JUSTICE WITHOUT BORDERS: THE PRESENCE AND ABSENCE
OF INTERNATIONALISM IN CRIMINAL JUSTICE
GRADUATE CURRICULA
Keith N. Haley
Tiffin University
Scott Blough
Tiffin University
Theodora E.D. Ene
University of Bucharest
Tiffin University
John D. Collins
Tiffin University
A paper presented at
the annual meeting of the
Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences
in Boston, Massachusetts
March 4 - 8, 2003
Paper and article are copyrighted. All rights pertain.
*Article below is an abbreviated version of the paper.
JUSTICE WITHOUT BORDERS: THE PRESENCE AND ABSENCE
OF INTERNATIONALISM IN CRIMINAL JUSTICE
GRADUATE CURRICULA
INTRODUCTION
By the close of 2002, just a glance at one of the nation’s major newspapers, a cable TV news show, or an active news website would reveal the prominence of international justice issues that affect America and its citizens. Some of the more conspicuous issues are the new International Court, extradition of fugitive criminals, legal and illegal immigration, overseas deployment of U.S. justice officials, Europe’s staunch resistance to the death penalty in the U.S., and the legion of national and international matters that relate to terrorism. Some of the most pressing issues have to do with adding additional border security personnel, tightening our lax immigration policies, beefing up airport security, coordinating national and international intelligence, and implementing a myriad of other security measures to protect our most vulnerable human and physical targets from terrorist attacks inside the U. S. and overseas.
The authority, jurisdictions, and assignments of our criminal justice agents have also changed, particularly for federal law enforcement officers. In Timisoara, Romania, for example, the Romanian Center for Fighting Drugs and Organized Crime recently joined the U.S. Secret Service in busting up an international credit card cloning operation (Pressreview.ro. 2003). Moreover, the FBI recently opened a field office in Bucharest. With Romania already approved for membership in NATO, these kinds of operations are likely to increase. Overseas deployment of federal agents, in fact, is much more common than it was several yeas ago. But local police officers are also deployed abroad. The New York City Police Department recently sent a senior counterterrorism expert to London to work on a ricin poison case (Rashbaum 2003).
Multi-national private prison systems are also common. Understanding the subtleties of another culture is paramount in providing high-quality criminal justice services in another nation. . A private U.S. prison firm recently got in hot water when it was discovered that its inclusion of the race of the inmate on a jail ID card was considered racist by many corrections officials in Canada (Brennan 2003). The private prison administrators had thought the procedure was standard procedure until the Canadian protest erupted.
Indeed local police agencies have taken on a much larger international role since September 11, 2001. A Dallas police officer, for example, was deployed with the FBI to look for Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan and western Pakistan. Some local police officers in Florida have also been appointed as federal officers to help the Immigration and Naturalization Service in controlling illegal immigration (citation). We, of course, have a plethora of situations where local state, and federal agents are working together in new ways to protect the homeland from members of international terrorist organizations. University police officers now serve on regional task forces with federal, state, and local police agents in an attempt to combat terrorism. (citation).
What is the appropriate role of the hundreds of criminal justice degree programs in the United States in promoting an understanding of internationalism and all of its attendant crime and justice related issues as it prepares criminal justice graduates to lead in a demonstrably smaller and more dangerous world? The universities and colleges of America have always been at the forefront of any major societal change as they were in the revolutions in industry, agriculture, and information technology. There is every reason to believe that the institutions of higher learning will play no less of a role in understanding international crime and justice issues that no longer can be ignored.
Engaging in relevant research that promotes an understanding of international justice issues and global interdependency is, of course, critical. But the mission and purpose of a many university curricula in criminal justice should also mandate that the problems and issues of international criminal justice be covered in the studies of criminal justice students, particularly in the curriculum of masters and doctoral programs where the new and current leaders of the field are being prepared.
Literature Review
The globalization of crime has long since resulted in courses in comparative justice system studies and international crime and justice, but they have not become standard fare in the majority of criminal justice curricula in the United States regardless of the calls for a more global approach to criminal justice and criminological research (Adler 1996). Terrell (1983) reported discouraging results of his study of comparative criminal justice courses in colleges as far back as 1983, finding that less than one-third of baccalaureate institutions offered a comparative criminal justice or related course while none of the community colleges did. Several years later a study showed that a little more than half of 128 criminal justice programs offered courses in comparative criminal justice (Esbensen and Blankenship 1989). This comes after the fall of the Berlin wall and the unleashing of freedom in Eastern European nations.
More than a decade later (Cordner, Dammar, and Horvath 2000) discovered equally dispiriting results when they found that only 58 (34%) of 169 criminal justice programs surveyed had some version of comparative or international justice courses in their curricula. This is remarkable in light of an increasingly global economy and the proliferation of international criminal justice issues. Now we live in a post September 11, 2001 world and the need for preparing criminal justice leaders and operations level agents, particularly at the graduate level, to fully understand international justice issues and practice is paramount.
On the other hand, we can be encouraged that the 40th Annual Meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences has delineated ” The Globalization of Crime and Justice” as its theme for the March 2003 gathering in Boston. An examination of the panel and roundtable presentation agendas contains scores of topics that relate to internationalism and global perspectives on crime and justice. Certainly the university faculty who prepared these papers for presentation in Boston will teach some of this content to their students in the classroom by means of lectures and seminar discussions.
METHODOLOGY
Objectives
The purpose of this study was to determine to what extent internationalism and related content were included in the graduate curricula of criminal justice programs in the United States and other select nations. The specific objectives of our study are below:
l. Review the criminal justice literature concerning the presence of internationalism in the graduate curricula of criminal justice majors.
2. Conduct a content analysis of criminal justice graduate curricula to determine the extent of the presence of internationalism and other program components that provide students with learning content and experiences that teach international justice issues and concepts.
3. Discuss the implications of our findings on the preparation of current and future leaders of criminal justice agencies and university programs awarding graduate degrees in criminal justice.
For the purposes of this study the presence of internationalism in a graduate curriculum would include any course title, curriculum content, or other learning activity that would allow students to transcend national boundaries and learn about the criminal justice agencies, personnel, and procedures of nations beyond the students’ home nation.
Selection of Criminal Justice Graduate Programs
From gradschools.com (a website that lists and describes nearly 54,000 graduate degree programs), the authors identified the curricula of 183 colleges and universities that offered a master's degree in criminal justice as declared in these four different degree nomenclatures:
1. Master of Criminal Justice - MCJ
2. Master of Science in Criminal Justice - M.S. in C. J.
3. Master of Arts in Criminal Justice - M.A. in C.J.
4. Other degrees that clearly focused on the graduate preparation of criminal justice agency professionals and teachers such as a Master of Science in Criminal Justice Administration.
We did not include in our study any master's degrees in Criminology since the specific focus of those degree programs is seldom, if at all, on the preparation of criminal justice leaders other than providing them with a general theoretical background for the most part.
The 183 colleges and universities with the graduate programs in criminal justice in the United States are divided into 8 regions of the nation. Those regions are listed below with their corresponding number of universities offering a graduate program in criminal justice.
Northeast (23)
South Central (21)
Middlestates (30)
Western Plains (20)
Midwestern (24)
Pacific (19)
Midsouth (27)
Southeast (19)
Two other separate categories of universities offering a graduate degree program in criminal justice are identified as Outside the United States (44 universities) and Distance Learning (19 universities). A number of the universities listed in one of the 8 regions of the United States also offer Distance Learning programs that award a graduate degree in criminal justice.
From the list of 183 graduate degree programs in criminal justice found on the website gradschools.com we selected the curricula of 56 graduate degree programs in criminal justice from each of the eight regions of the United States. We also selected 2 curricula from criminal justice graduate degree programs in Romania, the University of Bucharest and University of West in Timisoara because Tiffin University has worked under a USAID grant for the past four years to assist Romania in democratizing its criminal justice system and has been influential in the establishment, implementation, and instruction in graduate degree programs in criminal justice at the University of Bucharest and the University of West in Romania. The Master of Community Justice Administration degree program at the University of Bucharest degree has already graduated four classes of criminal justice leaders and while the graduates receive a degree from the University of Bucharest, they also receive a certificate from Tiffin University. One of the graduates in the first class was one of Romania’s nine Supreme Court Justices.
In total, 58 graduate curricula in criminal justice were selected for analysis to determine the presence of internationalism. In each of the 8 regions in the United States we tried to select curricula from a mix of public, private, large, and small universities.
For several reasons we did not include per se the curricula in doctoral programs in criminal justice. Certainly fewer criminal justice leaders would be in doctoral programs than master’s programs based on the relative paucity of PhD study opportunities and the likelihood that most criminal justice executives would choose a master’s degree program over doctoral study to enhance their management career. Moreover, master’s level courses are often taken by first year doctoral students anyway, and the higher level doctoral courses tend to be more theoretical, interdisciplinary, and research methods-based, indicating there is less opportunity to find courses or content on international issues and comparative criminal justice.
The Criminal Justice Master's Degree Internationalism Inventory
The authors created the Criminal Justice Master's Degree Internationalism Inventory (CJMDII) instrument in order to collect and analyze the data available in the list of curricula and other descriptive information found on the website of each of the universities and colleges offering a master's degree in criminal justice in one of the 4 degree nomenclatures mentioned above. The CJMDII instrument was then applied in a pretest examination of several of the master's degree programs in criminal justice in order to revise and refine variables and measurements found on the instrument. The CJMDII can be found in Appendix A.
RESULTS
Degree Programs in the United States
A total of 56 criminal justice master's degree curricula in the United States were examined for the presence of internationalism content. Forty-one (73.2%) of the universities in the study were public institutions; 15 (26.8%) were private universities or colleges. Eight (14.2%) of the universities in the study offered a Master of Criminal Justice degree (MCJ); 30 (53.6%) offered a Master of Science in Criminal Justice degree (MSCJ); 13 (23.2%) awarded a Master of Arts in Criminal Justice degree (MACJ); and 5 (9%) offered a Master of Criminal Justice Administration degree (MCJA) or a degree with the word "administration" in its title.
The Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, Southeast, and the Plains sections of the United States have criminal justice graduate programs with the most specific courses focusing on internationalism out of the 56 criminal justice master's programs in the United States included in this program. A total of 6 such courses were found in the each of the four sections. The Midwestern section of the United States contained the least number of specific courses focusing on internationalism with 3.
Table 1 below is a frequency distribution of the total number of specific courses focusing on internationalism identified in this study.
Table 1. Specific Courses Focusing on Internationalism
_____________________________________________________________
Course N
_____________________________________________________________
Comparative Criminal Justice 14
History and Philosophy of Criminal Justice 10
Terrorism 10
International Justice 5
Human Rights 1
Nation Specific 0
_____________________________________________________________
TOTAL 40
A total of 40 courses were found among the curricula of the 56 graduate programs in criminal justice in this study that had an internationalism focus. The most frequently occurring courses are Comparative Criminal Justice (14), History and Philosophy of Criminal Justice (10), and Terrorism (10). Unusual as it may seem, no Nation Specific courses, such as the British Criminal Justice System or the Police of Japan, were found in our study.
The potential for students to enroll in Special Topics Seminars and Independent/Directed Studies that could expose them to internationalism content is widely available in nearly all of the 56 United States colleges and universities in this study. This is not to say that this exposure actually happens but given the common practice of faculty and students determining the area of readings and study in this kind of academic opportunity, internationalism in some fashion could be explored.
Twenty-one (21) of the 56 master's degree programs in criminal justice in this study have opportunity for a practicum or internship experience that would allow students to study abroad. Only one of the institutions, however, Lynn University, specifically mentions the overseas internship opportunity and we can assume that most students in the other schools do not take a practicum or internship course that sends them abroad. Other evidences of internationalism content were only minimally available to master's students in criminal justice.
Table 2. Universities with Specific Courses on Terrorism
_____________________________________________________________
Northeast
University of Massachusetts Lowell
Northeastern University
Mid Atlantic
Villanova University
Mercyhurst College
St. Joseph's University
Mid South
Jacksonville State University
Mississippi College
University of Memphis
Plains
Wichita State University
Northern Arizona State University
_____________________________________________________________
In a post 9-11 world only (10) of the 56 United States universities in the study had specific courses in Terrorism. The Southeast, the Midwestern, the South Central, and the specific regions had no specific courses on Terrorism.
Degree Programs Abroad
The master's programs in the area of criminal justice in Romania were included in this study for a number of reasons. First, the master's programs at the University of Bucharest (UB) and the University of West (UW) in Timisoara are the first of their kind in Romania and in the former communist nations of Eastern Europe. The older of the two is the Master of Community Justice Administration (MCJA) degree program at the University of Bucharest, beginning in 1999. The Master of Social Reinsertion and Supervision Services (MSRSS) at the University of West in Timisoara focuses on juvenile and community corrections, but was modeled after the University of Bucharest program. It has a strong probation services emphasis.
Table 3 below identifies the courses in each of the two graduate programs in Romania.
Table 3. Curricula of Romanian Master's in
Community Justice Programs
_____________________________________________________________
University of Bucharest (12) University of West (9)
_____________________________________________________________
Issues and Trends in Community Social Policy
Justice Administration Alternatives to Custodial
Social Policy: Crime Prevention Sentences
And Control Issues and Trends in
Criminology: Forms and Trends in Community Justice
Victim Protection Administration
Alternatives to Prison: The Probation Victims Protection
System Management of Community
Legal and Moral Aspects in Crime Actions
Control: Preservation of Human Rights Scientific Research Methods
Management of Community Justice Current Social Problems
Administration Agencies Restorative Justice Principles
Data Sources and Statistics in Practicum
Criminal Justice
Applied Social Psychology
Research Methods in Criminology
Social Problems and Community
Development
Proseminar
Master Paper
_____________________________________________________________
Beginning in 1999, The University of Bucharest's MCJA degree is the older of the two criminal justice programs in Romania and it has graduated four classes of students (84 students) who received a Master of Community Justice Administration degree. The master's program at the University of West in Timisoara began in the fall of 2002 and has not had any graduates yet. The MCJA program at the University of Bucharest has 12 required courses in the curriculum while the program in Timisoara has 9.
While course titles may vary somewhat, the two universities have six near identical courses: Issues and Trends in Community Justice Administration; Social Policy; Alternatives to Prison; Management of Community Justice Administrative Agencies; Research Methods; Social Problems. The faculty at the University of Bucharest and Tiffin University consulted with the University of West in the development of its master's program. The master's programs at both universities are in similar academic units: the MCJA program at the University of Bucharest is in the School of Sociology and Social Work. The MSRSS program at the University of West is in the School of Social Work.
The University of Bucharest. The University of Bucharest's graduate program in criminal justice clearly has an international focus. First, it was developed in close cooperation with several of the faculty at Tiffin University and with criminal justice executives in the state of Ohio.
