The rest of the story

I guess I am a little melancholy. My prison visit yesterday was actually one of the most enjoyable ones ever. It did not start out that way though.

I was to arrive at 10 am. I got caught behind an accident on the highway and did not arrive until 10:10, so they told me I was late and could not see her. Huh. That was not what I was expecting. I was expecting to have trouble with a different thing altogether. My client was in segregation -and thus, was sure we would only be able to have a no-contact visit. I do not believe in no-contact attorney-client visits, because it destroys attorney- client privilege. Plus it is just stupid. I needed to establish a rapport with her and that is dang near impossible to do via TV monitor. I had not driven 250 miles to do that.

I was all ready to have that fight. But I did not get it for some reason. Instead I got grief over being 10 minutes late. I did not have a stinking appointment at a certain time, and there was only one other couple there to visit, so this did not need to be a big deal. We managed to get past that and moved on to the next problem. The CO –who we will call Grumpy- had to log me into the computer and cross-check all these lists, etc, to let me in. She had my license and my bar card to work from, but evidently this is a much larger task than you would think. Even having my confirmation letter from the warden approving my visit was not helping. Finally she hit the jackpot and found me–under NINE different names. NINE. I was not aware I had nine aliases. Oddly enough, not a single one of them is my actual name under which I have entered every prison I have ever entered—somehow, there were NINE others. Some were even hyphenated–and I have never hyphenated my name in my life. It was very peculiar.

We got that settled and they decided that I could not take my notebook and pen into the visit. WTF? What kind of lawyer would I be if I did not write down everything that went on? That was the stupidest thing I ever heard. Officer Sticking his Nose where It Does not Belong said that my authorization from the warden’s office did not say I could take anything in, so I could not. I spent ten minutes explaining why that was stupid and convincing him to call the warden–who agreed it was stupid and said I could. That is what I thought.

Next big hurdle–the lockers. You are not allowed to take most things in, such as your car keys etc. Some facilities have lockers to put stuff in, some expect you to leave them in the car, some lockers require quarters and in some places you cannot bring money in to put in the lockers. Of course, this place had lockers that take quarters, and I did not bring any anyway. Ol Grumpy said I could put my keys in a locker and not lock it, if I was willing to take the risk. I was, so I did.

Then came what turned out to be Grumpy’s favorite part–the frisk of me. She was far more thorough than any frisk I have ever had–and I have had a few, thank you very much. That is all I have to say about that.

While I was waiting to be let into the visiting area, an older couple came in to see their daughter, or I assume it was their daughter. The man was well-dressed, the wife was in a sweat suit. Grumpy asked who they were visiting, and mom reeled off her inmate number. For some reason, that hit me hard. Why any parent should know their child’s inmate number like it was her birthday almost made me cry. That is no frame of mind to be in when I am headed in to be a bad ass attorney.

But that is what happened. Off I went to sit in the class cube to wait on my client. This gave me time to watch the other people visiting there. There were three different older men, waiting on their inmates to arrive. They all looked like successful confident people, all well-dressed, but seemed comfortable being there–it was not their first visits, I do not think. There was one woman that looked like a nun, as she sat with an inmate and read their bibles. There was a good mixture of white people, black people, Asians and hispanics—that is not something I have ever noticed before. The general population is about 60% African-American in all prisons, but I do not know if that number holds true in women’s prisons.

Finally, my client arrived. She has been there for almost a year and I was her first visitor. How bout that for sad? She is only 22 or 23, and she is going to be in this prison until she is 67, unless something intervenes. You would think that she would be miserable, but she is not. She would rather not be in prison, but she is happy–she has friends, and a “wife” and is not so different from me. She wasted all the money she started with in her commissary account on shoes and clothes, just like I did when I was a kid. She wants a TV so she does not have to watch A & E on her neighbor’s TV–I love A & E. We have even read some of the same books and other experiences

I had asked her to bring notes she made from her trial transcripts, but she did not. Great, I thought, she won’t have anything to contribute and then will feel like she was not a part of it. Man was I wrong. She was so on top of things and immediately pointed out most of the things that I wanted to talk to her about. That was a nice surprise.

We talked for almost four hours–90% about her case, then about what really happened, and about regular things like what she would do with her life if she could, where she think it all went wrong, which part she would change...I do not think that I have ever had a conversation like that with a client. Frankly, I do not normally want to hear all that. I do not need to know extra info, as I cannot use it in the case anyway and it quite often just confuses the issues for the client. This time, we just somehow ended up in this conversation where I learned some fascinating things. I wish I could tell it all, but obviously I cannot, so it is hard to explain how interesting it was to me.


