* I took a tour of state prisons several years ago, and by far the Tamms “SuperMax” prison was the cleanest, quietest facility in the bunch. One reason for its spotless look is the prison is still relatively new compared to most of our ancient facilities. And it’s so quiet because inmates - who are supposedly sent there because they are the “worst of the worst” are kept in solitary confinement 23 hours a day.
That’s torture, say some, and now Gov. Pat Quinn’s new Dept. of Corrections director is taking a look at the conditions.
Amnesty International released a report calling for changes, which prompted Dick Durbin to hold a subcommittee hearing on the matter.
* One of the reasons that I’ve been so hesitant to go into detail of the Belleville News Democrat’s series on Tamms is that prisoners are known to say just about anything. Also, the series appeared to be prompted by a lawsuit against a Tamms psychiatrist. One should always be careful about basing articles on lawsuits of that nature, and I wasn’t sure the paper was careful enough.
Not everything is as it seems…
During a civil trial Tuesday in U.S. District Court, Tamms supermax prison inmate Anthony Gay was described by the day’s only witness as a “manipulator” who routinely cut or threatened to cut himself to get what he wanted from prison staff.
His accuser, psychiatrist Dr. Rakesh Chandra, is being sued by Gay, 35, of Rock Island, for alleged violations of the Constitution’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. Gay claims his civil rights were violated when, after severely mutilating himself on several occasions in 2004, Chandra ordered him strapped naked to a metal bed frame and left for as long as 32 hours without food instead of being given mental health therapy or medication.< [...]
Powell, Chandra's attorney, said her client did everything he could to help Gay, including strapping him down to prevent him from further harming himself until his mental state stabilized.
More from Dr. Chandra…
“If there was a magic pill to make Anthony stop cutting, I would have given it to him,” Chandra said.
In the end, the jury found for the prison psychiatrist Chandra and against the prisoner plaintiff.
Anthony Gay, the prisoner plaintiff, was at the heart of the Belleville News-Democrats’ series…
The [BN-D] articles included evidence of mental illness exhibited over periods of years by inmates, including self-mutilation and feces-smearing.
It also challenged the Department of Correction’s assertion that the prison holds the “worst of the worst.”
For example, Anthony Gay, who entered prison to serve a seven-year sentence for stealing a hat and a dollar bill, is now serving a 99-year prison sentence for assaults on guards. Since his incarceration, he engaged in self-mutilation by cutting his arms, legs and genitals.
But this is from a letter in the Belleville News-Democrat…
I read your recent series on the “inhumane” treatment of prisoners at Tamms prison. I mentioned this series to a family friend. Ironically enough, he is a former corrections officer at Tamms, and every day he fearlessly faced the dangers of his profession. The reason I brought this event up is because your reporter only reported half of the story.
When I mentioned the article, my friend asked if Anthony Gay was one of the inmates mentioned. They know each other really well.
The whole reason Gay has been in prison for so long. Gay’s stay at the “Concrete and Iron Bar Hotel” was extended because he assaulted my friend [a former prison guard]. Your article fails to mention that Gay was convicted of repeatedly throwing urine, fecal matter, and other bodily fluids, striking my friend.
* Click here to see the IDOC director’s 10-step plan for reform…
His 10-step plan announced [yesterday] in Chicago includes a full mental health evaluation of all Tamms prisoners within 30 days of their arrival. Clinical staff also will make weekly rounds of all areas throughout the prison, not just the mental health unit, to detect whether inmates’ conditions worsen or if they become suicidal.
Another significant change is the new process for reviewing prisoners who are to be transferred from a lower security prison to Tamms. Hearings will be conducted to allow inmates to rebut information that led them to be placed in Tamms, and they would be able to appeal their placement there. All hearings would be recorded.
More…
* Inform each inmate of an estimated time they’ll stay at Tamms and how they can earn privileges and eventually transfer out to a less restrictive prison.
* Enhance incentives for good behavior, including earning the right to use the telephone or spend more time out of their cells.
