Get Me Outta Here!

As if Threedonians needed any exhortation to stay out of jail…. Here however is a fascinating piece by Heather MacDonald at City Journal on jails in general and Rikers Island in particular. She highlights the problems of mentally ill offenders, the transitory nature of jail inmates (and the difference from prion inmates), inmate culture, etc. Here’s a taste — do read the whole thing.

The challenges of running jails exceed anything that the academic world—and most of us—can begin to understand. In addition to the huge problems of logistics and safety that jails present on their own, commissioners also face a well-organized inmates’ rights lobby that fights commonsense antiviolence measures. Until recently, for example, New York City officials weren’t allowed to put pretrial detainees in uniform, which made detecting contraband more difficult. Only last year did Commissioner Horn win the right to monitor detainees’ phone calls. Adolescents arrive at Rikers with their criminal histories largely concealed from officials to protect their privacy, hindering the determination of their security risk.

But the order that the lobbyists, academic critics, and neo-Foucauldians see as oppressive is inmates’ only hope for safety and even, perhaps, rehabilitation. The recent insights of urban policing—that order matters, that small violations lead to greater crimes, and that information must be gathered and analyzed—are all equally pertinent to jails, where chaos and corruption always threaten.

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