One of the courses that is taught in the program is a five-day course on the American Criminal Justice System, and more recently the Glencoe/McGraw-Hill book Introduction to Criminal Justice. 3rd. edition by Robert Bohm and Keith Haley has been translated into Romanian by one of the co-authors of this paper, Professor Theodora Ene from the University of Bucharest, and published under the title of Justicia Penala; O Viziune Asupra Modelului American, 2002, by the publisher Editura Expert. This book will be used in the Proseminar requirement and other courses in the master's program at UB. This requirement clearly demonstrates the commitment of the UB faculty to a program that indeed has an international focus. While we would classify this course as a Nation Specific entry on the Criminal Justice Master's Degree Internationalism Inventory, the Tiffin University faculty know from experience that other nations' justice systems are also discussed in the program, particularly since Romania is on schedule to enter NATO soon and the European Union in 2007.
By means of the Proseminar credit and the Master Paper students from the UB master's program have also come to the United States and completed internships in Chicago, Denver, Columbus, Cleveland, and other cities. This experience has allowed them to gain first-hand knowledge of the American criminal justice system. UB faculty have also come to Ohio to join in teaching classes, develop curriculum, and tour criminal and juvenile justice agencies.
University of West. The MSRSS program in Timisoara is in its first year of operation. The opportunity to study internationalism content appears to be less than what is available at the University of Bucharest. The University of West is both a newer and smaller university, so it has fewer resources to devote to any academic program. The faculty there also have a strong interest in juvenile justice and probation services in their particular region of the nation and have actually joined with a private NGO, St. Peter's and Paul's Humanitarian Society, and Tiffin University to open the first private juvenile probation center in Romania. Probation in general has only been widely available over the last several years in Romania. Some of the faculty at the University of the West have also visited Ohio, attended classes, and toured many of the state and local justice agencies. Naturally, much of that knowledge of the American criminal justice system will be passed on to their students in the MSRSS program.
Finally, Romania has been free of a dictatorial political regime and repressive police system for a little more than a decade. She is to be commended for the commitment and actions the nation has taken to demilitarize and democratize her criminal justice system. But as President George Bush alluded to in his speech in Revolutionary Square in Bucharest in 2002, on the occasion of Romania being invited into NATO, the Romanians no best the value of freedom, having recently overthrown her repressive political system. Without question we know that Romania will continue to study the justice systems of other nations and combine the good ideas and practices there with the many commendable features of its own current approach to controlling crime in a free society. Criminal justice education will continue to be a popular and relevant area of study in the nation's graduate programs.
Interesting and Unique Features of U.S. CJ Master's Degree Programs
The authors discovered a number of interesting features of the master's programs in criminal justice included in this study.
We found, for example, that not only were there courses in terrorism at 10 of the 56 universities but also that some of the courses have a particular emphasis such as the Domestic Terrorism and National Security course at Villanova. Other unique courses were found such as the World Indigenous Peoples and Justice course at Northern Arizona State University. At Boise State University the Governor of Idaho comes each semester and teaches a seminar on Legislative Policy.
St. Joseph's University has 6 different content tracks in its M.S. in Criminal Justice degree program: Police Executive; Federal Law Enforcement; Law Enforcement Intelligence and Crime Analysis; Behavior Management and Justice; Probation, Parole, and Corrections; and Criminology. The University of South Carolina trains Russian police. Eastern Kentucky University's Justice Training Center has students from other nations. Finally, Tiffin University helps prepare Romania's justice officials for their careers in a degree program at the University of Bucharest.
DISCUSSION
Our study examined 56 master's degree programs in criminal justice in the United States and two master's programs in Romania. This number represents a little more than one third of the master's degrees in the area of criminal justice found on gradschools.com. While our selection process was not entirely random, we did look at programs from all 8 regions of the United States, including both public and private universities. We might add that some of the universities websites made it very difficult if not nearly impossible to find the master's degree curricula we wanted to analyze. Our findings demonstrate that internationalism is found in the curricula and other program activities of the universities in the study, but it is not widely available and it is not substantial in most cases.
The Presence and Absence of Internationalism
It is incredible in a post 9-11 period to see that only 10 (18%) of the 56 universities and colleges in the study offer specific course titles including the term terrorism. We are now engaged in a world-wide effort to root out and eliminate terrorist threats to the United States and other nations and we have created an enormous new government agency to protect our homeland from terrorism. Our graduate programs in criminal justice have not responded in kind by having their graduate students study terrorism or comparative criminal justice to any large degree.
Only 14 (25%) of the programs in our study offered a comparative criminal justice course at the graduate level. While 10 (18%) of the graduate programs in criminal justice had a History and Philosophy of Criminal Justice course in their curriculum, it is not clear as to how many of these courses would contain specific content addressing international justice issues. Special topics seminars, directed studies and readings were far less available than other opportunities to study internationalism. A practicum experience was found in 10 (18%) of the master's programs. Still there is no clear indication that an opportunity exists for a practicum or internship experience abroad in all but a few of the master's programs in criminal justice.
The Politics and Practice of Curriculum Development
Courses often arrive in any curriculum by a circuitous route. To be sure there are essential standard courses that have to be offered such as a research methods or statistics, for example. Curriculum integrity and professional practice demand an understanding in such content areas as these. But much of what becomes a course entry in a curriculum is a product of the interests and anomalies of the faculty. This phenomenon has resulted in some of the most interesting and forward-looking curricula possible at any level of education. On the other hand, only creative and bold faculty are able to work against the grain of standard and often near extinct course titles. Curriculum means courses, courses mean staffing, staffing means faculty, and faculty cost money. If courses are considered outside the mainstream relative to the core values and concepts of any degree program, the faculty who advocate them will have to fight to have them included in a required curriculum. Obviously many of the interesting and avant-garde entries we found in our study were courses that creative and persistent faculty promoted to have included in the required master's of criminal justice curriculum. Acknowledging that most master's degree programs are completed in approximately one year, there is not much room for elective courses and it is likely that internationalism content would come up short in competition for a slot in a one-year degree program. But indeed it would seem that the vast majority of criminal justice graduate faculty have not grasped the need to address internationalism in their master's degree programs.
What are some of the reasons why faculty have not taken up this cause to teach internationalism content? We can only surmise. Criminal justice problems at home are concern enough in a one or two-year master's degree program. There simply may not be enough "vacant" space in a curriculum to study internationalism when all of the content from other competing areas is considered. Faculty often teach courses in content areas where they are experts as a result of their research interests. To be expert in the criminal justice issues of one or more nations abroad, for example, is difficult. It involves regular trips abroad and often a second language capability. That may be more than most faculty are willing or able to do given their particular circumstances. That is what our study's results would seem to indicate. The interest in internationalism as it relates to criminal justice is not widespread.
The Private School's Prerogative
While it seems that the concern for internationalism is neglected in all of the criminal justice master's degree programs in our study, private universities and colleges paid more attention to internationalism than their public counterparts. Private college and universities, as a rule, have less state governing board oversight. They are usually granted more freedom to offer curricula and degree programs of their choice and avoid successive rings of review ending at the level of the state controlling board. St. Joseph's, Villanova, Lynn, Mercyhurst, and Northeastern all have curriculum and other learning experiences with more concern for internationalism content than what is generally found in public colleges and universities. Standardized or limited curriculum content at the baccalaureate and master's degree levels is much more prevalent in public universities than in private institutions. Moreover, private universities not only have more latitude in offering courses they choose, but in many respects they believe that their academic programs and curricula have to be more attractive, convenient, and competitive in order to draw in students at the higher tuition rates.
Classic Provincialism
The United States is the only super power in the world today after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1980's. In the minds of many, the nation remains the beacon of liberty for the rest of the world and despite the current state of the economy, the standard of living is still one of the highest on the planet. All of this is to say that it is easy to consider the rest of the world as less important to study than the problems and issues that call out for solution at home. Our study indicates that concerns over the management and operations of local criminal justice dominate the learning content of master's degree programs in criminal justice with relatively little room left in the curriculum to study internationalism.
But this has been a criticism of the American university education for decades. In contrast, universities in other parts of the world offer degree programs and curriculum offerings that are much more international in their scope. The MCJA program at the University of Bucharest is a case in point with its Proseminar in the American justice system, the opportunity for an internship in the United States, and the university's desire to translate American criminal justice literature into Romanian.
Recommendations
We recommend that more internationalism content be included in master's degree programs in criminal justice. In large universities with extensive course offerings, criminal justice faculty could use the elective option to steer students to courses in other departments and colleges that would expose them to internationalism content.
A second option would be to require a minimum second language capability that would enroll students in language and culture courses of another nation. Even if this requirement would extend students' studies for an extra semester, the feature may attract additional students.
An internship abroad of one month or longer would be a very attractive addition to a master's degree program in criminal justice. This could be done in the summer and even for students already working in criminal justice the requirement could be accomplished through the use of vacation time. Students who have completed internships abroad often consider them to be a highlight of their academic career.
Government funding agencies and universities should make more resources available for criminal justice faculty to study abroad. If realized, then faculty would naturally develop stronger interest in international justice issues. Moreover, they would also establish contacts and friendships with faculty abroad and out of this process many edifying educational experiences are likely to develop where students and faculty are the beneficiaries.
Finally, a standardized course in International Issues in Criminal Justice, complete with instructional materials, ought to be developed by a team of criminal justice faculty from across the nation and from other countries that are cognizant of and experienced in international criminal justice issues. At this point in time, the standard Comparative Criminal Justice course is no longer sufficient in breadth to prepare graduate students who are or will soon be leaders of criminal justice agencies.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
International criminal justice issues are now common items of discussion in criminal justice practice. Illegal immigration, foreign terrorists on U.S soil, extradition of transnational criminals, and the deployment of large numbers of American justice agents abroad are some of the more prominent issues. When any set of economic, political, and social problems approach criticality, the colleges and universities of America have taken a leadership role in helping to resolve them. We should expect no less from our higher education institutions in understanding and resolving international justice issues.
The results of this study show, however, that master's degree programs in criminal justice throughout the nation do not include in their curriculum content or other sponsored learning experiences a lot of opportunities to study internationalism and its ramifications in controlling crime and preserving liberty. In fact, aside from a paucity of courses on Comparative Criminal Justice, History and Philosophy of Criminal Justice, and some courses on Terrorism, the public and private universities in every region of the United States provide far too few chances for master's degree graduates to prepare for a leadership role in criminal justice where international justice issues pervade the pubic agenda. But that should be changing in a post 9-11 world. The Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences theme of "The Globalization of Crime and Justice" for its 2003 annual meeting is indeed a stark recognition of the need to see the world of criminal justice as one that transcends national borders.
The master's programs in the area of criminal justice in Romania are including courses and experiences that allow their students and faculty to study internationalism.
The authors of this study recommend several means to increase the amount of internationalism in master's degree programs in criminal justice. Those recommendations include selective use of the elective option to expose students to internationalism content; requiring a minimum amount of foreign language study; internships and practicum experiences abroad; increased funding for criminal justice faculty who wish to study abroad; and the development by faculty and practitioner experts of a standardized course on International Issues in Criminal Justice.
We would be remiss if we did also not call for a closer examination of the criminal justice curricula at all levels of education in order to determine the need and deficiencies as they relate to the study of internationalism in criminal justice degree programs. We suspect there is much to learn by more research in this area.
One more tragic event of the magnitude of the destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, and the murder of thousands of innocent people would catapult the issue of internationalism to the top of the public agenda in America's universities and colleges. Let's hope and pray that criminal justice faculty and practitioners of America will not need that kind of motivation to stimulate an increased interest in internationalism that has heretofore been only peripheral.
Appendix A
CRIMINAL JUSTICE MASTER'S DEGREE INTERNATIONALISM INVENTORY
UNIVERSITY ___________________ PUBLIC ___ PRIVATE ___
REGION ______ STATE _____ NATION ______ DATE ______
DEGREE MCJ ____ MSCJ ____ MACJ ____ MCJA _____
I. SPECIFIC COURSES FOCUSING ON INTERNATIONALISM
COMPARATIVE CJ ___ INTERNATIONAL JUSTICE ___
HUMAN RIGHTS ___ NATION SPECIFIC ___ TERRORISM ___
HISTORY AND PHILOSOPHY OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE ___
II. OTHER CURRICULUM ENTRIES RE INTERNATIONALISM
SPECIAL TOPICS SEMINAR ___
INDEPENDENT/DIRECTED STUDY ___
III. OTHER EVIDENCE OF INTERNATIONALISM CONTENT
INTERNATIONAL PRACTICUM OR INTERNSHIP ___
OVERSEAS SPONSORED DEGREE OR TRAIING PROGRAM ___
OVERSEAS FACULTY CONSULTING/TEACHING ___
IV. SPECIAL FEATURES AND NOTES
Monday, November 27, 2006
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
VIRTUAL CORRECTIONS: A CONTENT ANALYSIS OF STATE CORRECTIONS DEPARTMENT HOME PAGES
VIRTUAL CORRECTIONS: A CONTENT ANALYSIS OF STATE CORRECTIONS DEPARTMENT HOME PAGES
Keith N. Haley
John D. Collins, Ed.D.
*Article is also a paper presented at the 2000 Annual Meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences in New Orleans, LA
Paper is copyrighted. All rights pertain.
INTRODUCTION
If there was any doubt left that the "Dot-Com" society had arrived, the holiday shopping season of 1999 removed it. The planet and much of its activity has moved to the World Wide Web. We buy books, read newspapers, find houses, identify neighborhood sex offenders, locate jobs, find employees, listen to CD's and radio stations, watch news and movies, take education and training courses, store data files for the road, and then there are all of those pornography sites. Who knows what goes on there? We, of course, communicate asynchronously around the globe by email, with many people having several email addresses. Time magazine topped off this affirmation of a World Wide Web (WWW) revolution by naming Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon.com, the magazine's man of the year for pioneering Internet retailing (Lohr, 1999). Did you know that there is even a man who has decided to spend the entire year online inside of a house in Dallas? He wants to demonstrate that it can be done, depending only on e-commerce to supply him with groceries, furniture, entertainment, etc. (Associated Press, 2000)? He is known as the Dot Com Guy and you can monitor him at where else but http://www.dotcomguy.com/
The list of human activities associated with the WWW is indeed endless and unfathomable since new services and types of commerce are added on a daily basis. Businesses can have the capability, if they wish, to instantaneously deliver information to the parts of their organizations that need it (Gates, 1999). In my own case, I am at last disposing of my dictionary, thesaurus, book of quotes, and other reference books for writing that clutter my desk since all of them and many more are available on the WWW at no charge. Even the entire Encyclopedia Britannica is finally online and operating as a portal for news and information. Not all, of course, see this passion for instant and up-to-date information as entirely desirable if it means we become slaves to our employers and misfits to our families and friends (Streitfeld, 2000).
The year 2000 may indeed be the first presidential campaign substantially utilizing Internet technology. Senator John McCain collected $810,000 in campaign pledges within one hour after he was declared the winner of the New Hampshire primary (How the Web Is Changing Presidential Campaigns, 2000).
