that we are appalled. We ask, “Can you believe this?” From atop our haughty towers we yell to each other, “Can you get over that?” A scandal involving someone else somehow helps to make us feel a little better about ourselves. Someone else doing some “awful” thing equates to “I am not really so bad after all.” We do not stop there, oh no. Judging others makes us feel so good, that for sure we could feel even better if we go on to belittle, berate, and be mean. The garnish on that particular concoction is punishment. That is the purpose of prisons.

To punish good is the purpose of C/Os.

It is they, not the Department of Corrections (DOC) who do not administer fairness or justice. The DOC is responsible for the irresponsibility of letting that be the case. Removing the pleasure of punishment, the elation of extermination, would be like setting mousetraps to spite the cat. Prison staffs, enforcement personnel, the almighty unchallenged, un-questioned, unqualified-to-wear-a-uniform of accountability supremacists—these are the immoral mob that thrives on promoting scandalous criminal doings.

Are those who look the other way any less to blame?

What’s black and white but not read?

The following is an excerpt from Part One:

My all-time favorite book, in the genre of vindictiveness, is The Never Ending Library Book, by Usuck Bigtime. When I first arrived at the prison, my first and only two library books were confiscated by pecker-head Patty Cake before I got to read them. I began submitting requests to the library, depositing ten of them over the following twelve weeks. I skipped the two weeks at inventory time in April. Still having no results, I resorted to having an e-mail sent to the warden’s office, from my sister. Much to their discontent, notification was sent to Piss mod block officer Roberto, and his supervisor, Lt. Normandy. They emphatically ensure me that e-mailing is not the solution and that Roberto would “handle it,” with Normandy as the backup.

The published Inmate Rule Book, under the section entitled, “Minimum Standards of Confinement While in Disciplinary Confinement,” lists: “Reasonable reading material, the inmate may have two soft-covered books.” Surely it would not be preposterous to expect that the general prison population have some measly reading material made available to them. Naturally, as with all other matters at the Intake Service Center, it depends on who is on duty and their mood.

More weeks pass. Roberto or Normandy have not yet handled a thing. On a rare occasion, when Roberto is in the mod instead of lounging around in the bubble, I ask, “Where’s the books?”

“I don’t know anything about it.” After another month, I confront Normandy, the hotshot who promised results. During eight months in that shit hole and eighteen request slips later, I get not a single library book with the exception of the first two that were confiscated.

It's Showtime!

Alert! Portion control is on the fritz. The entire row of us sit
before our skimpy lunch portions, gaping in amazement at some
of the steepest peaks known to humanity: Mount Vesuvius,
Mount St. Helens, Mount McKinley and Mount Rushmore,
right before our very eyes in the shape of macaroni masses.
The trays being carried to the next row of tables are ridiculously
stacked. They are piled so high that the scene resembles Saturday
Night Live tomfoolery. Avalanches of elbows, drenched in a
white film, cascade from precarious piles.

Each fortunate recipient is attempting balancing acts en
route to their table. Efforts to contain toppling pasta piles
leave fingers coated with a milky stickiness. The procession
of oversized loads passes by in what seems like a Most Outrageous
Video scene.

I direct my vision to the meal on the
sloppy, wet plastic receptacle resting in front of me...
The truly astounding factor is the difference in the serving size
compared to the mountainous heaps across the way. I cannot
help but break into a subdued chorus of “one of these things
is not like the others.” My dining partners glance around at
our spreads and then back toward my dumbfounded expression.
I gesture an infi nitesimal nod toward the next row of
lunch goers. The sky-high portions of elbows are flopping
onto the table and into their laps.


Tim, a regular at the prison because of his “out of control
Irish temper,” points out, “See that woman over there that
just walked in?” All eyes roll toward the doorway to view a
dark-skinned woman entering the chow hall; entourage follows.
“She’s the deputy warden.” Thus, the mystery of the
macaroni overdose is solved. We are putting on a show for
the head honcho. See how well fed and happy we are?