While I enjoyed myself, I am sad about how one more kid is lost. If something does not change, this kid is going to be in prison for the rest of her life, never have a family, never make anything of herself–because she was a dumb girl who thought she was in love. She knows now, but what good does that do? Her mistakes started long before this one, but the were basic kid stuff that a lot of us did. For her, it was a vicious cycle where one mistake led to another, and little things like whether to stay broken up with a boyfriend let to one more disaster, when for me and you, all that meant was a nite crying and eating ice cream. How did we end up so different? I know I have done some dumb things that seemed to make sense at the time–but it sure never led to this kind of mess.

And while I am glad it is not me, I am still sad that it happens to anyone.

Document this- and an eye opener

That seems to be the theme at work right now--document document document. It is making me document everything in my life--as if it did not happen if there is not a photo of it. That is my big explanation for my post here that is probably going to be about nothing.

Check this out folks---first fill up in my car that was not obscene. I felt like I was robbing the place, but no one stopped me when I drove off, so I guess these gas prices are for real.
This is the now-hallowed WalMart where the Reduced Fat Ruffles reside. 277 miles from my house. I could drive 277 miles the other way and be in Nashville or Memphis, Tennessee. Heck, I could be in Tunica, Mississippi if I kept going. And it would not have taken as long as it would not have been on two-lane roads. It was totally worth it, though, since the big find was made.
This is what they look like. I took this pic to prove to myself that they were the right ones I had been hunting for so long. And then I ate them. So that puts me down a bag.
On another note, see my little bitty eyelashes on the outside of my eye there? I do not even think that length is measurable. Also, do you have any idea how hard it is to take pics of your own eyelashes without a macro lens? Damned hard. I better ask for a macro lens for Xmas just in case something like this happens again. And Good Lord, do I need lipo on my own eyelids. That is just sad.

This is sort of related to the eyelashes incident in that it falls into the really-stupid-stuff-
Paige-does category. While at the WalMart I bought the brown socks to wear with my khakis and brown shoes. I love brown socks. These were especially good socks.

I put them on this morning, put my turquoise crocs on to wear to the car where my brown shoes were in the back (under the Ruffles). Except guess what? Not so much. There was one brown shoe. Not two brown shoes. Now WTF was I going to do. Thank God I had my tennis shoes with me, which looked equally absurd, but at least were not turquoise.

In this process, I spilled something all over my pants. That is a normal day for me, and normally I would go on with my bidness like that, but not today when I had to have the big meeting at which I should not look like a friggin idiot. Good thing I had bought these other brown pants that are a weird knit material, so no zipper or buttons--but nice looking. I put them on, put my tennis shoes on and realized that the next step will be me stalking around the perimeter of a mall walking of a morning, wearing a metallic sweat suit.

Fast forward about 8 hours while I am driving home. This one is really good, you are going to love this. I am eating my chips and happy as I can be, and I have crumbs all over me, so I shook out my shirt. In so doing, I noticed that the front of my new brown pants looked funny, and my belly itched. You know why? This is so Paige, yet something even I have not done before. MY PANTS WERE ON BACKWARDS. All day. The tag was tickling my tummy, that is what itched. Had I not checked into that, I never would known. I had wondered why the pockets were all jacked up earlier, but hey they are Wal Mart pants, I figure you get what you pay for. No stupid, when you put your pants on backwards, the pockets point wrong too.

I almost crashed the car laughing at myself

This may not look strange-- and I guess it is not---except that it was hanging on the dumpster house at my hotel. Who are they talking to? Where are they being welcomed? To the dumpster? I just did not get it. I was willing to give them a little slack though since I had the Ruffles and was pretty dang happy. I still felt I should document it for you all
This is the town I was in. Middle of freaking nowhere.
This is the razor wire around the facility. Evidently it is the subject of much controversy in the area---they have to balance the community's concerns, but to trap children behind miles of wire that will shred them if they are touched is counter productive to the whole rehab idea.

Looks just like a regular prison to me, doesn't it you?


Even inside, it looked just like a prison, and it is a prison. It was just so odd to see such young children in there. This facility is for boys, and there are 251 of them there right now. Or there was at the beginning of the day--it was parole board day so a few were granted release this afternoon while we were there, which is a whole other topic I may rant about later.

I met with the superintendent, several psychiatrists, several other administrators, etc about the changes in the juvenile corrections system. It was very eye-opening for me. I was shocked by a lot of the information, so here I go telling it to you so you can be shocked too.