Criminal justice agencies have been rapid adopters of technology, in general, and the Web, specifically. In recent years the services that law enforcement and corrections departments have provided citizens and their employees is nothing short of phenomenal. At law enforcement web sites citizens can report crimes, request vacant house checks, obtain licenses, apply for police employment, and view the latest crime statistics with maps specific to their own neighborhoods (Haley and Taylor, 1998). Never mind that you can become a virtual student of the police department in your area or anywhere else if they have a richly developed web site. You can even listen to many of these agencies dispatch live on the Internet by going to http://www.apbonline.com/ Finally, some agencies will send you daily emails to update you on crime concerns in the community.
The interactivity between the citizen and the police is one of the most promising developments for Internet technology. Emergency announcements, e-mail contact, and crime prevention services via the Web are now widely employed.
Corrections has also been quick to turn to technology for solutions to some of its most pressing problems (Dalton, 1997). James Gondles, Jr. (1999) declares in an editorial piece in Corrections Today, “For those of us who have been in the corrections field for many years, we cannot help but be amazed by the technology that is now routinely available.” During his keynote address to the membership, President Reginald Wilkinson (1998) told the American Correctional Association that they now have in their toolboxes technology that did not exist five years earlier and that correctional systems are using computers unlike ever before. Public and worker safety being of primary concern, the corrections profession has long since gone high tech with electronic fences, electrical shock weapons, home electronic monitoring, man-down radios, and prison video cameras. Much more is on the horizon, although Becker (1997) believes corrections systems have been slow in adopting the Internet into their operations. A virtual prison can not be too far off. Two Ohio criminal justice professionals, and graduate students at Tiffin University, have written a paper designing such an institution (T. Heimberger and L. Heimberger, 2000).
Haley and Taylor (1998) studied law enforcement agency web sites from all regions of the United States and determined that many valuable services are provided residents, victims, students, and scholars by means of a department home page. Has corrections provided a similar utility to its several clientele? The potential is there. Clayton (1997) suggests that corrections “organizations can use web sites to increase awareness about themselves, generate cost savings, undertake community outreach, programs, place themselves on equal footing with other groups, recruit personnel, manage public relations activities, and reach a wide range of people.”
Utility of a Corrections Web Page
Why would anyone want to visit a state corrections department web page? A number of reasons come to mind. Families and friends of prisoners and correctional employees may be interested in finding out what the living conditions and work environment of their loved ones is like. Taxpayers and voters may be curious about how their dollars are spent and if prison existence is living up to the promise of our current “get tough” philosophy. Applegate, Cullen, and Fisher found that the public wants rehabilitation as part of correctional policy, but it also supports punishment for offenders. The support has long since become expensive. State corrections budgets have tripled between 1986 and 1996, growing from $7 billion to $20 billion ten years later (Eckl, 1998). Corrections now consumes an average of about 6% of state budgets. Florida’s Department of Corrections is so determined to be sure that you understand how tough and cost-effective things are that they post a “myths of prison” document on their web site. Moreover, staff of a large state corrections system will be able to study their own organization to a degree that was not easily possible just several years ago. Many of the state corrections web sites contain detailed organization descriptions, annual reports, budget information, and research documents, and statistical data.
There are other good reasons. Academics can now obtain descriptive and statistical data on state corrections home pages that heretofore were available only for the most persistent scholar. At many web sites, a citizen can see who is in prison, who is on parole or about to be paroled, or who has escaped. Nearly every state corrections system is looking for employees and they post the jobs on their web sites. Online education via the Internet can address learning and skill building for staff and inmates, with specialized education available at the Education and Student Center at the Corrections Connection Network at http://www.correcitions.com/ (Halasz, 1997). Finally, you might be curious about how many residents there are in your state prison system in contrast to others. We are, of course, on record-breaking ground since the year 2000 opens with 2 million people in custody nationwide.
Purposes of State Corrections Web Sites
A cursory examination of state corrections department web sites demonstrates that they serve several distinct purposes:
1. Share their philosophy, mission, and other perspectives on corrections, a big-ticket item in state budgets;
2. Pass on useful information to the public such as visiting hours, directions to the prison, and escapees;
3. Present a positive and progressive image of the agency, its leaders, and its workers to the public;
4. Provide politically advantageous information to the public, such as the incapacitation rates and the cost per inmate;
5. Portray a web savvy and technologically modern state corrections system.
METHOD
Objectives of the Paper
The objectives of the paper are to:
1. Describe the content of state corrections department web sites;
2. Identify and evaluate the amount and types of useful information displayed for citizens, corrections professionals, and clients;
3. Evaluate the aesthetic and technological qualities of the sites, such as art, color, site layout, framed displays, audio, streaming video, scrolling news tickers, and virtual reality capabilities;
4. Identify the strong and unique features of each site;
5. Discuss the meaning and implications of the content of state corrections department web pages.
Selection and Examination of Study Web Sites
The Universal Resource Locators (URL's) of the state corrections department web sites were identified by going to The Corrections Connection site at http://www.corrections.com/ This site contains a plethora of information, resources, news, research, and links concerning the corrections profession. One of the pages at the site contains the URL's of all 50 of the states' corrections sites.
Since it was not possible to include in this study all of the state corrections department web sites (many contain hundreds of pages of information), 26 corrections department web sites were included in the study, almost evenly divided among a commonly accepted regional division of the United States: Northeast; Midwest; South, and West. Some were visited numerous times because of the large amount of information available or in order to update the study. Many of the most populated states have the web sites that contain tomes of information. A State Corrections Web Site Recording Instrument (see Appendix A) was constructed and used to study each state corrections department home page. The instrument was designed with a check-off format that would allow the researchers to identify the presence or absence of 41 web page features and includes a narrative section for describing special features about each of the sites. Because corrections and criminal justice are associated with some of the most volatile issues in society, the authors included a check-off feature as to whether or not the web page displayed information about the death penalty, sex offenders, escapees, offender databases, imprisonment costs, and parole notices, which have become a part of a growing list of information requests from victims and frightened citizens (Noack, 1999). These items are major points of concern for the public and the corrections community. The State Corrections Web Site Recording Instrument (SCWSRI) is an adaptation of a recording device used in a previous study of law enforcement agency web sites (Haley and Taylor, 1998). The instrument was pre-tested and modified before beginning to record data in this study. Relevant literature sources from books, journals, monographs, periodicals, newspapers, and the World Wide Web were also consulted in order to complete the research.
RESULTS
A total of 26 corrections department web sites were included in this study. Table lists the corrections department web sites by region of the United States.
Table 1. State Corrections Department Web Sites by U.S. Region
____________________________________________________________________ Corrections Department
____________________________________________________________________
Northeast 6
Connecticut
Delaware
Pennsylvania
Maine
Massachusetts
Vermont
Midwest 6
Ohio
Wisconsin
Illinois
South Dakota
Kansas
Nebraska
South 8
Alabama
Florida
Texas
Oklahoma
Mississippi
Virginia
West Virginia
Arkansas
West 6
Alaska
California
Arizona
Colorado
Washington
Oregon
TOTAL NUMBER OF AGENCIES = 26
Descriptive and Public Relations Information
From even a cursory examination of several state corrections department web pages, you would gain a favorable impression of the agencies and likely be surprised at the amount of information that is available to the citizen, employees, victims and their families, and inmates and their families. Table 2 lists the kinds of descriptive and public relations information that is available on the web sites of the state corrections departments in this study.
Table 2. Descriptive and Public Relations Information
_______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information: Number and Percent
_______________________________________________________________________
Mission/Values 24 (92.3%)
History/Description 17 (65.4%)
Executive’s Message 14 (53.8%)
Facts/Figures 23 (88.4%)
Who’s Who 19 (73.1%)
What’s New 20 76.9%
_______________________________________________________________________
What an agency looks like on its World Wide Web site is, in fact, not real. In fact, when something is “virtually true,” it’s not quite true. Such is the case in this study. We would be naïve to think that the purpose of a corrections web site is anything but making the agency look good by showing its best face. That is the case with state corrections department web pages as it is with online portrayals of business, education, or other public service organizations.
Mission writing has not escaped the confines of state corrections departments. In order to be accredited by the American Correctional Association, a department’s mission and values have to be defined. In this study, 24 (92.3%) of the state corrections departments have a mission statement, often supplemented by a list of values, displayed on their web sites. It should be no surprise that those statements include references to insuring public safety, providing a humane, safe, and sanitary treatment environment for the inmate population, and effecting rehabilitation of the sentenced offenders in order that they become law-abiding and productive members of society. Making available opportunities for rehabilitation goes at least one step farther than the traditional approach to corrections that might be described simply as “keep them inside, don’t let them hit each other, and feed them correctly.”
Even though the mission-writing mania has arrived in corrections, two of the 26 agencies in this study did not list a mission. Chances are very good that they do business about the same way that agencies do that have lengthy mission statements posted on the web site.
Seventeen (65.4%) of the corrections departments posted a history or detailed description of their agency and its work. Facts and Figures concerning the departments were listed on 23 (88.4%) of the web sites, to include such items as how many institutions there are in the state and how many inmates are in confinement. Adapting to the parlance of the WWW, you might even find these data listed in a FAQ’s section. Nineteen (73.1%) of the departments included a Who’s Who section where the names of the wardens, assistant wardens, and other division heads are identified.
An Executive’s Message from the state corrections department director, secretary, or commissioner was found on 14 (53.8%) of the web sites. This is also a common feature on law enforcement agency web pages, but some of the chiefs and sheriffs had audio and video messages for web surfers and other law enforcement professionals to enjoy. Sometimes the welcome message conveyed new developments in that state’s corrections business, but more often than not it was a standing sort of “welcome” and “we care” introduction to corrections in the state. To convey recent developments, 20 (76.9%) of the corrections departments had a What’s New section in the form of a news ticker, a recent developments page, or a full-blown newsletter.
Corrections Professional and Technical Information
Students of criminal justice and corrections professionals will be delighted to find the amount of professional and technical information available on the corrections department web sites in this study. They will find detailed information about correctional programs, institutions, research, and legislation. Without Internet technology, this kind of information would be very difficult to obtain and perhaps not even be sought.
Table 3. Corrections Professional and Technical Information
_______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information: Number and Percent
_______________________________________________________________________
Corrections Programs Information 20 (76.9%)
Parole Board 15 (57.7%)
Agency Links 20 (76.9%
Legislation 17 (65.4%)
Prison Industries/Work 23 (88.4%)
Research/Reports 19 (73.1%)
Private Prisons 6 (23.1%)
_______________________________________________________________________
Twenty (76.9%) of the corrections web sites contained substantial information about corrections programs, to include details about drug rehabilitation programs, boot camps, pet therapy, specific counseling modalities, etc. Parole board facts were found on 15 (57.7%) of the sites.
Information concerning prison industries and work programs can be found on 23 (88.4%) of the state corrections department web sites, leaving little doubt that the state corrections departments want the taxpayers to know that prisoners are working to help earn their keep. Those web site browsers and researchers that will want to access corrections research and technical reports will find that information on 19 (73.1%) of the sites while 17 (65.4%) of the sites carry information about corrections legislation. Much less prevalent is information about private prisons, naturally since the private prison industry is not found in a majority of the states. Only 6 (23.1%) of the state corrections web sites contained information about private prisons. Finally, in order to see what corrections colleagues are doing around the nation, 20 (26.9%) of the state web sites had agency links.
Communication and Other Useful Information for Citizens, Victims, and Inmates Families
Any public service agency in a democracy has the obligation to
provide useful information to citizens in order that they can make intelligent decisions about their lives. State corrections departments may be somewhat ambivalent about their responsibilities in this area since they want to be open and informative but they also must remain cognizant of their public safety role. Too much of the wrong kind of information may, in fact, jeopardize security. But with 80 million people worldwide using the Internet (Wolk, 2000), and perhaps 200 million within three years, it may become difficult to shield all but the most sensitive information. The state corrections web sites in this study were indeed helpful in providing useful information for citizens, victims, and the families of inmates. Table 4 below contains that information.
Table 4. Communication and Other Useful Information for Citizens, Victims, and
Inmates’ Families
_______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information: Number and Percent
_______________________________________________________________________
Institutions 24 (92.3%)
Maps/Directions 14 (53.8%)
Pictures 19 (73.1%)
Victim’s Assistance 14 (53.8%)
Site Search 8 (30.7%)
Employment 24 (92.3%)
Offender Database 8 (30.7%)
Communication 26 (100%)
E-mail 20 (76.9%)
Phone/Address 26 (100%)
Escape Notices 4 (15.4)
______________________________________________________________________
Twenty-four (92.3%) of the web sites had separate and distinct web pages for each of their prisons, penitentiaries, and reformatories, with 19 (73.1%) of the states posting one or more pictures of their prisons. Fourteen (53.8%) had maps and/or clear directions to the prisons in order that inmates’ families, prospective employees, and other visitors can easily find the institution. In the current U.S. economy, finding capable workers is a not easy. You may not be surprised that 24 (92.3%) of the state corrections department web sites have open corrections positions posted. You can work as a corrections officer just about anywhere you want with Ohio offering the highest starting salary at about $26,000 per year. It is interesting that a parole officer with a baccalaureate degree starts at the same salary in Ohio.
A lot of information is available for victims, inmates, and their families. Victims assistance was plentiful on 14 (53.8%) of the web sites. Eight (30.7%) of the sites actually allowed anyone to view the corrections system offender database, often including pictures of the inmate. Eight (30.7%) of those sites also had a site search capability allowing web surfers to type in the topic they were interested in accessing.
Any public service agency nowadays must provide public access in a variety of ways uncommon just several decades ago. All 26 (100%) of the web sites posted some means of communicating with the central offices of the state corrections system, regional offices, and individual institutions. Addresses and phone numbers were available on all 26 (100%) of the web sites. Twenty (76.9%) had posted email addresses for many of their personnel and offices. Important for victims and their families, as well as the public at large, 4 (15.4%) posted special escape notices on their corrections web sites. The remaining 22 state corrections departments did not have any special escape notices, perhaps thinking that it is an embarrassment and chose not to display the information in the form of a special notice such as a ticker tape. In the next section the matter of an escapee database will be addressed.
Public Safety and Politically Sensitive Information
Some information on the state corrections web sites in this study is of vital concern to citizens relative to public safety and may indeed be politically volatile. Capital punishment, sex offenders, escapes, and the costs and conditions of confinement are matters the general public and politicians are more than likely to be concerned with. Table 5 below gives us a measure of how prevalent these “hot-button” issues are on state corrections department web sites.
