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Erick Rios
English 1010-009
James Celestino
05/03/15
Final Essay
A Failed Prison System
Throughout history, the United States has been reliant on prisons as part of its judicial
system. However, during recent decades, Americas prison system has been in decline. During
the ancient world era until the Colonial America, imprisonment was not used as a common
practice to punish those who had committed crimes. A different system of punishment was
prosecuted such as corporal retribution, physical work, and banishment from socializing with
loved ones. After the 17th century, England and France were one of the first countries to take
action on a new punitive method for criminals by creating captive facilities. These facilities were
called penitentiaries and restricted freedom privileges, based on the severity of an inmates
crime. In effect, penitentiaries became a solution for governments and spread to countries such as
the United States between the 17th and 18th century. While prison facilities keep criminals away
from society, it may not be the ideal solution legislators originally hoped for. Prison facilities in
the United States have failed to control the growth of prison gangs, sexual abuse, proper
rehabilitation for the elderly, and equality. If legislators dont take action, prisoners will continue
to be killed in correctional facilities by acts of violence before finishing their time. After serving
time, the prisoners who do survive continue to live their lives with lack of rehabilitation and are
prone to fall under a repetitive cycle of committing their same crimes. As a result of these

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problems escalating, it will continue to strip human rights from prisoners and permanently harm
society without the help of legislators.
Before gangs invaded prisons, inmates followed their own rules called the Convict Code.
Behind the code, inmates avoided interference with anyones personal life by eavesdropping,
snitching, and stealing. If inmates followed the Convict Code, it established trust among
themselves and formed power in a place where it was non-existent. Violence behind bars began
to reduce with the code in motion and that benefited prison guards by keeping the system under
control. It wasnt until the 1960s where the Convict Code became more strenuous to maintain
when penitentiaries received large numbers of different ethnic groups. Constructing bigger
facilities wasnt enough to withhold the population of inmates and made it feasible for problems
such as prison gangs to slip through the cracks.
With gangs controlling prisons, it transformed a system that once advocated stability into
a barbaric environment. New inmates with non-gang relations are unaware that they are the
primary targets before they enter to their new cell. Each man in prison is for his own and in
desperate need to search for protection. In order to obtain protection, some inmates beg for their
lives to join a gang association and others who refuse are violently forced. Once an inmate
converts into a gang member, they are easily manipulated to do illegal actions in order to feel
approved by their family another term for gangs. As gangs build a stronger foundation within
penitentiaries, it diminishes the ability of guards to protect and control the violence that occurs.
Furthermore, being forced to join other gangs takes whats left from prisoners human rights and
reduces chances of proper rehabilitation if guards dont regain power.
Each gang group oversees their home prison in a unique way and will threaten anyone
who crosses their path. The young guys on the street look to the gang members inside as role

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models, says Charles Dangerfield, a former prison guard who now heads Californias Gang
Task Force, in Sacramento, CA. Getting sentenced to prison is like being called up to the
majors (50 Wood). Pelican Bay State Prison, located in Crescent City, California, is home to six
main prison gangs. The majority of the inmates are either a part of the Nuestra Familia, the
Mexican Mafia, the Aryan Brotherhood, the Black Guerrilla Family, the Northern Structure, or
the Nazi Low-riders. With the diversity of gangs in the prison system, it creates harrowing
uproars and dominating their competition.
Correspondingly, each of these gang groups serves a higher purpose to street gangs by
controlling the drug traffic on the inside of prisons and the outside world. A way prison guards
know that gangs reprisal exists behind walls is by noticing the different formation of cliques
during breaks. Once each gang goes to their claimed territory, they send scouts out to roam
around the prison to traffic weapons, drugs, and even cell phones. In 2013, The Department of
Corrections and Rehabilitation confiscated 12,151 phones. A reasonable guess might be that this
represented a tenth of all cell phones in the system, which means that almost every one of the
states 135,600 inmates had a phoneall in violation of prison regulations (49, Wood).
Nevertheless, prison guards need to start investing more time to separating gangs from each
other in order to break down their groupings. Aside from legislators creating new renovations
within penitentiaries, they should also reach out to teachers and communities to guide the
younger generation from joining gangs. Having communities encourage grade schools to
establish lectures for students could prevent the younger generation from dismantling their
education, relationship with loved ones, and overall future.
As guards become more intrusive on illegal trafficking in penitentiaries, gangs have
fought back by developing a secretive solution to avoid conflicts while completing trades. Gangs