* Begin offering General Educational Development testing.
* Implement congregate religious services for inmates.
* Rescind some of the restrictions on printed materials.
* Develop a plan to allow inmates access to a “step down” program, which would help at-risk inmates transition from Tamms to the general prison population.
* Plan a media, legislative and public outreach program that includes a visit to Tamms.
* Reexamine the population of inmates having served extensive time at Tamms to see whether they are eligible to transfer out. Some have been at Tamms since it opened in 1998.
Thoughts
- wordslinger - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:24 am:
SuperMax prison like Tamms are necessary for the protection of correctional workers and prison populations. I wish it weren’t the case, but wishing doesn’t make it so.
In and of itself, I don’t think a 23-hour lockdown is inhumane treatment. There’s a long road you have to willingly take to get there.
- VanillaMan - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:24 am:
I will always support any needed investigation into our prisons. We don’t want any harm coming to those who live there - or work there.
But no one wants to be in solitary confinement, and they will do anything to avoid it. That’s some rough punishment.
- Springfield Sceptic - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:34 am:
It is a prison. It is the one and only prison that is not also a faux rehab facility. They get sent there for a reason.
- Raymond Moley - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:42 am:
I’ve had the opportunity over the last 20 years to visit many of the Illinois correctional institutions. Today’s prisons, like Stateville and Menard, are much safer for inmates and staff than they were prior to Tamms.
Twenty years ago the gangs were running the prisons, and they were mad houses. Tamms has allowed state managers to segment the worst violent offenders with the result being staff and inmate assaults are down by half over the last 10 years.
Perhaps, some changes are needed. However, there is a limit to what taxpayers should be asked to spend on dubious consoling and rehabilitation programs, especially, on the criminally insane.
- IDOC - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:43 am:
I know one convict is there because he raped and tried to murder a employee. He should never get out.
- Okay Then... - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:45 am:
VanillaMan, if no one wants to be in solitary confinment then why do some inmates engage in activities and behaviors that they know will land them at Tamms? Clearly not all prison inmates are doing what is necessary to avoid being sent to Tamms in the first place. Of course it’s rough punishment, isn’t that what prison should be?
Our society is far too permissive. When we treat criminals with kid gloves what message are we sending to law abiding citizens and victims of crime?
Ever seen the film Scared Straight? I would encourage bleeding heart liberals to walk a mile in a correctional officer’s shoes before they judge what is harsh or unfair treatment of prison inmates.
- dupage dan - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:46 am:
From the comfort of our homes and lives Tamm seems horrific. A cursory review of the events that lead to one being sent there confirms that the inmates are truly dangerous. We must keep an eye on these institutions to make sure they are housing only the worst of the worst. We have seen where abuses have occured (Chester MHC and a long standing patient who probably should not have been there).
Keep the light on so we can see what’s going on.
Keep the staff safe.
- Deep South - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:58 am:
When the USP at Marion was the lock up for the federal prison system’s “worst of the worst,” prisoners were also kept in their cells 23 hours a day. That management technique was put into place after prisoners started killing the guards, throwing feces and urine at them, etc., so this is really nothing new. Some of these guys are real animals and very well be very mentally unstable.
- lake county democrat - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 12:05 pm:
U.S. Senator Jim Webb is crafting major prison reform legislation which looks to have bipartisan support — I wonder if the 23-hour issue will be addressed in it and what impact that might have on state prisons.
- girllawyer - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 12:09 pm:
We should not lose track of the fact that “worst of the worst” means hardest to manage. It does not mean they committed the worst crimes on the outside. Few are there for life. Prison should be punishment but it does not serve anyone to have inmates released back into society (or into the general prison population)in a condition where they will be more violent and less able to meet basic societal expectations than when they went in.
- Skeeter - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 12:28 pm:
“One should always be careful about basing articles on lawsuits of that nature”
Not to digress, but have you seen the local news in Chicago? That’s SOP — bring in a plaintiff and his/her attorney, don’t seek a response from defendant/attorney, but just run with it. I was pretty outraged over a one-sided story I saw last night on CBS Chicago that was simply a plaintiff and her attorney accusing a hospital of malpractice.
