by Rachael Creger
In
our nation, there are close to 2.3 million inmates incarcerated at any time.
And of these 2.3 million, over 200,000 are sexually abused annually. In 2003,
under President Bush, Congress passed the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA).
Six years later, President Obama issued these much-needed standards (Kaiser).
One may wonder if this act will really stop this immense issue our nation is
facing. The United State’s Office of Justice Programs’ Bureau of Justice Statistics
continually surveys both prisoners and correctional workers on sexual violence
in their prisons. A Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) survey reports that
sexual violence in state and federal prisons rose 386% between 1980 and 1994.
And in 1995, 6% of previously incarcerated prisoners reported experiencing some
type of sexual violence during their sentence (Thomas). An article from CNN
titled “Study finds nearly 1 in 10 state prisoners is sexually abused while
incarcerated” reports that in 2009 the victimization rate of 9.6% was nearly
double what it was in 2008, and that female prisoners are victimized three
times more than men (“Study”). Because of the higher frequency of sex crimes
against female prisoners, I have chosen to focus my research on women. I also
saw the focus on women as fitting because we have been talking a lot about
women in terms of spirituality in our Ancient Mesopotamia unit.
Tom
Martin has worked in both male and female correctional facilities and wrote
about his experiences in these prisons in his book Behind Prison Walls. In his chapter on female inmates he explains,
“But even with experience and common sense, more male staff members are likely
to destroy their careers being compromised by female inmates than by being
physically hurt by them” (92). He continues on to explain the protocol the
officers would follow so they would never be left alone with one of the women
he calls manipulative or self-centered. Martin made it very clear that many of
the correctional staff watch each other’s backs to keep themselves out of any
risk of accusations. One may wonder why they have to take such precautions. An
article in the Journal of Urban Health
explains that inmate-on-inmate sexual violence is not only more prevalent in
women, but that it is much more prevalent than officer-on-inmate sexual
violence. Wolff and the other authors of this article conducted a survey of
6,964 men and 564 women in state prisons and found that more than 20% of women
admit to being a victim of sexual
violence; less than 5% of men admitted to being victims (835). Their surveys
also indicated that unwanted sexual contact is more prevalent than penetrative
rape or sodomy. I’ve included a table from their article that summarizes the
different types of sexual acts, consensual and non-consensual that occurs
statewide.
A table taken from Wolff's article in the Journal of Urban Health |
Their table is very informative in
summarizing a large amount of data. Although they have included many advanced
statistics principles that some readers may not fully understand, it clearly
demonstrates the higher occurrences of inmate-on-inmate sexual violence; and
also the higher rates in women than in men.
Joycelyn
Pollock, author of Sex and Supervision:
Guarding Male and Female Inmates used her research and surveys to cross
reference with what previous studies had concluded. In her first Appendix she
featured a chart of authors of previous studies, what they concluded and if her
research agreed or disagreed. I’ve included a reproduction of an excerpt of her
appendix’s section on behavior differences.
Author(s) of study
|
Finding
of study
|
Agree/Disagree?
|
Lindquist
|
More assaults among women
|
YES
|
McKerracher, Street and Segal
|
More acting out types of behaviors among women
|
MIXED
|
Lombroso, Thomas, Pollak, and Knopka
|
Women in prison more masculine
|
MIXED
|
Giallombardo, Tittle, Ward, and Kassebaum
|
Different needs fulfilled and manifested by male and
female homosexuality
|
YES
|
Van de Wormer
|
Masculinity related to homosexual involvement
|
YES
|
I found it very interesting that
our assigned viewing for this unit, “Shawshank Redemption” came up in Tom
Martin’s book. Martin believes that this movie is a poor representation of
correctional facility officers, but an accurate depiction of the sexual violence.
A small gang in his previous place of employment was referred to as “The
Sisters” just like in the movie. The real-life posse operated much like in the
movie. He defines them as “predatory homosexual rapists” (57). It will be interesting to see how this
movie parallels Martin’s accounts of dealing with this group in the
correctional facility he once worked in.
Overall
many different scholars have different things to say about this horrible
problem in our nation’s prison. And many surveys have come up with differing
results. We can only hope that with the enacting of the Prison Rape Elimination
Act, that these statistics will see a major reduction.
Works Cited
Kaiser, David
& Louisa Stannow. Prison Rape:
Obama’s Program to Stop It. N.p., Web. 23 Jan 2013.
Martin, Tom. Behind Prison Walls. Boulder: Paladin,
2003. Print.
Pollock, Joycelyn
M. Sex and Supervision: Guarding Male and
Female Inmates. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1986. Print.
“Study Finds
Nearly 1 in 10 State Prisoners is Sexually Abused While Incarcerated.” CNN, N.p., 17 May 2012. Web. 23 Jan
2013.
Thomas, Dorothy
Q. All Too Familiar: Sexual Abuse of
Women in U.S. State Prisons. New York: Human Rights Watch, 1996. Print.
Wolff, Nancy, et
al. “Sexual Violence inside Prisons: Rates of Victimization.” Journal of Urban Health 83.5 (2006):
835-48. Print.
Wolff, Nancy, et
al. “Six-month prevalence of sexual victimization in statewide correction
system.” 2006. JPEG.
This is a really interesting post. I always thought that officer violence on inmates was more common, especially in a women correctional facility but on the contrary, inmate to inmate violence is more common. I think that the federal laws passed will help these instances go down, but in the end, one can't stop the violence because inmates do have their own free will. Inmates usually don't have the best personalities and they usually will conflict with one another. That is why they are in the prison in the first place most likely.
ReplyDeleteRachael,
ReplyDeleteI really appreciated the amount of research you put into this blog post as well as the use of charts and tables as an alternative way to display your data. This helped make your points more clear to me. What concerned me about your post were the words of Tom Martin that described his work in a female correctional facility. He described women prisoners in a very one-sided, somewhat degrading way and I'm not sure if I would consider him as a reliable source. I understand that he has credibility as he has served in both types of prisons, but I think that he may have been biased towards his own gender.
However, I have not read this source as thoroughly as you, so please correct me if I am wrong. I really do admire this context post. Good job!