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members have adapted to become aggressive towards handling their illicit dealings and begun
preying on female prison guards to continue trafficking without risking their own. At the
Baltimore City Detention Center seventy-five percent of the six hundred and fifty correctional
officers were woman, and between sixty and seventy-five per cent of them were involved in
contraband smuggling and/or having sexual relationships with gang inmates (Toobin, Jeffrey).
Since prison guards live off a thirty thousand salary, it is easy for them to be compelled to risk
their jobs in order to make an extra profit. In order to receive their payments, they go under
agreements with the prison gangs by doing their dirty deeds such as trafficking illegal supplies in
their hair, underwear, and internally. Gangs such as the Black Guerrilla Family have been trained
to spot out vulnerable female officers who have insecurities and low self-esteem with their
physical appearance. The intentions of using a specific stereotype make it easier to infatuate and
allure women guards to gangs advantages.
It has been made clear that gangs have overthrown a once concrete system and will
continue to rule the penitentiaries without a solution from legislators. By providing invasive
background checks, training, and protocols for all prison guards, a drug and violence free system
could be achieved. Another measure to obliterate prison gangs is creating an innovative program
run by the Army, Navy, and SWAT to assist and improve better care handling with apprehensive
situations, illegal trafficking and brutality between the prison gangs. Involving more security
training is a way to modify an old system that isnt able to handle the evolution of violence
caused by prison gangs. If the solutions that I have listed arent imposed any time soon, inmates
and security staff will be at risk and end in traumatic danger.
Aside from prison gangs, other predicaments such as sexual assault and rape lurk within
the jail cells of America. Raped by the System: A Comparison of Prison by Alexandra

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Ashmont, researched that one in five male inmates and one in four female inmates in the United
States struggle with being sexual assaulted in prison (57). Rather than the inmates confessing the
occurring sexual assaults, the number of unsolved cases and underreporting has augmented. This
neglected problem places prisoners on a stage of stigma and fear of breaking the code of silence.
If an inmate is caught reporting to a patrol guard or officer on who sexually assaulted them, it
could conclude with the prisoner being labeled as an outcast and high crisis. Before the Federal
Bureau of Prisons can file charges against the attacker, the victim is either beaten, in critical care,
or dead. In 2006, The U.N. Committee against Torture did a study case of prison rape across the
nation and concluded that only fifty-one percent of prison inmates report sexual assault. Out of
the fifty-one percent, only three percent of the cases that are reported discipline and punish the
abuser (58, Ashmont).
With the overcrowding of prisons, it gives a stronger opportunity for prisoners and
officers to take sufferance of victims because of the limited privacy. The prime times for inmates
to plan their sexual raid are during their shower break when victims expose how defenseless and
terrified they feel. In contrast, prison guards and officers wait for the inmates to fall asleep after
the day turns to dusk. They creep within the black shadows and flash their lights to search for the
next innocent to rape.
Lisa Nelson is a pre-operative transgender woman who suffers from mental illness. In
September 2004 while being held at a California jail on charges of smuggling drugs into
a correctional facility, another inmates threatened to stab her if she did not come with him
to the shower stalls, where he proceeded to rape her. A corrections official walked by as
the rape was being perpetrated and laughed, doing nothing to stop it. Subsequently the
facility placed the perpetrator in a cell together with Nelson. Nelson told SPR that, he

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did nothing but beat me and rape me. When I finally got out of there, I had two black
eyes that were completely swollen up. (63 Ashmont)
Officials refused Ms. Nelson after requesting multiple times to be placed into a unit for
gay and transgender inmates. Carelessly, the facility ignored her wishes and located her in a unit
with six other men where two men coerced Ms. Nelson to involuntary perform oral sex. At the
moment, the deputy keeping guard made eye contact with Ms. Nelson and did nothing to stop the
men. The next day, the deputy joked with Ms. Nelson and asked how much she charged the guys
for her sexual performance. Simultaneously dealing with the harsh conditions in the prison
system, she quoted to SPR, Sometimes I want to die. I am scared to close my eyes at night (63
Ashmont).
Ms. Nelsons confession makes her situation unique from other sexual abuse testimonies
because, by constitution, she is known as male and not female. Transgender male and female are
three times likely to be sexually abused than any gender in penitentiaries and endure arduous
conditions against their predators (62, Ashmont). In spite of these harsh conditions that all
genders face, correctional facilities are improperly running a broken system by failing to
maintain formal records. Having a dysfunctional system generates an advantage for predators to
continue sexual assaults in prison and a high demand for legislators to put an end to prison rape.
Legislators need to investigate what is occurring behind prison walls and impose surprise visits
on how their system is being managed. It is equally important for Legislators to enable public
awareness on the inhumane assaults and pass laws, protecting victims from forced intercourse.
With the negligence that is occurring right now in the prison system, it creates an increase the
number of physiological illnesses, suicides, and bloodshed against other inmates and staff.

