The trip to federal prison from court to your new bed (2004)

http://www.prisontalk.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-48879.html

by omnibrain • 12 years ago

108 43 12 years ago

ufmace4• 12 years ago

I've been watching Orange is the new Black lately, and the Con-Air scene was pretty similar to their description. Sounds like it's true that you really don't want to use the bathroom there, doubly so if you're a girl. And that they really don't want to take your cuffs off for any reason. And the guards all act like everybody there is planning to pull a Con-Air movie style hijacking, and so will not tell you anything or talk in any way that isn't strictly required.

dobbsbob• 12 years ago

One punishment BOP uses is Con-air for weeks at a time or "diesel therapy". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diesel_therapy

CIA Whistleblower John Kiriakou was threatened with permanent con-air for complaining to the press about prison conditions. https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/1018653-john-kiriako...

Living shackled on a plane or bus transferred from prison to prison for years sounds like a nightmare

darksim905• 12 years ago

That sounds very brutal in it's own right. Does it actually accomplish anything other than wasting our tax paying money, though?

kefka• 12 years ago

It's a great way to have unaccountable torture.

Is that what you are asking?

ufmace4• 12 years ago

Going by the letter he linked, it sounds like it would make it much harder for the prisoner to contact and interact with lawyers, family, etc. You normally can't sent or receive letters or phone calls while in transit, since it would be a pain to organize and transit is normally short. If they could keep somebody perpetually in transit, though, he would tend to be isolated.

On the other hand, this sounds like a higher-profile prisoner with access to good legal representation. I would think that, if they actually tried to do that, the prisoners' lawyer would figure it out eventually, and a court would most likely take a dim view of such a practice.

I'm not sure if they've ever actually done that, though. It sounds like they might have kept some problem inmates tied up in pointless transit maybe for a week or three. Doing it perpetually sounded more like speculation than something they've actually done, or could realistically pull off.

bdcravens• 12 years ago

While a prisoner is being moved from one facility to the next, it's a sneaky way of reducing prison overcrowding, on paper at least.

coldtea4• 12 years ago

How's that not a "cruel and unusual punishment"?

Not that they would care, or that the constitution means anything to them...

kashkhan• 12 years ago

It's awful that such a medieval correction system exists in any civilization.

spacemanmatt2• 12 years ago

-correction

vacri• 12 years ago

While it is awful, it's weird to see a system that uses shotguns, cargo aircraft, and a centralised distribution network (spanning a continent) described as 'medieval'.

archildress• 12 years ago

Really intrigued by the community this links to. I guess there is a bulletin board for everything.

pigDisgusting• 12 years ago

...or perhaps it's an astro-turfed propaganda campaign inspired by "scared straight" programs.</tinfoil-hat> But still, don't take everything posted on the internet at face value.

chatmasta• 12 years ago

That is seriously medieval. I cannot believe that people in 21st century western civilization are subjected to this sort of torture, by the hands of private contractors no less.

The emphasis on retribution over rehabilitation is a serious problem in modern society. Unfortunately the victims of an often over zealous justice system are granted a severely muted and underrepresented voice. The people most motivated to change the system are unable to do so. I'm glad that a forum like Prisontalk exists to give them some semblance of a voice. It seems like if this system is going to change, somebody else is going to have to step up to the plate and take charge of changing it. Hopefully the internet will help to disseminate stories like this to the public and motivate people to push for change in what is a seriously backwards prison system.

America should be ashamed.

Edit: I post a lot of unpopular opinions... I sure didn't expect this one to get downvoted!

skwirl4• 12 years ago

Did I miss a paragraph in there that involved torture? What specifically are you referring to?

zorpner• 12 years ago

Try to define torture in an abstract way that includes the things you think of as torture (whips, the rack, waterboarding, cramped isolation, et cetera) and excludes this. You won't find it easy.

barce• 12 years ago

The part where they don't help you use the bathroom and you defecate on yourself in a con-air. This is both cruel and unusual, and a psychological pain.

coldtea4• 12 years ago

In modern western democracries like Sweden etc, the conditions under which they transfer people as described in the post, is like the mafia operates, not an actual civil service, like law enforcement.

curun1r• 12 years ago

The emphasis on retribution over rehabilitation is a serious problem in modern society.