First, people think that juvenile corrections are like adult corrections. They are not, nor should they be. Juvenile offenders do not really have the same rights as adults, which also means they do not have the same protections. The pendulum tends to swing as time passes, regarding whether juvenile offenders are treated like criminals or not. Illinois now has changed how it runs its juvenile facilities---in theory, if not in practice. Now that the Department of Corrections is separate (so to speak) from the Department of Juvenile Justice, there are new rules for the department. A major one is that employees--even guards-- have to have a bachelor's degree. This does not mean that they have guards that meet that standard. They are not replacing the un-qualified with new people. It will be a gradual turnover

In depressed areas, which is where most prisons are these days, prison jobs are a hot commodity. People do not leave once they are in---and that means that it will take a super long time to get qualified people in these positions. There are 1200 jobs in juvenile justice in Illinois--and 11 are new hires that meet the requirements that have been put in place in the last few years. This may seem like an arbitrary line to draw, but there has to be a line somewhere, and many of the "old guard" have difficulty adjusting to the new day--the one where you cannot treat children like really short criminals, but have to take a different approach. This is one change that is designed to address that problem. At that rate though it will take forever, while countless children are sitting in there waiting for change.

Here is what I learned today. The recidivism rate for youth in Illinois is 83% for girls--I do not remember for boys. If the girls have gone through the substance abuse program offered, the rate of return is only 43%. For boys, the rate does not change based on whether they have had that treatment.

Interesting fact about juvenile sex offenders: contrary to their adult counterparts, the recidivism rate is only 3%, and quite often the subsequent offense is not a sexual one. I thought that was interesting, but it bears out what I have noticed about my own clients---juvenile sex offenders are not necessarily dangerous, but often just experimenting, or involved in consensual acts that are illegal due to the age of the parties, etc. Put them in prison and treat them like animals, and NOW you have a problem.

The psychiatrists told us that by far, the most common diagnosis is bi-polar disorder, then depression. There were very few actively psychotic children at this facility, which is good, I guess. They always have at least one on suicide watch and have had as many as 7 on suicide watch at once. Once a month, each child sees a psychiatrist, unless of course, something acute happens.

Of the 251 boys at this particular facility, 148 of them are sex offenders. According to the staff--100 of them have NO business in a correctional facility. The theory is that judges seem to think they will get better treatment in prison than in the community, so they send them there. The fact is that while they are trying, they have more open positions for mental health professionals than they have positions filled. Same for teachers--way understaffed, so that the prison offers only 3 hours of school a day for each boy. That is half what is required in the outside world. Why? No applicants for the positions--partly because the pay offered is less than public schools pay and the teachers have to work 12 months instead of the standard 9 that public teachers work.

What is interesting to me is how school impacts the prison population. Of 900 boys in the system that are in prison because of parole violations, only 100 were violated for committing another offense. 800 of them are technical violations--the most common of which is failure to go to school. So they send them back to prison where they only have school Part-time.

Isnt that crazy? And for this, what does it cost the tax payers? At this particular facility, $96,ooo a year per boy. The average cost for an adult inmate is closer to 25K a year. This means we are spending the money, but not providing the services--why? How does that happen?

Maybe the most disturbing thing I learned today is that there are 120 kids statewide who are eligible for release--done their time, or paroled--but have nowhere to go. Either they have no family, or their parents do not want them back, or the family has another child that precludes admission of the sex offender child back into their home-but in any event, they have nowhere to go. So there they stay. At 96K a year. Even if those in need of further drug treatment were sent to a private drug rehab facility, it would save up to 40K per kid per year than we are currently spending. There just are not available facilities to receive them.

There is next to no after care. Parole for juveniles is still handled by the Department of Corrections, which is not good. It is obviously being mishandled when 90% of the parole violators have only technical violations such as not calling in from a specific phone line, etc....there is a movement to start discharging kids from parole after 6 months of being clean (a year for sex offenders), but if that movement is as slow as the other changes, my grandchildren won't benefit from it.

The difference in dealing with children instead of adults is how much more room there is to help them--real reform, real treatment, real help can make a difference in a child. And somehow we are not getting that done, although the staff at this place seems to be very much on the ball and is embracing the changes. They were all very friendly with the kids, and seemed genuinely happy to be there. I also noticed how many women were in high positions there, which was interesting and absolutely not the case in Department of Corrections facilities.

It was very interesting, and there were a few things that really threw me, and of course, one incident that broke my heart, but mostly this was a very eye-opening experience. As we were leaving, a colleague from another office in our agency who got me involved in this stuff received a phone call from the capitol, advising her that the bill to require 17 year olds charged with misdemeanors to be handled as juveniles rather than adults, had just passed. That is a HUGE and important change, and there is no reason to think the governor won't sign it. One more baby step