That shows why I get news here and not from Chicago’s local news. Here, there seems to be the idea that “reporting” is more than just running with one party’s side of the story.
- VanillaMan - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 12:45 pm:
VanillaMan, if no one wants to be in solitary confinment then why do some inmates engage in activities and behaviors that they know will land them at Tamms?
Because they are #$%@^!# out of their minds.
- PeoriaBob - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 1:00 pm:
Everything is 180 degrees out of phase here!
Procedures at Tamms should be the model for all prisons.
- Pat collins - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 1:00 pm:
What is the alternative to 23 hour lockdown?
Worse prisons elsewhere?
Let them be in a nice big yard, but drugged to the max?
One commenter has it nailed: They walked a long road to get there.
- Skeeter - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 1:05 pm:
Wow. “Okay then” accused “Vanilla Man” of being a bleeding heart liberal
That’s big news.
VMan, why the radical philsophical shift?
- News Watcher - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 1:10 pm:
Whatever else you want to say about it, the Belleville News Democrat showed us that it is not only the worst of the worst in Tamms, and the parade of 4 horrible people there. There were examples of seriously mentally ill people for whom it makes no sense to place in Tamms, and who were, even by the IDOC acccounts not properly diagnosed or treated. They also did do original investigating about why the prisoners are at Tamms. And contrary to claims that they are the “worst of the worst” and that they are all there for a violent act in regular prisons, over half of them did not have a conviction in prison. (Those who did had assaults of throwing urine or feces or possessing a weapon–admittedly bad things, but not even prosecuted in most prisons and certainly not something to send someone to a supermax for.) I think the reforms speak to the fact that everyone agreed that this prison had gotten out of control and way off its original mission. You can secure people, as we have for years and years, without isolation. It simply has unwanted consequences. People are ignorant of all the unwanted effects of isolation, and about why that is a terrible recent trend in corrections that stems from counter-productive tough on crime policies. The New Yorker article on Tamms is fantastic and got me very interested: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/03/30/090330fa_fact_gawande
- moby - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 1:14 pm:
ok, so Anthony Gay has been outed by the Capitol Fax as an excrement hurler. Does anyone seriously maintain that this crime — generally the act of someone with a mental illness — merits a decade of 24/7 solitary confinement at Tamms? The guard who is a victim of the abuse changes his shirt and washes his hands; the prisoner is shut in a 200 sf. concrete cell w/o human contact for a decade. Does that sound like justice to anyone out there?
- News Watcher - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 1:19 pm:
In spite of Rich’s cautionary (all press cautionary is wise), I encourage the commenters to actually read the Belleville reporting on this. It gives you a better sense of “the path” that some of them took to get there. It is easy to make these blanket comments about how everyone deserves to be there, but (just like the rest of Illinois government) you should be open to the idea that the IDOC has not been doing an admirable job with this facility. Many other states have had to come to terms with the expense and problems of their supermaxes, and many have converted them to regular max facilities or even closed them. Ok, enough from me, I promise.
http://www.bnd.com/600
- VanillaMan - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 1:41 pm:
VMan, why the radical philsophical shift?
Hi Skeeter - long time no read, good to see ya! To answer your question - there isn’t any radical philosophical shift here. Being conservative doesn’t mean not having a bleeding heart. We care about freedom. Whether it is the freedom given to each of us with our wages, and how that freedom is damaged by high taxes. Or the freedom given to each of us regarding life itself. We care about those we disagree with, just like anyone else.
What I have found so disturbing over the past eight years has been the elitist belief that normal Wal-Mart-shopping, big vehicle-driving, church-going, charity-giving, married-heterosexual family folks are too uncool or hip to be taken seriously.
The fact that we exist at all, is a reputiation of a long record of human history’s forced class system. It is those boring vanilla people who are the tax backbone of any government that used to face exinction throughout history. We are the radicals. We are the ones who were never empowered before the Founding Fathers gave us the Bill of Rights.