Table 5. Public Safety and Politically Sensitive Information
______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information: Number and Percent
______________________________________________________________________
Sex Offender 13 (50.0%)
Capital Punishment 15 (57.7%)
Death Row Roster 10 (38.5%)
Escapee Database 10 (38.5%)
Costs 19 (73.1%)
Prisoner 18 (69.2%)
Probation/Parole 7 (26.9%)
Community Corrections 6 (23.1%)
Restitution 4 (15.4%)
______________________________________________________________________
Thirteen (50%) of the web sites in this study had information about sex offenders, either material dealing with their confinement and treatment or actually listing them in a database, sometimes with pictures. Capital punishment was addressed on 15 (57.7%) of the web sites. Ten (38.5%) provided a death row roster that often included criminal history details. Some states actually listed every person that has been executed in the state’s history. In this presidential election year, capital punishment has already appeared as a major issue since Governor George W. Bush has presided over far more executions than any of the other governors. Support for capital punishment remains high among voters although recent exonerations of condemned inmates has cast some doubt on the whole process. An emerging position on the death penalty for politicians this year may go like this, “Tough enough to support the death penalty, but not bad enough to actually do it.” Evidence the fact that the number of death row inmates continues to grow with no likelihood at all of ever reducing the numbers. Nevertheless more than half of the states in this study displayed capital punishment information, a few a lot more prominently than the others did.
If you are not able to obtain information about escapes from a special news bulletin or ticker tape, 10 (38.5%) of the corrections web sites displayed an escapee database, nearly always with a picture, description, and other pertinent details.
Even in a strong economy, the general public is worried about the costs and conditions of confinement. Few people realize, however, the size and cost of the corrections enterprise. The state corrections systems are also interested in the public’s perception of what prison life is actually like. In short, the public doesn’t want prisoners to have it too good. Some of the state corrections web sites deal tactfully with this issue by giving a synopsis of what daily prison life is like. In Texas, for example, prisoners get up an hour or two earlier (3:30 AM) than in any of the other states and the web site lets you know that if you look around.
Nineteen (73.1%) of the web sites in this study listed the costs of confinement, probation and parole, or other community corrections methods. Eighteen (69.2%) identified the costs per prisoner or for the prison system itself. Seven (26.95) posted the costs for probation and parole services. Six (23.1%) had information on the costs of community corrections operations while 4 (15.4%) identified the amount of restitution prisoners made to victims and communities.
Aesthetic and Technological Features
The ability of the World Wide Web to distribute information, shape opinion, and facilitate commerce has grown astronomically since the first national Internet Service Provider (ISP) came on the scene in 1992. While most state department corrections web sites are not likely to win major awards for their aesthetic and navigation feature, some are indeed sophisticated sites. California, Ohio, and Florida are a few in the top tier. Hosting and maintaining a high-quality web site is not an easy task. Haley and Blough (1999) found in their study of police department web masters that they were proud of their work but often felt frustrated in trying to keep the site current and accurate. Table 6 lists aesthetic and technical features found on the web sites of the state corrections departments in this study.
Table 6. Aesthetic and Technological Features
______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information N Percent
_______________________________________________________________________
Pictures/Graphics/Art 22 (84.6%)
Audio 0 (0%)
Video Presentation 2 (7.7%)
Color Variety 20 (76.9%)
Virtual Reality 0 (0%)
Frames 9 (34.6%)
News Ticker 2 (7.7%)
Navigation Dialogue Box 6 (23.1%)
_______________________________________________________________________
Twenty-two (84.6%) of the corrections web sites contained pictures, graphics, or art work of some kind that added to the text features of the site. In this age of inexpensive web construction software, placing graphics on a web site is easy and you have to wonder why four of the sites excluded any graphics, pictures, or art work. It is also surprising that none (0%) of the sites contained any audio files, unlike some law enforcement web sites that contain music and audio welcome messages from the chief executive. Two (7.7%) contained a video presentation in the form of a slide show or a so-called virtual tour of institutions. None (0%) were actual virtual reality tours. Twenty (76.9%) displayed three or more colors on their web pages. To aid navigation throughout the site, 9 (34.6%) of the sites employed frames which allow the web surfer to save a lot of time by going to other sections of the web site from any page that they are viewing without having to go back to a start page or do a lot of scrolling. News tickers appeared on 2 (7.7%) of the corrections web sites. Six (23.1%) contained a navigation dialogue box permitting the site visitor to easily negotiate the shoals of a multi-layered web site.
Special Features
Exploring the Web can be fascinating and no less so when surfing the content of state corrections department home pages. The displays are, of course, meant to leave the web surfer or corrections professional with a positive image of the state’s prisons and community corrections agencies. Still there are surprises and oddities that can be discovered on these web sites that are, without doubt, little known facts and matters of interest to the student of corrections. Table 7 below lists some of these discoveries.
Table 7. Interesting and Unique Features Found on State Corrections Department
Web Sites
_______________________________________________________________________ Feature/Fact State Corrections Agency
_______________________________________________________________________
1. Only state with “rehabilitation” in its title Ohio
2. Lists last meal menus of condemned inmates Arizona, Texas
3. Lists every execution in state’s history Arizona, Oklahoma
4. Mother Teresa visited its Walpole Prison Massachusetts
5. Prison was site of governor’s radio show Minnesota
6. To stay modern, has a Technology Transfer Unit California
7. Posts lasts statement of condemned inmates Texas
8. One third of its executions since 1923 were for rape Maryland
9. Posts pictures of those executed California, North Carolina
10. Spanish language option for many web pages Arizona
11. Largest corrections system: $4.6 billion dollar California
budget; 45,852 employees; 162,381 inmates
12. Inmates have an arts and crafts web store Arizona
13. Notes January 8, 1997, as the day it executed three Arkansas
condemned murderers
14. Largest death row holding 555 inmates California
15. Has only braille machine repair service in West California
16. Has a corrections system ombudsman for inmates Texas
17. Has a diversity calendar for inmates and staff Washington
18. Posts all published articles of its agency director Ohio
19. Its public safety center contains a women’s prison, South Dakota
highway patrol post, sheriff’s department, city police
department, and state criminal investigation unit
20. Executes its inmates at a different location than Kansas
its death row to reduce death row staff stress
21. Inmates build a 768 sq.ft. house for $22,000 for all South Dakota
senior citizens who request it
_______________________________________________________________________
DISCUSSION
Public Relations
We should not be surprised to find that “virtual corrections” as found on the state department web sites in this study is indeed better than the “real corrections.” In almost every state you will clearly get the impression that inmates are fed well, live in safe and adequate housing, have a plethora of education and training opportunities, and have more chances for recreation than most of us, unless, of course, they are confined in the highest level of security. In “real corrections”, however, we would be able to see the cell extractions of recalcitrant inmates, hear the whining and screaming of those requiring mental health attention, or read the too infrequent reports of sexual assaults inside the walls. But prison is not so bad because in the last analysis how we live is always relative to how we perceive others living. The authors visited a Romanian prison in Bucharest in November 1999, and found conditions to be indeed Spartan in contrast to any prison in the United States. Yet in a society where the average income is about $100 a month and schoolteachers are on strike for $81 a month, Romanians also complain about the plush conditions of their prisoners’ existence.
While the onslaught of prison litigation has slowed in the United States, two decades of lawsuits have substantially improved the physical conditions of prison life. Any person is able to go to the state corrections web sites included in this study and find that half of the prisons from and exterior examination look far better than our nation’s schools. No federal courts are likely to be forcing the school systems to fix up their facilities. But those two big-ticket items, schools and prisons, are often competitors for the biggest portions of state budgets. Prisons have won in every encounter.
Politics have also strongly influenced the look of some state corrections departments’ web pages. In states such as Florida and Minnesota, where crime rates are relatively high, the governors actually appear on the corrections department web pages. Governor Jeb Bush’s picture is right next to the corrections director’s. In Minnesota, Governor Jesse Ventura’s picture is shown in the context of his broadcast of his radio show from prison. In seems that in states with high crime rates and prison populations, the governors want to be seen “minding the store” when it comes to public safety. It is very easy to tell also that Governor Bush is a strong advocate of capital punishment. The story of Florida’s electric chair controversy is easily located on the web site. In other states with the death penalty, but having few, if any, executions, the information is buried in some obscure location on the web site. This is an indication, no doubt, as to how troubling the death penalty is for Americans. We have it, but for the most part, we don’t do it. As people come to know more factual information about the death penalty and a strong, meaningful alternative to execution is offered, Bohm (1999) thinks that there is a possibility that the United States may cease with the punishment. In the last analysis, penality is always a balancing act (Lucken, 1998). The weight of the arguments on either side of the capital punishment debate is not static.
Corrections Technical Information
The state corrections department web sites in this study are rich depositories of technical information about corrections. Any undergraduate or graduate student will have at mouse click away annual reports, statistical studies, performance measures, department histories, innumerable charts and graphs, and newsletter and magazines reporting on almost every corrections topic imaginable. Spending time on these sites is an education. Some of the sites have thousands of pages and many more archived reports in PDF format.
One of the habits criminal justice professionals have is to inquire as to what is being done in a similar agency. By looking at another state’s web site they are able to glean a tome of information without making a phone call or traveling any farther than their department computers. “Would you mail me some information,” is a much less frequent request in corrections and law enforcement since the advent of storing information on the World Wide Web. Staying out front is a lot easier in the dot-com (dot-gov) society.
Distribution of Useful Information
The cost of mailing information to other corrections professionals, lawyers, judges, victims, and offenders’ families must have dropped drastically in the second half of the 1990’s. Not only is much of the information that is useful to those mentioned above available on a web site, but the information is easily updated and distributed.
On the other hand, the posting of staff names, phone numbers, addresses, and email listings has undoubtedly increased the communication between professional corrections staff and the community. As Internet access increases in the next several years, keeping up with the communications in corrections departments may be difficult. Police department web masters report that answering email inquiries alone consumes a large portion of their workday (Haley and Blough, 1999).
Finally, finding a corrections job is substantially easier than it once was. The jobs in corrections seem to be there for the asking. Connecticut was the only state with no positions available. Some states, such as Texas, had hundreds of openings.
CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
Maybe what we all seek on the World Wide Web is something better than our own stark reality. People design and post personal web pages and they are often straight braggadocio and exaggeration, as if now posted on the web, they can believe it. Others frequently communicate in chat rooms and stretch the truth about their background and achievements. Business web sites put forth an image of quality, value, and service that they can hardly live up to. Maybe it’s something to shoot for, or perhaps only crass marketing.
On the Web we seek an easier and better life. Virtually speaking, we can find it. We can shop where we do not go. We can see where we have not been. We can feel what we have not really experienced. The Web enables us. In the same way, virtual corrections may indeed be better than reality. The state corrections web sites in this study all portray a corrections system better than it probably is. After all, the web sites are critiqued by only the state corrections personnel themselves, yet still the web pages are rich in detailed and useful information for citizens, victims, inmate families, and corrections professionals.
What you may now routinely glean from most of the web sites in this study was nearly impossible to obtain just several years ago. No agency would have been able to offer so much information to so many people without the Web’s phenomenal capacity for distribution.
We can conclude from this study that the images portrayed of a state corrections system, its institutions, and its personnel are overwhelmingly positive. Citizens will also feel welcome in visiting the web site of their state corrections agency. They will also find that the state corrections enterprise appears well organized, efficient, and confident. As least, it will seem that way. If they want to know more about the care and custody of offenders in their state, the web site will have hundreds of pages of reports, inmate data, performance reviews, research studies, and other descriptive information for those who would care to examine them. Names, addresses, and phone numbers of corrections administrators are equally accessible. In most cases, attractive pictures of the institutions are available on nearly all of the sites that might leave a viewer wondering why prisoners would complain about the conditions of their confinement. If a web surfer just so happened to have recently visited one of the nation's many dilapidated school buildings, they may conclude that prisons aren’t all that bad. But still there is that problem of not being able to go home at night. With 2 million people in custody in the nation’s prisons and jails on any given day, we must believe that the costs of confinement are worth it.
The web sites in this study will also allow corrections professionals to have an opportunity to study their own state system, or another state’s. They also can find a plethora of employment vacancies in other states, knowledge in today’s economy that must frustrate corrections directors who are trying hard to locate and retain qualified staff.
Politically sensitive issues such as the death penalty and sex offenders are prominent on a state’s corrections agency home page, or they are latent. There does not seem to be a middle ground. But you will have no difficulty figuring out that the paramount value portrayed on all of the web sites is public safety. It is the first order of business in every mission statement. That should be comforting to all of us.
Three years ago computer and Internet technology was primitive in contrast to what is now possible with high speed processors and cable modems. In 1997, one of the authors completed his paper on “police stations in cyberspace” for an Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences meeting while watching the Superbowl on the World Wide Web by means of slides changing ever so infrequently. It was a primitive webcast. This year at about the same time, Merlin, the author’s talking and reading animated agent, sits on the computer screen, occasionally cracking jokes. Merlin also snores a little when he is not working. He reads and pronounces text in the English language from my email, my word-processing documents, and web pages better than most of us. Merlin helped proofread my paper. These kinds of animated characters are about to enter are world in force.
Negroponte (1995) forecasts that we will soon have hologram-like agents in our service who will do our word processing, web surfing, information and household management, and some of our home chores by ordering robots to do physical tasks. We will also be able to select the agent of our choice, adding language and personality features according to our mood and preferences. I recently chose Al Morale, another agent that sits on my desktop computer screen and quite frankly "sucks up," telling me in clear speech with animation how smart I look and how great my work is. That sort of occasionally comforting employee is getting harder and harder to find.
Finally Ursula Owre Masterson (2000) tells us about the long-awaited debut of Ananova, a digitally created beauty who will soon be reading the news on British online news sites. She will also soon be working as the "perfect go-between for man and machine," in other ways, even appearing on the screen of our web telephones. Ananova is billed as the Internet's first "synthespian."
In a few years it is very likely that a "virtual warden" may greet us as we log on to the web page of his institution. He will invite us on a personal tour of the prison, and, of course, insist that "our images" join him as we walk down the ranges and tiers of the institution. We will meet inmates and staff. We can try out solitary confinement. We can pick up reams of information about corrections. Then, when we are tired of visiting, we can thank the warden, check out back through the main sally port, disconnect, and leave. Welcome to "virtual corrections."
REFERENCES
Applegate, B, F. Cullen, and B. Fisher. 1997. “Public Support for Correctional Treatment: The Continuing Appeal of the Rehabilitative Ideal.” Prison Journal, September, pp. 237-259.
Associated Press. 2000. “Man Plans to Live a Year Online.” January 1.
Becker, K. 1997. “Internets, Extranets, Futurenets.” Corrections Today, August, pp. 74-79.
Bohm, R. 1999. Deathquest: An Introduction to the Theory and Practice of Capital Punishment in the United States. Cincinnati, OH: Anderson Publishing Company.
Clayton, S. 1997. “Are You on the Net Yet?” Corrections Today, August, pp. 64-67.
Dalton, E. 1997. “Leaders Convene to Assess Correctional Technology Needs.” Corrections Today, July, pp. 82-83.
