Much training for correctional officers fosters an ‘us versus them’ philosophy. That causes them to see their job as a war zone where violence is the norm The guard-on-inmate violence that makes it to the news – an inmate in a wheelchair thrown down the stairs,women in Rikers who allege rampant sexual abuse – is just a fraction of the violence that happens in prisons daily. And it’s not just a few bad apples among a mostly do-gooder group: most prisons and jails foster violence because it is their main form of control.
I’ve reported at several California prisons and heard stories of correctional officers who flood a cell with tear gas to force an inmate to emerge, food intentionally thrown on the floor to compose it unappetizing and cell extractions where inmates are forcefully tackled and removed from their cells. (To be honest, and inmates also attack officers and each other with weapons and feces,so the violence is on all sides.)Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com