So, what the heck?! Why is Middle America suddenly considered too ignorant or unimportant to march in the streets without being labeled as some kind of medieval mob? Who is calling whom names here? Why is the Party in Power flipping the majority of Americans the bird instead of thanking them for their feedback - or some other polite response? Why the heck is one of our former presidents calling us racist?
Hey - if our money is good enough to take for their dreams, why must we sacrifice our dreams in order to do so?
Folks in prison deserve decent treatment. There is a difference between justice and revenge. Believe it or not, even folks with no college credit class, or even high school diplomas recognize this. People aren’t stupid. We believe in freedom - even for those in jail.
Preserving our freedoms is a conservative value.
Welcome back!
- North of I-80 - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 1:50 pm:
How about tort reform where the loser pays ALL court/atty costs?
Plan B is to reward these people who have CHOSEN to do things that landed them in prison?
And for those of you experts who have NOT spent a lot of time in a state prison, who have NOT taken convicted/sentenced killers to Joliet/Stateville etc, who have NOT had the pleasure of walking down prison corridors wearing a law enforcement uniform…. most everyone sentenced to prison is a feces hurler, a spitter or urinates on those free to walk about. I suggest 1 hour of solitary confinement and then 23 hours going home with a bleeding heart sympathizer.
- 47th Ward - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 2:00 pm:
===Preserving our freedoms is a conservative value.===
VM, your sentence should say it’s an “American” value. And I’m glad that you share that belief with people like me who aren’t as conservative as you.
- VanillaMan - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 2:46 pm:
I meant small “c” conservative - not a label.
- WOW - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 3:09 pm:
I think everyone who is incarcerated should be treated humanely. With that being said I also think they should be locked up for their crimes.
See the linked article:
http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=322506&src=109
- Skeeter - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 3:29 pm:
“So, what the heck?! Why is Middle America suddenly considered too ignorant or unimportant to march in the streets without being labeled as some kind of medieval mob? ”
Maybe because those people marching want government to keep its hands off Medicare. Just tossing ideas out there.
And with regard to your not cool/not hip comment: Of course those people are neither cool nor hip but I don’t choose to ignore them for that reason though. I take them seriously, even when they tell me that czars are communists. They are a great reminder that we need to improve public education.
But we seem to have gotten a bit off topic now.
- WOW - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 3:43 pm:
Skeeter … nice to see someone else has picked up on the whole Czar/Communist thing. I doubt the Romanoff’s would be too happy with that (not to mention Lenin, Trotsky or Stalin).
- News Watcher - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 3:50 pm:
As long as Rich is putting up a defense for Tamms doctor Rakesh Chandra, you might as well disclose this:
Earlier on Thursday, U.S. District Court Judge Michael Reagan ruled against allowing Chandra’s criminal record from being revealed to the jury. Chandra testified during a hearing out of the jury’s presence, that in 1986 he pleaded guilty to Medicaid fraud and obstruction of justice in Baltimore. Chandra testified he was sentenced to one year but that was suspended after he paid $110,000 in fines and restitution. His license was revoked and then restored after he took extra courses and underwent a psychological and psychiatric examination.
Under questioning by Massey, Chandra said he instructed social workers under his supervision to make up false reports that he had provided mental health therapy when he hadn’t.
“That was to cover your tracks, right?” Massey asked and Chandra replied, “Yes.” Court documents showed that Chandra made an Alford plea, which means he did not admit to the wrongdoing but conceded the prosecutor could prove the charges.
Sorry–I promised no more news from me. I’m going to go take a walk outside.
http://www.bnd.com/news/local/story/928367.html
- VanillaMan - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 3:52 pm:
“Just tossing ideas out there”, is a way to say insulting things, but not be held responsible for saying them, as though you are parroting what others are also saying, and you haven’t really given it much thought.
Good stand to take - classy.
- Fan of the Game - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 3:55 pm:
The first post in this thread nails the issue.