Eckl, C. 1998. “The Cost of Corrections.” State Legislatures, February, pp. 30-34.
Gates, W. 1999. Business at the Speed of Thought.” New York, NY: Warner Books, Inc.
Gondles, J, Jr. 1999. “Corrections in the 21st Century.” Corrections Today, July, p. 6.
Halasz, I. 1997. “Internet Use in Education and Training.” Corrections Today, August, pp. 92-98.
Haley, K. and R. Taylor. 1998. “Police Stations in Cyberspace: A Content Analysis of Law Enforcement Agency Home Pages.” Pp. 125-147 in Criminal Justice Technology in the 21st Century, edited by L. Moriarity and D. Carter. Springfield, IL: Charles C Thomas Publishers.
Haley, K. and S. Blough. 1999. “Caught in the Web: The Pride and Perils of a Police Department Webmaster.” A paper presented at the annual meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, March, Orlando, Florida.
Heimberger, T. and L. Heimberger. 2000. “Virtual Panopticism.” A paper presented at the annual meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, March, New Orleans, Louisiana.
“How the Web Is Changing Presidential Campaigns.” Time.com, February 7. pp. 2-7.
Lohr, S. 1999. “The Internet Wears Out Its Welcome.” The New York Times, December 26.
Lucken, K. 1998. “Contemporary Penal Trends: Modern or Post Modern?” British Journal of Criminology, Winter 1998, pp. 106-124.
Masterson, U. 2000. “Coming Soon, Internet’s First Synthespian.” MSNBC.com, March 2.
Negroponte, N. 1995. Being Digital. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.
Noack, D. 1999. “Parole Notices Go Online.” APB news.com, October 22.
Streitfeld, D. 2000. “A Web of Workaholic Misfits.” The Washington Post, February 16, p. A01.
Wilkinson, R. 1998. “Best Practices: Tools for Correctional Excellence. Corrections Today,” October, pp. 56-58
Wolk, W. 2000. “For Web Users, Freedom Has Its Price.” MSNBC.com, January 17.
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Keith N. Haley
John D. Collins, Ed.D.
*Article is also a paper presented at the 2000 Annual Meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences in New Orleans, LA
Paper is copyrighted. All rights pertain.
INTRODUCTION
If there was any doubt left that the "Dot-Com" society had arrived, the holiday shopping season of 1999 removed it. The planet and much of its activity has moved to the World Wide Web. We buy books, read newspapers, find houses, identify neighborhood sex offenders, locate jobs, find employees, listen to CD's and radio stations, watch news and movies, take education and training courses, store data files for the road, and then there are all of those pornography sites. Who knows what goes on there? We, of course, communicate asynchronously around the globe by email, with many people having several email addresses. Time magazine topped off this affirmation of a World Wide Web (WWW) revolution by naming Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon.com, the magazine's man of the year for pioneering Internet retailing (Lohr, 1999). Did you know that there is even a man who has decided to spend the entire year online inside of a house in Dallas? He wants to demonstrate that it can be done, depending only on e-commerce to supply him with groceries, furniture, entertainment, etc. (Associated Press, 2000)? He is known as the Dot Com Guy and you can monitor him at where else but http://www.dotcomguy.com/
The list of human activities associated with the WWW is indeed endless and unfathomable since new services and types of commerce are added on a daily basis. Businesses can have the capability, if they wish, to instantaneously deliver information to the parts of their organizations that need it (Gates, 1999). In my own case, I am at last disposing of my dictionary, thesaurus, book of quotes, and other reference books for writing that clutter my desk since all of them and many more are available on the WWW at no charge. Even the entire Encyclopedia Britannica is finally online and operating as a portal for news and information. Not all, of course, see this passion for instant and up-to-date information as entirely desirable if it means we become slaves to our employers and misfits to our families and friends (Streitfeld, 2000).
The year 2000 may indeed be the first presidential campaign substantially utilizing Internet technology. Senator John McCain collected $810,000 in campaign pledges within one hour after he was declared the winner of the New Hampshire primary (How the Web Is Changing Presidential Campaigns, 2000).
Criminal justice agencies have been rapid adopters of technology, in general, and the Web, specifically. In recent years the services that law enforcement and corrections departments have provided citizens and their employees is nothing short of phenomenal. At law enforcement web sites citizens can report crimes, request vacant house checks, obtain licenses, apply for police employment, and view the latest crime statistics with maps specific to their own neighborhoods (Haley and Taylor, 1998). Never mind that you can become a virtual student of the police department in your area or anywhere else if they have a richly developed web site. You can even listen to many of these agencies dispatch live on the Internet by going to http://www.apbonline.com/ Finally, some agencies will send you daily emails to update you on crime concerns in the community.
The interactivity between the citizen and the police is one of the most promising developments for Internet technology. Emergency announcements, e-mail contact, and crime prevention services via the Web are now widely employed.
Corrections has also been quick to turn to technology for solutions to some of its most pressing problems (Dalton, 1997). James Gondles, Jr. (1999) declares in an editorial piece in Corrections Today, “For those of us who have been in the corrections field for many years, we cannot help but be amazed by the technology that is now routinely available.” During his keynote address to the membership, President Reginald Wilkinson (1998) told the American Correctional Association that they now have in their toolboxes technology that did not exist five years earlier and that correctional systems are using computers unlike ever before. Public and worker safety being of primary concern, the corrections profession has long since gone high tech with electronic fences, electrical shock weapons, home electronic monitoring, man-down radios, and prison video cameras. Much more is on the horizon, although Becker (1997) believes corrections systems have been slow in adopting the Internet into their operations. A virtual prison can not be too far off. Two Ohio criminal justice professionals, and graduate students at Tiffin University, have written a paper designing such an institution (T. Heimberger and L. Heimberger, 2000).
Haley and Taylor (1998) studied law enforcement agency web sites from all regions of the United States and determined that many valuable services are provided residents, victims, students, and scholars by means of a department home page. Has corrections provided a similar utility to its several clientele? The potential is there. Clayton (1997) suggests that corrections “organizations can use web sites to increase awareness about themselves, generate cost savings, undertake community outreach, programs, place themselves on equal footing with other groups, recruit personnel, manage public relations activities, and reach a wide range of people.”
Utility of a Corrections Web Page
Why would anyone want to visit a state corrections department web page? A number of reasons come to mind. Families and friends of prisoners and correctional employees may be interested in finding out what the living conditions and work environment of their loved ones is like. Taxpayers and voters may be curious about how their dollars are spent and if prison existence is living up to the promise of our current “get tough” philosophy. Applegate, Cullen, and Fisher found that the public wants rehabilitation as part of correctional policy, but it also supports punishment for offenders. The support has long since become expensive. State corrections budgets have tripled between 1986 and 1996, growing from $7 billion to $20 billion ten years later (Eckl, 1998). Corrections now consumes an average of about 6% of state budgets. Florida’s Department of Corrections is so determined to be sure that you understand how tough and cost-effective things are that they post a “myths of prison” document on their web site. Moreover, staff of a large state corrections system will be able to study their own organization to a degree that was not easily possible just several years ago. Many of the state corrections web sites contain detailed organization descriptions, annual reports, budget information, and research documents, and statistical data.
There are other good reasons. Academics can now obtain descriptive and statistical data on state corrections home pages that heretofore were available only for the most persistent scholar. At many web sites, a citizen can see who is in prison, who is on parole or about to be paroled, or who has escaped. Nearly every state corrections system is looking for employees and they post the jobs on their web sites. Online education via the Internet can address learning and skill building for staff and inmates, with specialized education available at the Education and Student Center at the Corrections Connection Network at http://www.correcitions.com/ (Halasz, 1997). Finally, you might be curious about how many residents there are in your state prison system in contrast to others. We are, of course, on record-breaking ground since the year 2000 opens with 2 million people in custody nationwide.
Purposes of State Corrections Web Sites
A cursory examination of state corrections department web sites demonstrates that they serve several distinct purposes:
1. Share their philosophy, mission, and other perspectives on corrections, a big-ticket item in state budgets;
2. Pass on useful information to the public such as visiting hours, directions to the prison, and escapees;
3. Present a positive and progressive image of the agency, its leaders, and its workers to the public;
4. Provide politically advantageous information to the public, such as the incapacitation rates and the cost per inmate;
5. Portray a web savvy and technologically modern state corrections system.
METHOD
Objectives of the Paper
The objectives of the paper are to:
1. Describe the content of state corrections department web sites;
2. Identify and evaluate the amount and types of useful information displayed for citizens, corrections professionals, and clients;
3. Evaluate the aesthetic and technological qualities of the sites, such as art, color, site layout, framed displays, audio, streaming video, scrolling news tickers, and virtual reality capabilities;
4. Identify the strong and unique features of each site;
5. Discuss the meaning and implications of the content of state corrections department web pages.
Selection and Examination of Study Web Sites
The Universal Resource Locators (URL's) of the state corrections department web sites were identified by going to The Corrections Connection site at http://www.corrections.com/ This site contains a plethora of information, resources, news, research, and links concerning the corrections profession. One of the pages at the site contains the URL's of all 50 of the states' corrections sites.
Since it was not possible to include in this study all of the state corrections department web sites (many contain hundreds of pages of information), 26 corrections department web sites were included in the study, almost evenly divided among a commonly accepted regional division of the United States: Northeast; Midwest; South, and West. Some were visited numerous times because of the large amount of information available or in order to update the study. Many of the most populated states have the web sites that contain tomes of information. A State Corrections Web Site Recording Instrument (see Appendix A) was constructed and used to study each state corrections department home page. The instrument was designed with a check-off format that would allow the researchers to identify the presence or absence of 41 web page features and includes a narrative section for describing special features about each of the sites. Because corrections and criminal justice are associated with some of the most volatile issues in society, the authors included a check-off feature as to whether or not the web page displayed information about the death penalty, sex offenders, escapees, offender databases, imprisonment costs, and parole notices, which have become a part of a growing list of information requests from victims and frightened citizens (Noack, 1999). These items are major points of concern for the public and the corrections community. The State Corrections Web Site Recording Instrument (SCWSRI) is an adaptation of a recording device used in a previous study of law enforcement agency web sites (Haley and Taylor, 1998). The instrument was pre-tested and modified before beginning to record data in this study. Relevant literature sources from books, journals, monographs, periodicals, newspapers, and the World Wide Web were also consulted in order to complete the research.
RESULTS
A total of 26 corrections department web sites were included in this study. Table lists the corrections department web sites by region of the United States.
Table 1. State Corrections Department Web Sites by U.S. Region
____________________________________________________________________ Corrections Department
____________________________________________________________________
Northeast 6
Connecticut
Delaware
Pennsylvania
Maine
Massachusetts
Vermont
Midwest 6
Ohio
Wisconsin
Illinois
South Dakota
Kansas
Nebraska
South 8
Alabama
Florida
Texas
Oklahoma
Mississippi
Virginia
West Virginia
Arkansas
West 6
Alaska
California
Arizona
Colorado
Washington
Oregon
TOTAL NUMBER OF AGENCIES = 26
Descriptive and Public Relations Information
From even a cursory examination of several state corrections department web pages, you would gain a favorable impression of the agencies and likely be surprised at the amount of information that is available to the citizen, employees, victims and their families, and inmates and their families. Table 2 lists the kinds of descriptive and public relations information that is available on the web sites of the state corrections departments in this study.
Table 2. Descriptive and Public Relations Information
_______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information: Number and Percent
_______________________________________________________________________
Mission/Values 24 (92.3%)
History/Description 17 (65.4%)
Executive’s Message 14 (53.8%)
Facts/Figures 23 (88.4%)
Who’s Who 19 (73.1%)
What’s New 20 76.9%
_______________________________________________________________________
What an agency looks like on its World Wide Web site is, in fact, not real. In fact, when something is “virtually true,” it’s not quite true. Such is the case in this study. We would be naïve to think that the purpose of a corrections web site is anything but making the agency look good by showing its best face. That is the case with state corrections department web pages as it is with online portrayals of business, education, or other public service organizations.
Mission writing has not escaped the confines of state corrections departments. In order to be accredited by the American Correctional Association, a department’s mission and values have to be defined. In this study, 24 (92.3%) of the state corrections departments have a mission statement, often supplemented by a list of values, displayed on their web sites. It should be no surprise that those statements include references to insuring public safety, providing a humane, safe, and sanitary treatment environment for the inmate population, and effecting rehabilitation of the sentenced offenders in order that they become law-abiding and productive members of society. Making available opportunities for rehabilitation goes at least one step farther than the traditional approach to corrections that might be described simply as “keep them inside, don’t let them hit each other, and feed them correctly.”
Even though the mission-writing mania has arrived in corrections, two of the 26 agencies in this study did not list a mission. Chances are very good that they do business about the same way that agencies do that have lengthy mission statements posted on the web site.
Seventeen (65.4%) of the corrections departments posted a history or detailed description of their agency and its work. Facts and Figures concerning the departments were listed on 23 (88.4%) of the web sites, to include such items as how many institutions there are in the state and how many inmates are in confinement. Adapting to the parlance of the WWW, you might even find these data listed in a FAQ’s section. Nineteen (73.1%) of the departments included a Who’s Who section where the names of the wardens, assistant wardens, and other division heads are identified.
An Executive’s Message from the state corrections department director, secretary, or commissioner was found on 14 (53.8%) of the web sites. This is also a common feature on law enforcement agency web pages, but some of the chiefs and sheriffs had audio and video messages for web surfers and other law enforcement professionals to enjoy. Sometimes the welcome message conveyed new developments in that state’s corrections business, but more often than not it was a standing sort of “welcome” and “we care” introduction to corrections in the state. To convey recent developments, 20 (76.9%) of the corrections departments had a What’s New section in the form of a news ticker, a recent developments page, or a full-blown newsletter.
Corrections Professional and Technical Information
Students of criminal justice and corrections professionals will be delighted to find the amount of professional and technical information available on the corrections department web sites in this study. They will find detailed information about correctional programs, institutions, research, and legislation. Without Internet technology, this kind of information would be very difficult to obtain and perhaps not even be sought.
Table 3. Corrections Professional and Technical Information
_______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information: Number and Percent
_______________________________________________________________________
Corrections Programs Information 20 (76.9%)
Parole Board 15 (57.7%)
Agency Links 20 (76.9%
Legislation 17 (65.4%)
Prison Industries/Work 23 (88.4%)
Research/Reports 19 (73.1%)
Private Prisons 6 (23.1%)
_______________________________________________________________________
Twenty (76.9%) of the corrections web sites contained substantial information about corrections programs, to include details about drug rehabilitation programs, boot camps, pet therapy, specific counseling modalities, etc. Parole board facts were found on 15 (57.7%) of the sites.