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The United States prison system is currently under stress with housing over two million
inmates and not enough funding to create superior rehabilitation programs. Visualizing a system
without a systematic health care plan for the elderly irradiates a solution to improve their lives.
In 2010, the US Bureau of Prisons spent an average annual cost of $28,284 to incarcerate a
middle-aged inmate within the Federal Prison system (Hirby, James). By contrast, elderly
inmates cost two or three times more, annually, than their middle-aged counterparts. In 1991,
inmates over the age of 54 represented 3% of the prison inmate population. In 2011, the same
demographic grew to 8% of the prison population (460, Luallen & King). American prisons are
now challenged with an ever-increasing cost to imprison greys another term for elderly
inmates. This increased cost makes it difficult for the prison system to provide proper
rehabilitation for all inmates, regardless of their age. According to a study in 2008, there has
been an estimated 31% increase in medical care costs for elderly inmates (460, Luallen & King).
Furthermore, the overall rise in the cost of medical care and insurance also places financial stress
on the prison system. Prisoners who lack physical strength, due to age, struggle to protect
themselves from prison violence. The medical care needed to treat these inmates adds on
additional costs. Due to the high cost of operating correctional facilities, some states dont fund a
lot of money for their prison systems and therefore cant provide the necessary protection to
elderly inmates from violent actions. Instead, older prisoners are left stranded from getting the
appropriate medication and slowly die without assistance from prison staff.
Penitentiaries that dont have enough funding for rehabilitation programs send a
barbarous statement on not helping the elderly. Occurring everyday, the elderly will have to
withstand the atrocious cruelties insides prisons and survive living on the bottom of the food
chain. Legislators need to solve the issue of improving rehabilitation without creating more

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financial debt so that elderly inmates have improved chances of survival. Lawmakers should
reach out to undergrads that are studying phycology or medicine and create a voluntary
organization where it is costless to support the elderly. The involvement of voluntary work could
narrow their death and suicide rates caused by acts of violent aggression and mental illness.
In conclusion, legislators need to realize that the old prison system no longer works and
needs to be replaced with an improved system. Building a stronger security system can
extinguish the monstrous carnage caused by gang members and sexual predators. By stopping
drug trafficking, sexual assault, and violence, prison gangs and the criminally insane will no
longer hold the power to cause harm from within our society. Legislators who bring voluntary
work from the military and undergrad medical students could create a stable system where
victims of abuse, the elderly, and mentally ill inmates can feel safe. Keeping penitentiaries under
control will help communities no longer stereotype the system as corrupted. Creating awareness
of the issues that our prison system faces will help pass laws to improve the lives of inmates
through rehabilitation. After serving time, prisoners can fall back into society without
committing more crimes if legislators place effort in changing the system for the greater good.

MLA Work Cited

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Ashmont, Alexandra. "Raped By The System: A Comparison Of Prison Rape In The United
States And South Africa." Pace International Law Review 26.2 (2014): 53-87. Academic
Search Premier. Web. 9 Mar. 2015.
Dervan, Lucian E. "American Prison Culture In An International Context: An Examination Of
Prisons In America, The Netherlands, And Israel." Stanford Law & Policy Review 22.2
(2011): 413-428. Academic Search Premier. Web. 13 Mar. 2015.
Gallagher, Stephen. "The American Prison, Open For Business?" Peace Review 20.3 (2008):
376-379. Academic Search Premier. Web. 13 Mar. 2015.
Hirby, James. "What Is the Average Cost to House Inmates in Prison." The Law Dictionary.
Black's Law Online Legal 2nd Ed. Law Dictionary, n.d. Web. 02 May 2015.
Luallen, Jeremy, and Ryan Kling. "A Method For Analyzing Changing Prison Populations:
Explaining The Growth Of The Elderly In Prison." Evaluation Review 38.6 (2014): 459
486. Academic Search Premier. Web. 9 Mar. 2015
Pitock, Todd. "Jailhouse Blues." Saturday Evening Post 285.1 (2013): 44-47. Academic Search
Premier. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.
Toobin, Jeffrey. "This Is My Jail - The New Yorker." The New Yorker. N.p., 14 Apr. 2014.Web.
17 Apr. 2015.
Wood, Graeme. "How Gangs Took Over Prisons." Atlantic 314.3 (2014): 46-53. Academic
Search Premier. Web. 9 Mar. 2015.

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