This is by design. That type of incarceration leads to more recidivism. We have a for-profit prison industry that wields a lot of political clout. When those driving policy have a financial interest increasing the number of prisoners, policies like mandatory minimums, voting suppression, the war on drugs and the traumatizing experience that you observed look less like problems and more like conscious decisions designed to increase profits.

spiritplumber2• 12 years ago

Retribution should happen quickly -- do hell a hell week / hell month for prisons, too. Once everyone got that out of their system, focus on rehabilitation. Best if done in separate facilities, too, that way prisoners that passed the retribution hurdle have an incentive to be rehabilitated.

I guess if you want to go full 1980s movie, you could do something like Thunderdome in the first sort of facilities.

ufmace4• 12 years ago

What gives you the idea that any of the people involved in this are private contractors? This is for Federal prison, and as far as I can tell, everybody involved in it is an employee of the Federal Bureau of Prisons or the Marshalls.

And calling it torture strikes me as ridiculously over the top. But then, I've come to think lately that the word torture isn't very useful at all. The only real use is to allow people to make inflammatory claims that compare some practice of the prison system to racks and thumbscrews. If you object to a specific practice, call out that practice explicitly. If it's actually unnecessarily bad, then no inflammatory rhetoric is required to get people to object. Suggest something more reasonable to accomplish the same goal instead. Making vague claims of torture makes me think that you're reaching in an attempt to make something sound worse than it is.

judk2• 12 years ago

Is there a website where I can pop in a URL and get the page rendered with word wrapping and line length less than 1000 pixels?

Readability as a service?

ceejayoz2• 12 years ago

Option 1. https://www.readability.com/bookmarklets

Option 2. Resize your browser window.

judk2• 12 years ago

These options are not available on mobile devices.

zaroth• 12 years ago

Apparently having a page like this in your browser history is great for prosecutors looking to establish mens rea (criminal intent).

[1] https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2014/07/web_activity_...

ianbicking• 12 years ago

They referred to some prisoners being "blackboxed"... any definition of that?

paulirish• 12 years ago

I believe hands are cuffed and retained inside a black (plastic?) box so you really can't do anything with them.

ben1040• 12 years ago

It means their handcuffs are fitted with one of these covers:

http://www.handcuffwarehouse.com/cs5thmoblbox.html

It covers the key holes to prevent tampering attempts, and it looks like it'd also increase the rigidity of the handcuffs (versus just the chain), further restricting movement.

seesomesense• 12 years ago

They kill, rape, torture children and women and then complain that they are transported in high security conditions ?

Wow.

tsaoutourpants• 12 years ago

Not everyone in federal prison is a rapist/killer. Half are there on drug offenses.

coldtea4• 12 years ago

You might end up in a prison at any time.

It could be just from a misunderstanding and wrongful targeting -- like it has happening to tons of people, including "respectable white people".

Or you could have a party and one of your friends has some marijuana in his pocket and you all end up in jail.

Or you could fall behind your taxes or whatever.

The idea that all prisoners are killers and rapists shows one has absolutely no idea about prisons and probably society in general.

spiritplumber2• 12 years ago

Pretty much this... and it's been a common problem through the ages; even That Jesus treats being in prison as something that can happen to people, rather than something they deserve.

In my case, any serious attempt to jail me unjustly would eventually bankrupt the state just from having to keep patching holes in jail, but even so, we need something better than "oh, you have the <criminal> tag in your life? Consider all good things over".

mickeyr• 12 years ago

Rape & Murder are generally state crimes. The majority of federal inmates are there on drug charges.

The trip to federal prison from court to your new bed (2004)

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