Information concerning prison industries and work programs can be found on 23 (88.4%) of the state corrections department web sites, leaving little doubt that the state corrections departments want the taxpayers to know that prisoners are working to help earn their keep. Those web site browsers and researchers that will want to access corrections research and technical reports will find that information on 19 (73.1%) of the sites while 17 (65.4%) of the sites carry information about corrections legislation. Much less prevalent is information about private prisons, naturally since the private prison industry is not found in a majority of the states. Only 6 (23.1%) of the state corrections web sites contained information about private prisons. Finally, in order to see what corrections colleagues are doing around the nation, 20 (26.9%) of the state web sites had agency links.
Communication and Other Useful Information for Citizens, Victims, and Inmates Families
Any public service agency in a democracy has the obligation to
provide useful information to citizens in order that they can make intelligent decisions about their lives. State corrections departments may be somewhat ambivalent about their responsibilities in this area since they want to be open and informative but they also must remain cognizant of their public safety role. Too much of the wrong kind of information may, in fact, jeopardize security. But with 80 million people worldwide using the Internet (Wolk, 2000), and perhaps 200 million within three years, it may become difficult to shield all but the most sensitive information. The state corrections web sites in this study were indeed helpful in providing useful information for citizens, victims, and the families of inmates. Table 4 below contains that information.
Table 4. Communication and Other Useful Information for Citizens, Victims, and
Inmates’ Families
_______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information: Number and Percent
_______________________________________________________________________
Institutions 24 (92.3%)
Maps/Directions 14 (53.8%)
Pictures 19 (73.1%)
Victim’s Assistance 14 (53.8%)
Site Search 8 (30.7%)
Employment 24 (92.3%)
Offender Database 8 (30.7%)
Communication 26 (100%)
E-mail 20 (76.9%)
Phone/Address 26 (100%)
Escape Notices 4 (15.4)
______________________________________________________________________
Twenty-four (92.3%) of the web sites had separate and distinct web pages for each of their prisons, penitentiaries, and reformatories, with 19 (73.1%) of the states posting one or more pictures of their prisons. Fourteen (53.8%) had maps and/or clear directions to the prisons in order that inmates’ families, prospective employees, and other visitors can easily find the institution. In the current U.S. economy, finding capable workers is a not easy. You may not be surprised that 24 (92.3%) of the state corrections department web sites have open corrections positions posted. You can work as a corrections officer just about anywhere you want with Ohio offering the highest starting salary at about $26,000 per year. It is interesting that a parole officer with a baccalaureate degree starts at the same salary in Ohio.
A lot of information is available for victims, inmates, and their families. Victims assistance was plentiful on 14 (53.8%) of the web sites. Eight (30.7%) of the sites actually allowed anyone to view the corrections system offender database, often including pictures of the inmate. Eight (30.7%) of those sites also had a site search capability allowing web surfers to type in the topic they were interested in accessing.
Any public service agency nowadays must provide public access in a variety of ways uncommon just several decades ago. All 26 (100%) of the web sites posted some means of communicating with the central offices of the state corrections system, regional offices, and individual institutions. Addresses and phone numbers were available on all 26 (100%) of the web sites. Twenty (76.9%) had posted email addresses for many of their personnel and offices. Important for victims and their families, as well as the public at large, 4 (15.4%) posted special escape notices on their corrections web sites. The remaining 22 state corrections departments did not have any special escape notices, perhaps thinking that it is an embarrassment and chose not to display the information in the form of a special notice such as a ticker tape. In the next section the matter of an escapee database will be addressed.
Public Safety and Politically Sensitive Information
Some information on the state corrections web sites in this study is of vital concern to citizens relative to public safety and may indeed be politically volatile. Capital punishment, sex offenders, escapes, and the costs and conditions of confinement are matters the general public and politicians are more than likely to be concerned with. Table 5 below gives us a measure of how prevalent these “hot-button” issues are on state corrections department web sites.
Table 5. Public Safety and Politically Sensitive Information
______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information: Number and Percent
______________________________________________________________________
Sex Offender 13 (50.0%)
Capital Punishment 15 (57.7%)
Death Row Roster 10 (38.5%)
Escapee Database 10 (38.5%)
Costs 19 (73.1%)
Prisoner 18 (69.2%)
Probation/Parole 7 (26.9%)
Community Corrections 6 (23.1%)
Restitution 4 (15.4%)
______________________________________________________________________
Thirteen (50%) of the web sites in this study had information about sex offenders, either material dealing with their confinement and treatment or actually listing them in a database, sometimes with pictures. Capital punishment was addressed on 15 (57.7%) of the web sites. Ten (38.5%) provided a death row roster that often included criminal history details. Some states actually listed every person that has been executed in the state’s history. In this presidential election year, capital punishment has already appeared as a major issue since Governor George W. Bush has presided over far more executions than any of the other governors. Support for capital punishment remains high among voters although recent exonerations of condemned inmates has cast some doubt on the whole process. An emerging position on the death penalty for politicians this year may go like this, “Tough enough to support the death penalty, but not bad enough to actually do it.” Evidence the fact that the number of death row inmates continues to grow with no likelihood at all of ever reducing the numbers. Nevertheless more than half of the states in this study displayed capital punishment information, a few a lot more prominently than the others did.
If you are not able to obtain information about escapes from a special news bulletin or ticker tape, 10 (38.5%) of the corrections web sites displayed an escapee database, nearly always with a picture, description, and other pertinent details.
Even in a strong economy, the general public is worried about the costs and conditions of confinement. Few people realize, however, the size and cost of the corrections enterprise. The state corrections systems are also interested in the public’s perception of what prison life is actually like. In short, the public doesn’t want prisoners to have it too good. Some of the state corrections web sites deal tactfully with this issue by giving a synopsis of what daily prison life is like. In Texas, for example, prisoners get up an hour or two earlier (3:30 AM) than in any of the other states and the web site lets you know that if you look around.
Nineteen (73.1%) of the web sites in this study listed the costs of confinement, probation and parole, or other community corrections methods. Eighteen (69.2%) identified the costs per prisoner or for the prison system itself. Seven (26.95) posted the costs for probation and parole services. Six (23.1%) had information on the costs of community corrections operations while 4 (15.4%) identified the amount of restitution prisoners made to victims and communities.
Aesthetic and Technological Features
The ability of the World Wide Web to distribute information, shape opinion, and facilitate commerce has grown astronomically since the first national Internet Service Provider (ISP) came on the scene in 1992. While most state department corrections web sites are not likely to win major awards for their aesthetic and navigation feature, some are indeed sophisticated sites. California, Ohio, and Florida are a few in the top tier. Hosting and maintaining a high-quality web site is not an easy task. Haley and Blough (1999) found in their study of police department web masters that they were proud of their work but often felt frustrated in trying to keep the site current and accurate. Table 6 lists aesthetic and technical features found on the web sites of the state corrections departments in this study.
Table 6. Aesthetic and Technological Features
______________________________________________________________________ Type of Information N Percent
_______________________________________________________________________
Pictures/Graphics/Art 22 (84.6%)
Audio 0 (0%)
Video Presentation 2 (7.7%)
Color Variety 20 (76.9%)
Virtual Reality 0 (0%)
Frames 9 (34.6%)
News Ticker 2 (7.7%)
Navigation Dialogue Box 6 (23.1%)
_______________________________________________________________________
Twenty-two (84.6%) of the corrections web sites contained pictures, graphics, or art work of some kind that added to the text features of the site. In this age of inexpensive web construction software, placing graphics on a web site is easy and you have to wonder why four of the sites excluded any graphics, pictures, or art work. It is also surprising that none (0%) of the sites contained any audio files, unlike some law enforcement web sites that contain music and audio welcome messages from the chief executive. Two (7.7%) contained a video presentation in the form of a slide show or a so-called virtual tour of institutions. None (0%) were actual virtual reality tours. Twenty (76.9%) displayed three or more colors on their web pages. To aid navigation throughout the site, 9 (34.6%) of the sites employed frames which allow the web surfer to save a lot of time by going to other sections of the web site from any page that they are viewing without having to go back to a start page or do a lot of scrolling. News tickers appeared on 2 (7.7%) of the corrections web sites. Six (23.1%) contained a navigation dialogue box permitting the site visitor to easily negotiate the shoals of a multi-layered web site.
Special Features
Exploring the Web can be fascinating and no less so when surfing the content of state corrections department home pages. The displays are, of course, meant to leave the web surfer or corrections professional with a positive image of the state’s prisons and community corrections agencies. Still there are surprises and oddities that can be discovered on these web sites that are, without doubt, little known facts and matters of interest to the student of corrections. Table 7 below lists some of these discoveries.
Table 7. Interesting and Unique Features Found on State Corrections Department
Web Sites
_______________________________________________________________________ Feature/Fact State Corrections Agency
_______________________________________________________________________
1. Only state with “rehabilitation” in its title Ohio
2. Lists last meal menus of condemned inmates Arizona, Texas
3. Lists every execution in state’s history Arizona, Oklahoma
4. Mother Teresa visited its Walpole Prison Massachusetts
5. Prison was site of governor’s radio show Minnesota
6. To stay modern, has a Technology Transfer Unit California
7. Posts lasts statement of condemned inmates Texas
8. One third of its executions since 1923 were for rape Maryland
9. Posts pictures of those executed California, North Carolina
10. Spanish language option for many web pages Arizona
11. Largest corrections system: $4.6 billion dollar California
budget; 45,852 employees; 162,381 inmates
12. Inmates have an arts and crafts web store Arizona
13. Notes January 8, 1997, as the day it executed three Arkansas
condemned murderers
14. Largest death row holding 555 inmates California
15. Has only braille machine repair service in West California
16. Has a corrections system ombudsman for inmates Texas
17. Has a diversity calendar for inmates and staff Washington
18. Posts all published articles of its agency director Ohio
19. Its public safety center contains a women’s prison, South Dakota
highway patrol post, sheriff’s department, city police
department, and state criminal investigation unit
20. Executes its inmates at a different location than Kansas
its death row to reduce death row staff stress
21. Inmates build a 768 sq.ft. house for $22,000 for all South Dakota
senior citizens who request it
_______________________________________________________________________
DISCUSSION
Public Relations
We should not be surprised to find that “virtual corrections” as found on the state department web sites in this study is indeed better than the “real corrections.” In almost every state you will clearly get the impression that inmates are fed well, live in safe and adequate housing, have a plethora of education and training opportunities, and have more chances for recreation than most of us, unless, of course, they are confined in the highest level of security. In “real corrections”, however, we would be able to see the cell extractions of recalcitrant inmates, hear the whining and screaming of those requiring mental health attention, or read the too infrequent reports of sexual assaults inside the walls. But prison is not so bad because in the last analysis how we live is always relative to how we perceive others living. The authors visited a Romanian prison in Bucharest in November 1999, and found conditions to be indeed Spartan in contrast to any prison in the United States. Yet in a society where the average income is about $100 a month and schoolteachers are on strike for $81 a month, Romanians also complain about the plush conditions of their prisoners’ existence.
While the onslaught of prison litigation has slowed in the United States, two decades of lawsuits have substantially improved the physical conditions of prison life. Any person is able to go to the state corrections web sites included in this study and find that half of the prisons from and exterior examination look far better than our nation’s schools. No federal courts are likely to be forcing the school systems to fix up their facilities. But those two big-ticket items, schools and prisons, are often competitors for the biggest portions of state budgets. Prisons have won in every encounter.
Politics have also strongly influenced the look of some state corrections departments’ web pages. In states such as Florida and Minnesota, where crime rates are relatively high, the governors actually appear on the corrections department web pages. Governor Jeb Bush’s picture is right next to the corrections director’s. In Minnesota, Governor Jesse Ventura’s picture is shown in the context of his broadcast of his radio show from prison. In seems that in states with high crime rates and prison populations, the governors want to be seen “minding the store” when it comes to public safety. It is very easy to tell also that Governor Bush is a strong advocate of capital punishment. The story of Florida’s electric chair controversy is easily located on the web site. In other states with the death penalty, but having few, if any, executions, the information is buried in some obscure location on the web site. This is an indication, no doubt, as to how troubling the death penalty is for Americans. We have it, but for the most part, we don’t do it. As people come to know more factual information about the death penalty and a strong, meaningful alternative to execution is offered, Bohm (1999) thinks that there is a possibility that the United States may cease with the punishment. In the last analysis, penality is always a balancing act (Lucken, 1998). The weight of the arguments on either side of the capital punishment debate is not static.
Corrections Technical Information
The state corrections department web sites in this study are rich depositories of technical information about corrections. Any undergraduate or graduate student will have at mouse click away annual reports, statistical studies, performance measures, department histories, innumerable charts and graphs, and newsletter and magazines reporting on almost every corrections topic imaginable. Spending time on these sites is an education. Some of the sites have thousands of pages and many more archived reports in PDF format.
One of the habits criminal justice professionals have is to inquire as to what is being done in a similar agency. By looking at another state’s web site they are able to glean a tome of information without making a phone call or traveling any farther than their department computers. “Would you mail me some information,” is a much less frequent request in corrections and law enforcement since the advent of storing information on the World Wide Web. Staying out front is a lot easier in the dot-com (dot-gov) society.
Distribution of Useful Information
The cost of mailing information to other corrections professionals, lawyers, judges, victims, and offenders’ families must have dropped drastically in the second half of the 1990’s. Not only is much of the information that is useful to those mentioned above available on a web site, but the information is easily updated and distributed.
On the other hand, the posting of staff names, phone numbers, addresses, and email listings has undoubtedly increased the communication between professional corrections staff and the community. As Internet access increases in the next several years, keeping up with the communications in corrections departments may be difficult. Police department web masters report that answering email inquiries alone consumes a large portion of their workday (Haley and Blough, 1999).
Finally, finding a corrections job is substantially easier than it once was. The jobs in corrections seem to be there for the asking. Connecticut was the only state with no positions available. Some states, such as Texas, had hundreds of openings.
CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
Maybe what we all seek on the World Wide Web is something better than our own stark reality. People design and post personal web pages and they are often straight braggadocio and exaggeration, as if now posted on the web, they can believe it. Others frequently communicate in chat rooms and stretch the truth about their background and achievements. Business web sites put forth an image of quality, value, and service that they can hardly live up to. Maybe it’s something to shoot for, or perhaps only crass marketing.
On the Web we seek an easier and better life. Virtually speaking, we can find it. We can shop where we do not go. We can see where we have not been. We can feel what we have not really experienced. The Web enables us. In the same way, virtual corrections may indeed be better than reality. The state corrections web sites in this study all portray a corrections system better than it probably is. After all, the web sites are critiqued by only the state corrections personnel themselves, yet still the web pages are rich in detailed and useful information for citizens, victims, inmate families, and corrections professionals.
What you may now routinely glean from most of the web sites in this study was nearly impossible to obtain just several years ago. No agency would have been able to offer so much information to so many people without the Web’s phenomenal capacity for distribution.