- Okay Then... - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 3:55 pm:
Skeeter, “bleeding heart liberal” was not directed at VanillaMan (I don’t know his political bend, nor do I follow his postings enough to know about his political bend). What was directed toward him in that post was addressed to him specifically.
VanillaMan,
Stop with the Tamms inmates don’t know or understand what they are doing defense. Many, if not all of them, in fact do know and understand what they are doing. All who are placed at Tamms are not always mentally ill to begin with, as you and bleeding heart types so often try to portray. Try watching NBC (MSNBC) Dateline’s Behind Bars or Lock Up, whatever it’s called. Some inmates are serving life terms and just don’t care about who they hurt behind bars, figuring they have very little left to lose. These are extremely dangerous and hardened criminals who are being sent to Tamms. Some of them do have mental problems, but they had those mental problems when the found mentally fit, mind you, to stand trial and were convicted for the often brutal crimes that they committed in the first place. In other words their mental condition or state was not the result of their imprisonment at Tamms or anywhere else. The state of Illinois according to the Governor has no money. But, he somehow seems to keep finding money lately, but I digress… Addressing the mental issues of many prison inmates needs to be done well before they find themselves in prison, wouldn’t you agree? A lot of their problems stem from the environments in which they were raised. Very often many of them are just suffering from depression, which has gone untreated for years and results in lack of self-esteem, which causes them to engage in criminal activity. If you’re trying to address the problem by the time they reach Tamms, it’s too late—you’re too late!
- Skeeter - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 4:05 pm:
“Just tossing ideas out there”, is a way to say insulting things, but not be held responsible for saying them, as though you are parroting what others are also saying, and you haven’t really given it much thought.
Good stand to take - classy.”
Interesting take, VMan. When I say “Just tossing ideas out there” I mean “This is probably the most obvious idea, but I’m sure there are many others.” But you may be right — others may use that phrase differently, including in the manner you suggested.
And to the merits — I didn’t think my comments were necessarily insulting. I was going for “accurate.” Statements like the one I mentioned have been pretty typical of the crowds. I note that my favorite has been the complaints of those attending the D.C. rally that the Metro was not very good. They feel that people have the right to extra trains for political rallys, but not a right to healthcare. And then they wonder why they are not being taken seriously by “elites.”
But again, we’ve gone far off topic now.
- moby - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 4:39 pm:
I don’t know why some people on this site can’t accept the simple fact of the existence of mental illness. If they did, they would never speak with the hatred they do. Some 15% of the men at Tamms are on psychotropic drug, and probably another 30 or 40 percent are mentally ill but not receiving treatment. That does not mean they should not be punished, but it means that putting them in solitary confinement for years, even a decade is both cruel and illogical. And to take a person who is a criminal but mentally stable, and then make them crazy by a regime of solitary confinement, is to impose a punishment never intended by any court or jury. A person who imposes such a punishment is literally an outlaw
- Okay Then... - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 4:47 pm:
Moby why only focus on the “mentally ill” and not others who have been or are likely to be victimized by them? Prisons have rules and regulations for reasons. Just as an in free society we must all abide by certain rules and regulations that are in the interest of our individual saftey and collective saftey as well. When we violate regulations and rules we are likely to be punished accordingly, and we should generally expect to be punished accordingly. There are many people who have psychological and mental problems who do not commit crimes against others. For those who do, there is prison. For those who insist on committing crime while in prison, there is Tamms.
- yinn - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 5:50 pm:
I am very glad to see Moby and News Watcher here. If we could be sure everyone who is in Tamms deserves to be there, that would be one thing, but there are bound to be improperly-placed inmates. I would like to err on the side of humanity because of that probability.
The amount of isolation is also likely to push many inmates over the edge. If you don’t want to see the behaviors described, you have to change the model.
