Duties to Prisoners

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Follow this pattern to post research results and links to this page:

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Duties to Prisoners

Main Topic Questions

• We may need to discuss the topic scope in class. Here are some possibilities.

• Focus on the death penalty.
• Ask what, if any, duties we have to prisoners? Are we obligated to provide resources beyond basic legal rights, food, safety, and shelter?
• Address the social justice issue of mass incarceration.
• What are the ethics behind mass incarceration?

Research Needs

*Ask what, if any, duties we have to prisoners? Are we obligated to provide resources beyond basic legal rights, food, safety, and shelter?

• Reasons for crimes
• Funding for rehabilitation projects
• Benefits of society in the long run based on the treatment of prisoners
• Studies on rehabilitation projects and statistics on re-entry after rehabilitation

Research

• Life after prison - Prisoners need to be set up for success in society if they are to be released back into the real world. They need to be treated with respect, given opportunities to work or educate themselves, given some sort of therapy, and be set up with a social worker to plan for the next steps in life. [1] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• Stanford prison experiment - Something that seems shocking at first, like putting paper bags over a prisoner's face or seeing people in cages, turned into something normal over time. Role playing turns into real life situations. [2] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• TedTalk from Zimbardo on evil - Everyone is capable of becoming evil. It has to do with the situation, and this usually includes some sort of power control. This can tie into what people think of prisoners, as separate from us "good people". When really, they are just like us but who have succumbed to the evil. Treatment in prisons should be set to a certain level and controlled by those who aren't accustomed to seeing it on a daily basis. [3] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• Prisoner re-entry and programs used to help reduce this - The high volumes of prisoners in the United States is due to re-entry of prisoners with three years of release. Thousands of prisoners are released everyday and two-third of them will re-enter prison. [4] and [5] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• 18 facts on U.S. prisons - [6] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• Reasons for imprisonment - a good pie chart showing the different reasons for imprisonment and the relative numbers. [7] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• Incarceration facts and re-entry - information on length of incarceration between states, cost of prisoners in different states, re-entry facts within five years of release, blacks vs whites incarceration rate for the same crime... [8] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• Rehabilitation - There is a definition of rehabilitation, some arguments against it, and some programs that are/were in place in the U.S.. [9] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• Beyond the prison bubble - [10] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• "Offender Reentry: Correctional Statistics, Reintegration into the Community, and Recidivism" - The title says it all. [11] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• Inmate programs and treatment - There is a list of programs, a brief description and an effectiveness rating. [12] (Kelsey K. Smith)

• Mass Incarceration in the US- This gives some basic but useful information on how many people are incarcerated in the US, gives some insight into what may or may not be ethical. It sheds light on life after prison and poses questions about how we can fix our prison system. [13] (Emilee Phillips)

• Statistics on World Prison Populations - A brief look at how the United States prisoner population compares to other countries [14] (Allison Hammer)

• Facts about the Death Penalty-Regarding race, trends, innocence, cost, deterrence, arbitrariness, and mental illness [15] (Justin Wiens)

• Healthcare treatment in US prisons. This study offers some insight about the physical and mental health of prisoners incarcerated in the United States, and how many of them lack the treatment they need. Could help support an argument that the United States could be doing more to rehabilitate the inmates rather than simply lock them up. [16] Another article from NPR talks about how prisoners still often have to pay copays while in prison [17](Luke Schumm)

• Norway has very low incarceration and recidivism rates. These articles are opinion pieces about positives about their prison system, and one that thinks it's not applicable to the United States. [18] [19] the con side: [20] (Sarah Blazevic)

• Current trends in US corrections. This article talks about the major trends seen in incarceration in the United States with statistics on women, juveniles, etc. [21] (Allison Hammer)

• Education while in prison - and interesting article from NY times about prisoners that received college educations while behind bars. It talks about prisoners' lives post jail if they are educated, non educated, and what this all means for the state taxpayers. [22] Another article, this one from the Federal Bureau of Prisons, talks about the current education that is offered to inmates. However, it is very vague and doesn't necessarily mean this is what happens in prisons [23] (Luke Schumm)

• How US prisons are more racist than we think they are--this article discusses how the prison system harshly discriminates against people of color. (Ximena Hernandez)[24]

• Prison Spending. A US Department of Education briefing on state and local prison spending versus spending on education. [25] (Michael Pham)

• Standards on Treatment of Prisoners. This website gives a list of standards on treatment ranging from acceptable disciplinary actions to ensuring that prisoners receieve necessary health care. [26] (Elisabeth Sitio)

• This is an article about a prison in Norway that not in line with the norm for prisons and how they treat their inmates. Some might consider this a "luxury prison", but I think it could provide great framework or a potential ideology of what a prison could look like with a more ethically aware approach. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/feb/25/norwegian-prison-inmates-treated-like-people -Brandon Pollard

• This ted talk looks into how the poor can be more negatively affected by incarceration [27] (Laura Marck)

• This explains the the Stress proliferation theory, which suggests that parental incarceration is a stressor, and this stress may have expansive effects on their kids and future generations to come. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43186901?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents (gabby podegracz)

• This is a study that found significant increases in aggressive behaviors and some evidence of increased attention problems among children whose fathers are incarcerated. The estimated effects of paternal incarceration are stronger than those of other forms of father absence http://www.jstor.org/stable/41408219 (gabby podegracz)

• This paper talks about the emergence of mass incarceration and describe its significance for African American family life. The era of mass incarceration can be understood as a new stage in the history of American racial inequality, as well as a period of dramatic growth in the American penal system ; http://www.jstor.org/stable/40375840 (gabby podegracz)

• This paper discusses how incarceration can have negative impacts on the stability of marriages and most likely leads to divorce or seperations:http://www.jstor.org/stable/3600200 (gabby podegracz)

NPR Pieces on Prisons

• "Food As Punishment: Giving U.S. Inmates 'The Loaf' Persists"- this article discusses how giving a nutritional but bland edit has been used as a punishment in

many prisons [28] (Laura Marck)

• "Inside Lewisburg Prison: A Choice Between A Violent Cellmate Or Shackles"- In this piece the story of one prisoners experience with a more extreme punishment of shackle punishment is exposed, and solitary confinement is also questioned [29] (Laura Marck)

• "THE CODE SWITCH PODCAST: How One Inmate Changed The Prison System From The Inside" on this episode of code switch a journalist who spent time interviewing Martin Sostre speaks about his history bringing rights to prisoners [30] (Laura Marck)

• "New York Approves Reforms To Keep Juvenile Offenders Out Of Adult Prisons"- In some states criminals over 16 sometimes go to adult prison, and this piece looks into how that is changing in New York [31] (Laura Marck)

• "One Lawyer's Fight For Young Blacks And 'Just Mercy'"- this article not only addresses how racial issues can become innately tied to mass incarceration [32]