We can conclude from this study that the images portrayed of a state corrections system, its institutions, and its personnel are overwhelmingly positive. Citizens will also feel welcome in visiting the web site of their state corrections agency. They will also find that the state corrections enterprise appears well organized, efficient, and confident. As least, it will seem that way. If they want to know more about the care and custody of offenders in their state, the web site will have hundreds of pages of reports, inmate data, performance reviews, research studies, and other descriptive information for those who would care to examine them. Names, addresses, and phone numbers of corrections administrators are equally accessible. In most cases, attractive pictures of the institutions are available on nearly all of the sites that might leave a viewer wondering why prisoners would complain about the conditions of their confinement. If a web surfer just so happened to have recently visited one of the nation's many dilapidated school buildings, they may conclude that prisons aren’t all that bad. But still there is that problem of not being able to go home at night. With 2 million people in custody in the nation’s prisons and jails on any given day, we must believe that the costs of confinement are worth it.
The web sites in this study will also allow corrections professionals to have an opportunity to study their own state system, or another state’s. They also can find a plethora of employment vacancies in other states, knowledge in today’s economy that must frustrate corrections directors who are trying hard to locate and retain qualified staff.
Politically sensitive issues such as the death penalty and sex offenders are prominent on a state’s corrections agency home page, or they are latent. There does not seem to be a middle ground. But you will have no difficulty figuring out that the paramount value portrayed on all of the web sites is public safety. It is the first order of business in every mission statement. That should be comforting to all of us.
Three years ago computer and Internet technology was primitive in contrast to what is now possible with high speed processors and cable modems. In 1997, one of the authors completed his paper on “police stations in cyberspace” for an Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences meeting while watching the Superbowl on the World Wide Web by means of slides changing ever so infrequently. It was a primitive webcast. This year at about the same time, Merlin, the author’s talking and reading animated agent, sits on the computer screen, occasionally cracking jokes. Merlin also snores a little when he is not working. He reads and pronounces text in the English language from my email, my word-processing documents, and web pages better than most of us. Merlin helped proofread my paper. These kinds of animated characters are about to enter are world in force.
Negroponte (1995) forecasts that we will soon have hologram-like agents in our service who will do our word processing, web surfing, information and household management, and some of our home chores by ordering robots to do physical tasks. We will also be able to select the agent of our choice, adding language and personality features according to our mood and preferences. I recently chose Al Morale, another agent that sits on my desktop computer screen and quite frankly "sucks up," telling me in clear speech with animation how smart I look and how great my work is. That sort of occasionally comforting employee is getting harder and harder to find.
Finally Ursula Owre Masterson (2000) tells us about the long-awaited debut of Ananova, a digitally created beauty who will soon be reading the news on British online news sites. She will also soon be working as the "perfect go-between for man and machine," in other ways, even appearing on the screen of our web telephones. Ananova is billed as the Internet's first "synthespian."
In a few years it is very likely that a "virtual warden" may greet us as we log on to the web page of his institution. He will invite us on a personal tour of the prison, and, of course, insist that "our images" join him as we walk down the ranges and tiers of the institution. We will meet inmates and staff. We can try out solitary confinement. We can pick up reams of information about corrections. Then, when we are tired of visiting, we can thank the warden, check out back through the main sally port, disconnect, and leave. Welcome to "virtual corrections."
REFERENCES
Applegate, B, F. Cullen, and B. Fisher. 1997. “Public Support for Correctional Treatment: The Continuing Appeal of the Rehabilitative Ideal.” Prison Journal, September, pp. 237-259.
Associated Press. 2000. “Man Plans to Live a Year Online.” January 1.
Becker, K. 1997. “Internets, Extranets, Futurenets.” Corrections Today, August, pp. 74-79.
Bohm, R. 1999. Deathquest: An Introduction to the Theory and Practice of Capital Punishment in the United States. Cincinnati, OH: Anderson Publishing Company.
Clayton, S. 1997. “Are You on the Net Yet?” Corrections Today, August, pp. 64-67.
Dalton, E. 1997. “Leaders Convene to Assess Correctional Technology Needs.” Corrections Today, July, pp. 82-83.
Eckl, C. 1998. “The Cost of Corrections.” State Legislatures, February, pp. 30-34.
Gates, W. 1999. Business at the Speed of Thought.” New York, NY: Warner Books, Inc.
Gondles, J, Jr. 1999. “Corrections in the 21st Century.” Corrections Today, July, p. 6.
Halasz, I. 1997. “Internet Use in Education and Training.” Corrections Today, August, pp. 92-98.
Haley, K. and R. Taylor. 1998. “Police Stations in Cyberspace: A Content Analysis of Law Enforcement Agency Home Pages.” Pp. 125-147 in Criminal Justice Technology in the 21st Century, edited by L. Moriarity and D. Carter. Springfield, IL: Charles C Thomas Publishers.
Haley, K. and S. Blough. 1999. “Caught in the Web: The Pride and Perils of a Police Department Webmaster.” A paper presented at the annual meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, March, Orlando, Florida.
Heimberger, T. and L. Heimberger. 2000. “Virtual Panopticism.” A paper presented at the annual meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, March, New Orleans, Louisiana.
“How the Web Is Changing Presidential Campaigns.” Time.com, February 7. pp. 2-7.
Lohr, S. 1999. “The Internet Wears Out Its Welcome.” The New York Times, December 26.
Lucken, K. 1998. “Contemporary Penal Trends: Modern or Post Modern?” British Journal of Criminology, Winter 1998, pp. 106-124.
Masterson, U. 2000. “Coming Soon, Internet’s First Synthespian.” MSNBC.com, March 2.
Negroponte, N. 1995. Being Digital. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.
Noack, D. 1999. “Parole Notices Go Online.” APB news.com, October 22.
Streitfeld, D. 2000. “A Web of Workaholic Misfits.” The Washington Post, February 16, p. A01.
Wilkinson, R. 1998. “Best Practices: Tools for Correctional Excellence. Corrections Today,” October, pp. 56-58
Wolk, W. 2000. “For Web Users, Freedom Has Its Price.” MSNBC.com, January 17.
.
Sunday, November 19, 2006
SHOULD TAX DOLLARS FUND INMATE SEX CHANGE MEDICAL COSTS?
Should Tax Dollars Fund Inmate Sex Change Medical Costs?
Ronald Edwards
Article is copyrighted. All rights pertain.
Prison staff members arguably have the most difficult jobs in public service today. They must be flexible in their attempt to properly house, treat, and rehabilitate inmates in an effort to produce productive tax paying citizens upon release. The roles of prison staff fundamentally focus on society’s interest to advance retribution, incapacitation, rehabilitation, and restoration of society. Most inmates will re-enter society, hopefully, better prepared to successfully integrate into a community near you.
However, it is thought that in many cases it is futile to attempt to try to rehabilitate those that have never been habilitated to begin with. Prisons house some of society’s most incorrigible people. Additionally, prisons are home to the most socially and morally deficient persons in the populace. Society bears the expense for the care and treatment of over 2 million prisoners incarcerated in the nation.
This extraordinary chronicle will provide you an unusual and in-depth look into some of the serious challenges that prison staff are obliged to contend with, as they strive to advance the goals of the criminal justice system. Please keep an open mind as you consider the needs of the individual offender and the needs of society.
Persons who contravene the traditional ideologies of gender and sex through transgender sex reassignment surgery are now confronted with unexpected issues and consequences when they step into prison. Transgender is defined as a person who alters their biological birth sex through surgery or pharmaceutical enhancements. Those persons who chose to identify themselves as a member of the opposite sex, such as male to female (MtF) and female to male (FtM), are finding that many prison facilities are not prepared to accommodate the many treatment issues that the transgender inmate present. For instance, the transgender inmate in prison is at a potentially higher risk of assault or even self-injury than typically found in the prison general population. Prison can be a very dangerous environment for a transgender inmate. Such inmates are in need of special policies that will protect them from predatory inmates in the general prison population. Multiple legal and ethical issues confront correctional administrators in their duties to provide appropriate healthcare services to transgender inmates.
The decision for a person to change their sexual gender is a serious personal choice that involves a significant health risk. It is a personal decision that requires extensive pre and post psychological and medical treatment plans. People who elect to proceed with the transgender transformation processes are cognizant that they will need substantial monetary resources to completely finance such an expensive elective procedure. These “life-changing decisions” are extremely serious and may even present life-threatening ramifications if the proper pre and post psychological treatment and post medical care plan is not implemented prior to the initial surgery. In most cases multiple surgeries and extended post surgery hospitalization are required to complete the process. The expense of transgender reassignment surgery can cost anywhere from $6,000 to $8,000 overseas (Thailand and Europe) while the same surgery would cost $10,000 to $20,000 in the United States.
At any given time a transgender person enter the criminal justice system, be adjudicated, and sentenced to prison. Once processed and received at a prison reception facility, correctional healthcare administrators are confronted with the initial legal and ethical aspects of how to address these medical issues. Most correctional agencies mandate that a prison inmate’s current state of health will be maintained as assessed at the initial reception center’s medical diagnosis. Prison medical staff are obliged to determine if a transgender inmate has serious medical needs and if so, to provide at least some treatment. In the United States, unlike Canada, transgender inmates will be maintained only at the level of change which existed when entered the reception facility. The policy for the Federal Bureau of Prisons is to provide hormone therapy at the level that was maintained prior to being incarcerated.
Several States are embroiled in litigation by inmates who are striving to gain taxpayer funded sex change surgery while incarcerated. Wisconsin currently has a law that specifically prohibits the use of government funds to provide hormone therapy or sex reassignment surgery for inmates. Most correctional jurisdictions do not have policies or laws in place to address these cases, or if so, as interpreted, are limited in scope or are too ambiguous in content to cover the complicated issues that exist. Some states allow transgender inmates to receive hormone therapy while in custody. In 1994 alone, there were seventy inmates receiving hormone therapy treatments in New York State prisons and seventeen in the New York City jail system.
The general public is not aware of such legal, ethical, and controversial dilemmas involved in this public conflict unless the media happens to report a particular case. Here are the most perplexing questions:
What is enough standard of care?
What is appropriate gender care?
What care options should be continued?
How do you educate staff against transgender prejudice?
Is lack of treatment “deliberate indifference”?
Is it discrimination?
How should this be explained to the public?
Should taxpayers pay for psychological and medical maintenance of transgender inmates’ healthcare?
However the case, when correctional administrators and healthcare staff identify transgender inmates at reception medical staff should concur if the transgender crossover progression has surgically altered the inmate’s biological birth gender as MtF or FtM. If the medical determination is made that an inmate is surgically rendered MtF or FtM, the inmate will be transferred and housed in a facility consistent with their current gender identity. If the circumstances exist that the inmate is still considered to be his/her biological birth gender, the inmate would be sent to a facility consistent with that gender. Once the assessment is concluded, a collaborative treatment plan should be initiated involving both mental health and medical staff.
Transgender inmates can attract unneeded attention in general prison populations. The attention can actually disrupt the harmony of an institution. The presence of a MtF inmate in a male facility can pose serious security concerns, especially when their appearance, through hormone therapy or surgical alterations, render their appearance to be more feminine. Some MtFs welcome this attention. Most transgender inmates chose to lead open homosexual lifestyles and therefore increase the probability of becoming prey for inmates who engage in homosexual sex, whether consensual or not.
Healthcare administrators, nurses, mental healthcare staff, and correctional officers collectively have a legal and ethical responsibility in providing adequate care and the appropriate level of security to protect the inmate. If a transgender inmate is assaulted while incarcerated, legal claims could be brought against the correctional agency for “failure to protect.” “Failure to protect” suits are serious and have proven difficult to defend, often ending in costly settlements.
Many transgender inmates are classified and initially placed in “special housing” or protective custody status. Protective custody status placement is to protect both inmate and staff from incorrigible inmates who prey on vulnerable transgender subjects. However the isolation of transgender inmates has occasionally resulted in suicides, which indicates that psychological and psychiatric intervention may be necessary. Self-esteem is a serious and complex psychological issue for transgender inmates, thus monitoring for mental instability is essential. Additionally, separate toilet and private showering facilities are necessary.
The transgender inmate is provided continuous psychological counseling and medical examinations to further determine what “special needs” are applicable. Controversy erupts between staff and inmates when transgender prisoners begin to receive non-conventional care. In many cases transgender prisoners are prescribed brasseries to be worn as undergarments to support hormone altered breast tissue in an attempt to “to maintain and sustain the health” of the MtF inmate. Some cases require that the inmate be prescribed hormone therapy to stabilize the medically altered process of the transformation. In many cases, prison medical staff prescribes the same hormone therapy that the prisoner received prior to their incarceration. Hormonal treatments maintain the MtF inmate’s breast size, impedes the growth of facial hair, and other hormonal effects that are intended to promote a feminine appearance. FtM hormone therapy may achieve the opposite effects of MtF, i.e. growing chest hair, facial hair, voice change, attenuation of the testicles and other internal medicinal modifications. Only Wisconsin has legislated that no government funds will be used for transgender inmate hormone therapy. Medical staff are conscious that any cessation of a prior prescribed hormonal therapy plan (from the transgender’s physician prior to incarceration), could prove to be ethically, morally, legally, and mortally damaging. Termination of the transgender inmate’s treatment can cause them to develop more serious gender identity issues and could lead to suicide.
Is it morally, ethically, and legally proper for taxpayer funds to pay for the transgender inmate’s psychological and medical maintenance programs during their incarceration years? Unequivocally yes.
There has not been any substantial media coverage or public attention that has generated significant debate for such cases because of the “out of sight, out of mind” philosophy. But, if it is ever revealed that hundreds of thousands of dollars per year are spend individually on these type situations, the public outcry may be certain to reach political attention.
The transgender inmate will require special needs from prison healthcare staff. Prison populations are a realistic reflection of society; prisons are in fact a microcosm of our communities and culture. As in most correctional systems in this country, legislatures establish laws that mandate that all inmates must be treated fairly despite the crime they committed. A popular correctional cliché is that “inmates are sent to prison as punishment, not for punishment.” That cliché’ can easily be interpreted to reflect the civilized manner of treatment in which prison inmates have grown accustomed to in the United States. This has not always been society’s stance. Our modern point of view is the result of years of moral and ethical evolution created by litigious prison inmates through their near effortless access to the courts.
American prison ideology is distributed throughout undeveloped and developed nations of the world. That ideology includes how prisoners are to be treated and afforded basic privileges. Our government in its noble efforts promotes an ideology that says that basic rights should be afforded to each and every detainee. People in society are divided on this issue of providing services to the transgender inmate.
A prison population is reflective of our society in that it too has become a very litigious environment. Legally transgender issues are recognized as medical and psychological disorders. All professionals involved need be cognizant that failure to provide appropriate care and treatment to transgender inmates may lead to malpractice or human rights abuse claims.
The conclusion is that there is no way out of providing medical and psychological maintenance programs for transgender inmates. It’s simply a legal necessity regardless of the extraordinary expensive. I am not saying that taxpayer funds should be used for transgender surgeries nor for other such controversial elective procedures. What I am saying is that we cannot in good conscious avoid spending money on the maintenance of procedures that were implemented prior to incarceration.