- Butterfly - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 6:04 pm:
I love Capitol Fax readers. They are educated and actually know and understand the issues. That being said, you have all given more consideration and thought to the CRIMINALS than the CRIMINALS ever gave to their VICTIMS. There are very good reasons that these people are incarcerated. They committed violent acts against other human beings. Please remember that when you feel sorry for them because they have lost their phone privileges. Big deal. Many have lost their lives because of some of these people.
- moby - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 6:25 pm:
Yes Butterfly, victims deserve compassion and respect. That is the work of friends, families, and the community as a whole. (It is also job of the person who has committed the crime, but he rarely gets the chance.) The job of the IDOC however is to provide justice and rehabilitations. It is not to exact vengeance. I agree that people who commit serious crimes should be punished seriously. But that does not mean they should be tortured or denied their very human reason! That punishment is not available to any judge or jury, nor should it be.
- Amalia - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 6:30 pm:
you know how people who are against the death penalty spend a whole lot of time nit picking on rules and claim that that is the problem instead of just saying “no one should be put to death?”
well, death row is kind of out of business now even though we
are still sentencing folks to death. so the big shift is on….let’s get on prison operations cause we really don’t get that incarceration is important.
see yinn just above. “I would like to err n the side of humanity because of that probability.” Whose humanity? the humanity that endangers prison guards? Cause confinement is not torture. and, “moby,” we get that there is mental illness. do you also get that there is violence that may be difficult for you to recognize as sociopathic behavior and not mental illness?
are we requiring that the inmates all get drug tested and
learn to read or is the ACLU still fighting to do whatever
the prisoners do or do not want to do?
evil is real people. and real evil people belong in deep confinement. and probably more evil people in Illinois
belong in a place like Tamms.
I hope and pray that as the system releases
the 1000 prisoners that nothing violent happens before
the authorities show up because they’ve been following the monitoring bracelets which are out in public while
authorities are from a distance, on a computer
- News Watcher - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 7:37 pm:
Look, this isn’t the Tribune and no one here is just barking off responses that don’t productively ponder the real policy issues. That is why this blog is great. So, let’s make sure we don’t turn to simplistic thinking just because the issue is prison policy.
I don’t think it is a good faith move, or a productive one, to suggest that people who support prison reform or supermax reform don’t care about victims or correctional officers. Everyone wants law enforcement to be protected, and everyone wants victims to be fully supported and helped. We should not assume to know who the victims are and how they feel about an issue. Many victims are involved in prison reform, and unfortunately, many, many victims eventually do become prisoners. (A famous victim advocate is actually listed as supporting the Tamms reform.) But that is beside the point.
The men at Tamms were all sentenced for their crimes and their punishment is prison. No one is taking that away. But, the purpose of Tamms was to be a short-term shocker for people who did violent crimes while in regular prisons. It was not thought that people should be there long-term because they could not endure the damaging physiological effect. (That is why prisoners of war are not allowed to be kept in long-term isolation according to Geneva Conventions. After all, we don’t want that done to our soldiers because they can’t endure it either.) It is hard for people to make the leap that this the wrong way to treat people, simply because it doesn’t “seem” like pain. Just like Rich said, Tamms looks cleaner than the other prisons.
But withholding human contact is a punishment so extreme that a judge said about the Pelican Bay supermax that it “hovers on the edge of what is humanely tolerable.” It may be futile to try to persuade people about this because it is complex….and it’s Friday. But, it is important to know that this kind of treatment is a historical anomaly and a serious wrong direction.
I understand that it is hard for people not to be calloused and flippant about how prisoners are treated, but good, fair and humane policies are good for everyone and actually improve behavior. Isolation worsens it. Most prisoners get out, and so will the men at Tamms.
There have always been ways to keep violent people secure-like the 1000s of segregation cells in Illinois prisons. Or the way we keep criminally mentally ill people. There is no evidence to support the claim that guards or prisoners in Illinois are safer because of the supermax. The gang problems in Illinois prisons, and how we overcame them, is another story altogether….
Anyway, please read the articles I recommended on this.They are not all properly placed. In fact, Randle is transferring many of them right off the top. They do not all fit the profile that some of the commenters insist on.
