penal system

Prisons fail their inmates

Most of the country’s prisons are ill-equipped to rehabilitate inmates. prepare them for release.

A pilot program, however, will create a mobile team of experts to prescribe treatments.

david mesa/la prensa

biding time: Overcrowding and an absence of professional guidance, including psychologists and social workers, finds inmates at the country’s prisons largely unchanged when they are released.1141882

Coming off last year’s 15-year record crime rates, the country’s prison populations are surging far above capacity, causing authorities to doubt the effectiveness of the penal system’s methods of rehabilitating inmates.

Director of Treatment and Rehabilitation for the Penitentiary System, Maritza Grifo, said the failure of the country’s prisons to release successfully rehabilitated inmates lies with two main problems: the lack of a well-organized interdisciplinary team of lawyers, psychologists, criminologists and social workers to provide support and stimuli for each convict; and the dearth of constructive activities, including education, sports and spiritual development. Without these key elements, the system returns criminals to society in much the same state that they entered.

Grifo explained that teams of specialists provide “the axis of the humanization” within an often oppressive atmosphere of privation and fear, and is what is the most crucial missing element in the penal system. In fact, in many prisons in developed countries, the technical staff prescribes each intern a course of treatment based on the individual’s psychological and physical diagnosis.

Then it is up to that same team to supervise the prisoner while they undergo the treatment and monitor behavior changes that signal progress within the rehabilitation process. In many cases, the professional team can even recommend that an inmate’s sentence be commuted or reduced. In other cases, the team decides to petition the court to allow the prisoner to study or work inside or outside the prison.

“Since prisons such as La Joya and La Joyita are divided into pavilions, they should have a technical meeting in each sector,” said Grifo. “But the reality is that there are only two psychologists, six social workers and a lawyer for a population of 3,010 inmates in La Joyita, for example.”

To fill this gap, penal system officials have organized a mobile team that, as of late January, that will be available to prisoners based on their need.

According to Griffin, the goal is to bring all of the prisons up to the level of performance found at El Renacer, a low-security facility, and the Women’s Rehabilitation Center.

“If these teams are not formed, little can be done, because the inmate ends up yielding to the prevailing criminal socialization process, i.e., learning criminal activities from hardened criminals,” she added.

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