Quote of the day
We don’t develop courage by being happy every day. We develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging adversity - more amenable to) debating issues ‘to death’ rather than channeling their intellectual exertions in the direction of seeking remedies. It has been precisely that way with our protracted prison crisis.
After last July’s fire and prison break the eroding prison security situation has been manifested chiefly in the frequent inmate flare-ups notably at Lusignan, which facility has now been pressed into service beyond that which it is reasonably equipped to provide. It seems, as well, that each prison incident appears to open up new fissures in the wider prison security system that allow for what now appears to be an increase in the remarkable twoway flow of illegal communication between inmates of our prisons and the outside world.
There is nothing but national embarrassment to be derived from any objective inquiry into a prison security system that reveals the humiliating truth about Prison Warders being pressed into service as common ‘bag men’ shamelessly servicing the needs of prison inmates for weapons, drugs, cell phones and creature comforts of one sort of another. In that context the less said about the recent Mother’s Day soiree at the New Amsterdam Prison and the cluelessness of the authorities as to how the event came to be serviced with high-priced alcohol, cigarettes and drugs, the better. What should be said, however, is that the New Amsterdam Mother’s Day ‘do’ came perilously close to matching the near flattening of the Georgetown jail as a symbol of official loss of control of our prison system.
Setting aside the fact that our overall prison infrastructure has simply been outgrown, in more ways than one, by the evolving penal needs of our society, we must endure, as well, the betrayal of some of those whose task it is to protect the system, but whom, instead, have opted to embrace the quagmire of corruption into which prison security would appear to be sinking fast. The challenge in this particular regard goes beyond simply throwing material resources behind the broader physical enhancement of the prison infrastructure. It requires, as well, more measured value judgements in the process of creating a selection and subsequent training process which, hopefully, can create greater numbers of prison officers with a sense of the mission required to get the job done.
The bottom line, of course, is the need for an enhanced sense of official will to improve our prison security system by turning public discourses and Commissions of Inquiry into the structured implementation of well thought out plans to turn things around, bearing in mind, of course, that resource limitations place restraints on the speed with which things can happen. This notwithstanding, what we need is sustained and evidence-driven official reassurance that the gaping holes in our prison security system are being plugged. That reassurance has simply not been forthcoming.