Here is a timeline to see how recent this correctional approach is:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5579901
- Tobor - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 9:05 pm:
24 lock down is the answer.
- steve schnorf - Friday, Sep 18, 09 @ 11:12 pm:
there’s a reason the prisoners are there and not somewhere else. As long as they are not being physically tortured, Tamms has a purpose. I like the sounds of some of the Director’s proposed reforms.
- Segatari - Saturday, Sep 19, 09 @ 12:26 am:
You want a good article on the Tamms prison? Reread this one by Dusty Rhodes of the Illinois Times a few months ago –
http://www.illinoistimes.com/Springfield/article-6047-tougher-than-guantanamo.html
- Okay Then... - Saturday, Sep 19, 09 @ 11:41 am:
“The job of the IDOC however is to provide justice and rehabilitations.” Moby
Neither of those are the job of the IDOC. Justice is handled by a judge and/or the jury, prosecutors and defense counsel. In other words, the justice part (really) comes into play BEFORE someone goes to prison.
Rehabilitation of convicted criminals is the responseibility of the convicted criminal. Services, such as GED programs or health programs, are provided by IDOC and the convicted criminal elects to utilize those services or not of his or her own accord.
All convicted criminals serving prison time should be afforded the ability to serve their time without incident. By not removing the problematic element from the general prison populations, other inmates will be put into harms way and possibly denied their rights, which has happened. For examples inmates have been injured or killed by other inmates. Of course as has been mentioned repeatedly throughout this discussion, the safety of prison personnel is always of extreme importance. It is true that they accepted the job knowing that there are some risks involved, but that doesn’t mean that they should be forced to work under threatening conditions, with no recourse, when alternatives can be sought to minimize the threats that they face.
Tamms is a perfectly reasonable solution to minimizing the threat that violent convicted criminals pose to themselves and others who work or live around them.
- moby - Saturday, Sep 19, 09 @ 12:48 pm:
to OKThen:
When I spoke of “justice”, I meant the fair distribution of whatever penalty is meted out by the court. But note the following IDOC mission statement: “The mission of the Department of Corrections is to protect the public from criminal offenders through a system of incarceration and supervision which securely segregates offenders from society, assures offenders of their constitutional rights and maintains programs to enhance the success of offenders’ reentry into society.” Does Tamms enhance reentry prospects? The answer is no, though IDOC will argue otherwise. The mission statement does not include vengeance, retribution, or even restitution to the victim. For 200 years, U.S. corrections did perfectly well w/o the supermax. There is no evidence — I have done my homework and I can show you why it is true — that supermax prisons protect guards, other prisoners or the general public. But even if they did, I would maintain that the evidence is overwhelming that LONG-TERM solitary confinement is psychologically and physically injurious and must be stopped
- Bulldog - Saturday, Sep 19, 09 @ 3:40 pm:
Here’s another good piece about Tamms, from 2009. SuperMax prisons are, by definition, cruel and unusual. They are a poor substitute for proper mental health services. http://www.riverfronttimes.com/2000-02-16/news/cruel-and-usual
- Bulldog - Saturday, Sep 19, 09 @ 3:41 pm:
Oops, I meant 2000.
- truthteller - Sunday, Sep 20, 09 @ 5:55 am:
Shame on you, Rich. Actually visiting prisons. Reporting on the verdict in the trial, not merely publishing the sensational charges.Your insistence on the facts is what distinguishes you from the Trib and other news outlets which seek the “truth” and rarely let the facts get in their way.
- George Pawlaczyk - Sunday, Sep 27, 09 @ 11:09 am:
Just for the record, our series “Trapped In Tamms” was NOT prompted by a lawsuit filed by inmate Anthony Gay. At the time the series was being written, I was unaware of Mr. Gay’s lawsuit against former prison psychiatrist Dr. Rakesh Chandra. As we reported, the series was prompted by a telephone call from a woman in Belleville whose son is held at Tamms. — George Pawlaczyk, reporter, Belleville News-Democrat