Our society strives to advance civilized philosophies. Having worked a year as the former U.S. corrections advisor to the Republic of Haiti I observed first hand that the prison conditions there lack many of the things that we take for granted in the United States. To quote yet another cliché “you can tell the advancement of a society, by the operations of its prisons”. Our highly cultured American society will continue to preserve its worldly and sophisticated way of life and culture. The majority of our people are a caring and giving culture and even in this eccentric correctional issue there is some redemption for doing the right thing.
Reference:
“Transgender Inmates” No. 168 by Jake Blight; Trends and Issues: In Crime and Criminal Justice, Australian Institute of Criminology, September 2000
Ronald Edwards
Article is copyrighted. All rights pertain.
Prison staff members arguably have the most difficult jobs in public service today. They must be flexible in their attempt to properly house, treat, and rehabilitate inmates in an effort to produce productive tax paying citizens upon release. The roles of prison staff fundamentally focus on society’s interest to advance retribution, incapacitation, rehabilitation, and restoration of society. Most inmates will re-enter society, hopefully, better prepared to successfully integrate into a community near you.
However, it is thought that in many cases it is futile to attempt to try to rehabilitate those that have never been habilitated to begin with. Prisons house some of society’s most incorrigible people. Additionally, prisons are home to the most socially and morally deficient persons in the populace. Society bears the expense for the care and treatment of over 2 million prisoners incarcerated in the nation.
This extraordinary chronicle will provide you an unusual and in-depth look into some of the serious challenges that prison staff are obliged to contend with, as they strive to advance the goals of the criminal justice system. Please keep an open mind as you consider the needs of the individual offender and the needs of society.
Persons who contravene the traditional ideologies of gender and sex through transgender sex reassignment surgery are now confronted with unexpected issues and consequences when they step into prison. Transgender is defined as a person who alters their biological birth sex through surgery or pharmaceutical enhancements. Those persons who chose to identify themselves as a member of the opposite sex, such as male to female (MtF) and female to male (FtM), are finding that many prison facilities are not prepared to accommodate the many treatment issues that the transgender inmate present. For instance, the transgender inmate in prison is at a potentially higher risk of assault or even self-injury than typically found in the prison general population. Prison can be a very dangerous environment for a transgender inmate. Such inmates are in need of special policies that will protect them from predatory inmates in the general prison population. Multiple legal and ethical issues confront correctional administrators in their duties to provide appropriate healthcare services to transgender inmates.
The decision for a person to change their sexual gender is a serious personal choice that involves a significant health risk. It is a personal decision that requires extensive pre and post psychological and medical treatment plans. People who elect to proceed with the transgender transformation processes are cognizant that they will need substantial monetary resources to completely finance such an expensive elective procedure. These “life-changing decisions” are extremely serious and may even present life-threatening ramifications if the proper pre and post psychological treatment and post medical care plan is not implemented prior to the initial surgery. In most cases multiple surgeries and extended post surgery hospitalization are required to complete the process. The expense of transgender reassignment surgery can cost anywhere from $6,000 to $8,000 overseas (Thailand and Europe) while the same surgery would cost $10,000 to $20,000 in the United States.
At any given time a transgender person enter the criminal justice system, be adjudicated, and sentenced to prison. Once processed and received at a prison reception facility, correctional healthcare administrators are confronted with the initial legal and ethical aspects of how to address these medical issues. Most correctional agencies mandate that a prison inmate’s current state of health will be maintained as assessed at the initial reception center’s medical diagnosis. Prison medical staff are obliged to determine if a transgender inmate has serious medical needs and if so, to provide at least some treatment. In the United States, unlike Canada, transgender inmates will be maintained only at the level of change which existed when entered the reception facility. The policy for the Federal Bureau of Prisons is to provide hormone therapy at the level that was maintained prior to being incarcerated.
Several States are embroiled in litigation by inmates who are striving to gain taxpayer funded sex change surgery while incarcerated. Wisconsin currently has a law that specifically prohibits the use of government funds to provide hormone therapy or sex reassignment surgery for inmates. Most correctional jurisdictions do not have policies or laws in place to address these cases, or if so, as interpreted, are limited in scope or are too ambiguous in content to cover the complicated issues that exist. Some states allow transgender inmates to receive hormone therapy while in custody. In 1994 alone, there were seventy inmates receiving hormone therapy treatments in New York State prisons and seventeen in the New York City jail system.
The general public is not aware of such legal, ethical, and controversial dilemmas involved in this public conflict unless the media happens to report a particular case. Here are the most perplexing questions:
What is enough standard of care?
What is appropriate gender care?
What care options should be continued?
How do you educate staff against transgender prejudice?
Is lack of treatment “deliberate indifference”?
Is it discrimination?
How should this be explained to the public?
Should taxpayers pay for psychological and medical maintenance of transgender inmates’ healthcare?
However the case, when correctional administrators and healthcare staff identify transgender inmates at reception medical staff should concur if the transgender crossover progression has surgically altered the inmate’s biological birth gender as MtF or FtM. If the medical determination is made that an inmate is surgically rendered MtF or FtM, the inmate will be transferred and housed in a facility consistent with their current gender identity. If the circumstances exist that the inmate is still considered to be his/her biological birth gender, the inmate would be sent to a facility consistent with that gender. Once the assessment is concluded, a collaborative treatment plan should be initiated involving both mental health and medical staff.
Transgender inmates can attract unneeded attention in general prison populations. The attention can actually disrupt the harmony of an institution. The presence of a MtF inmate in a male facility can pose serious security concerns, especially when their appearance, through hormone therapy or surgical alterations, render their appearance to be more feminine. Some MtFs welcome this attention. Most transgender inmates chose to lead open homosexual lifestyles and therefore increase the probability of becoming prey for inmates who engage in homosexual sex, whether consensual or not.
Healthcare administrators, nurses, mental healthcare staff, and correctional officers collectively have a legal and ethical responsibility in providing adequate care and the appropriate level of security to protect the inmate. If a transgender inmate is assaulted while incarcerated, legal claims could be brought against the correctional agency for “failure to protect.” “Failure to protect” suits are serious and have proven difficult to defend, often ending in costly settlements.
Many transgender inmates are classified and initially placed in “special housing” or protective custody status. Protective custody status placement is to protect both inmate and staff from incorrigible inmates who prey on vulnerable transgender subjects. However the isolation of transgender inmates has occasionally resulted in suicides, which indicates that psychological and psychiatric intervention may be necessary. Self-esteem is a serious and complex psychological issue for transgender inmates, thus monitoring for mental instability is essential. Additionally, separate toilet and private showering facilities are necessary.
The transgender inmate is provided continuous psychological counseling and medical examinations to further determine what “special needs” are applicable. Controversy erupts between staff and inmates when transgender prisoners begin to receive non-conventional care. In many cases transgender prisoners are prescribed brasseries to be worn as undergarments to support hormone altered breast tissue in an attempt to “to maintain and sustain the health” of the MtF inmate. Some cases require that the inmate be prescribed hormone therapy to stabilize the medically altered process of the transformation. In many cases, prison medical staff prescribes the same hormone therapy that the prisoner received prior to their incarceration. Hormonal treatments maintain the MtF inmate’s breast size, impedes the growth of facial hair, and other hormonal effects that are intended to promote a feminine appearance. FtM hormone therapy may achieve the opposite effects of MtF, i.e. growing chest hair, facial hair, voice change, attenuation of the testicles and other internal medicinal modifications. Only Wisconsin has legislated that no government funds will be used for transgender inmate hormone therapy. Medical staff are conscious that any cessation of a prior prescribed hormonal therapy plan (from the transgender’s physician prior to incarceration), could prove to be ethically, morally, legally, and mortally damaging. Termination of the transgender inmate’s treatment can cause them to develop more serious gender identity issues and could lead to suicide.
Is it morally, ethically, and legally proper for taxpayer funds to pay for the transgender inmate’s psychological and medical maintenance programs during their incarceration years? Unequivocally yes.
There has not been any substantial media coverage or public attention that has generated significant debate for such cases because of the “out of sight, out of mind” philosophy. But, if it is ever revealed that hundreds of thousands of dollars per year are spend individually on these type situations, the public outcry may be certain to reach political attention.
The transgender inmate will require special needs from prison healthcare staff. Prison populations are a realistic reflection of society; prisons are in fact a microcosm of our communities and culture. As in most correctional systems in this country, legislatures establish laws that mandate that all inmates must be treated fairly despite the crime they committed. A popular correctional cliché is that “inmates are sent to prison as punishment, not for punishment.” That cliché’ can easily be interpreted to reflect the civilized manner of treatment in which prison inmates have grown accustomed to in the United States. This has not always been society’s stance. Our modern point of view is the result of years of moral and ethical evolution created by litigious prison inmates through their near effortless access to the courts.
American prison ideology is distributed throughout undeveloped and developed nations of the world. That ideology includes how prisoners are to be treated and afforded basic privileges. Our government in its noble efforts promotes an ideology that says that basic rights should be afforded to each and every detainee. People in society are divided on this issue of providing services to the transgender inmate.
A prison population is reflective of our society in that it too has become a very litigious environment. Legally transgender issues are recognized as medical and psychological disorders. All professionals involved need be cognizant that failure to provide appropriate care and treatment to transgender inmates may lead to malpractice or human rights abuse claims.
The conclusion is that there is no way out of providing medical and psychological maintenance programs for transgender inmates. It’s simply a legal necessity regardless of the extraordinary expensive. I am not saying that taxpayer funds should be used for transgender surgeries nor for other such controversial elective procedures. What I am saying is that we cannot in good conscious avoid spending money on the maintenance of procedures that were implemented prior to incarceration.
Our society strives to advance civilized philosophies. Having worked a year as the former U.S. corrections advisor to the Republic of Haiti I observed first hand that the prison conditions there lack many of the things that we take for granted in the United States. To quote yet another cliché “you can tell the advancement of a society, by the operations of its prisons”. Our highly cultured American society will continue to preserve its worldly and sophisticated way of life and culture. The majority of our people are a caring and giving culture and even in this eccentric correctional issue there is some redemption for doing the right thing.
Reference:
“Transgender Inmates” No. 168 by Jake Blight; Trends and Issues: In Crime and Criminal Justice, Australian Institute of Criminology, September 2000
SHOULD CSI ENTHUSIASTS SERVE ON JURIES?
Should CSI Enthusiasts Serve on Juries?
Stacie Suemoto
Article is copyrighted. All rights pertain.
Almost since the inception of television itself, viewers have been intrigued with various aspects of the criminal justice system. When I was growing up shows like Perry Mason, Adam12 and Quincy M.D. were popular. As time progressed viewers began to want more realism in their viewing. Special effects were commonplace in movies and now they were being used in television shows. Law and Order became the first big criminal justice program spawning 2 spin-offs that displayed various law enforcement divisions (Special Victims Unit and Major Case Squad). People could watch a crime from its reporting; follow the detectives through their investigation, right through the arrest of the guilty party. The next half hour showed us what goes on behind the scenes at the prosecutor’s office.
Fast forward a few years and we have CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. For the first time people could watch what crime scene investigators look for at a scene and how evidence is collected. After the mound of evidence is collected it is taken to the lab for detailed testing. Gone are the days when Quincy’s side kick Sam just peers into the microscope for helpful clues. Now there are high tech computer programs to enhance images (photographic or digital), on-site DNA testing, use of entomology, AFIS for instant fingerprint comparison, ballistics testing, dental and shoe print comparison software plus much, much more. Reenactments both in and out of the autopsy room allow us to see the actual crime take place and what actually killed the person. Was she pushed by her adoring new husband or did she accidentally fall off that cliff bumping her head repeatedly on the way to the bottom? Was the tyrannical mother of the bride dead before she was tied to the bumper of the 1955 Chevy Bel Air the bride and groom are driving off in?
From the time a crime scene is located in one 45 minute episode it is solved. There is little waiting in line for test results, just stop into an office and ask for the results, magically some of them happen to be printing out at that same moment. The CSI’s get to talk to witnesses and suspects. Collecting more evidence and getting answers along the way. Finally, the case is solved; the guilty admit their involvement and it’s case closed.
The record viewers for this program and its spin-offs CSI: Miami and CSI: NY have created a new television programming trend. We can now see Criminal Minds where the FBI uses behavior analysis to catch criminals, Bones where forensic anthropology is used and Justice where defense attorneys manipulate the criminal justice system for high profile and very rich clients. Dr. Michael Baden recounts his most memorable cases on HBO in Autopsy #1-11. In fact, over 73 million people tuned into the top 3 broadcast television crime shows in one week alone.
One can ask what is the harm in viewing these programs and what does it have to do with real life jury selection? In real life, testing takes time. It is estimated that over 200-300,000 DNA samples are backlogged for testing. It takes months for results. Time of death can’t be determined to within 30 minutes or less of actual death. Toxicology results take months. Crime labs are under-funded and can’t produce the results that are seen on TV. Sometimes forensic scientists make mistakes such as those in the high profile OJ Simpson case or sometimes results are fabricated. Investigators are not infallible and they do not look for every type of evidence at a scene when it doesn’t apply to the crime for “just in case” scenarios.
There has been much debate about the effects of these fictional shows on the jurors. Prior to this viewing trend, people watching the progress of the OJ Simpson trial had never really heard about DNA testing. Some felt the jurors were asked to make a decision based upon science that they couldn’t understand. It was too much detail and there were too many mistakes. Fast forward to the Robert Blake case where jurors felt there wasn’t enough direct evidence. In fact, jurors, who were asked, said they wondered why there weren’t fingerprints on the gun, why there wasn’t gunshot residue on Blake’s hands and why the eyewitness couldn’t be more precise. According to Joshua Marquis, an Oregon prosecutor, “prosecutors across the country are very concerned about this." Marquis found it disturbing that Blake jurors "seemed very dismissive of circumstantial evidence," he said. "Well, guess what? In most cases, ... you don't have physical evidence."
Prosecutors are seeing what is being coined the “CSI Effect”. Jurors have unrealistic expectations. They expect the prosecutors to put on an entertaining presentation of the case and they expect to be provided with mounds of infallible evidence linking the person to the crime. In fact, in one case with a confession, the jurors asked why they didn’t test a piece of evidence for DNA. There was a confession, means, motive and opportunity, so it was unnecessary. It’s making cases difficult to win if there is an absence of physical evidence. Prosecutors are being placed in the position where they have to explain why they didn’t run certain tests or why certain evidence is absent from the case. This is called “negative evidence witness”. ”If there are no fingerprints in evidence, more prosecutors are asking investigators to explain why, lest jurors take their absence as cause for doubt.” (Roane, K.) There are more and more incidences where jurors have questioned cases. In Phoenix a jury asked a judge why DNA testing wasn’t done on a jacket. It wasn’t done because the defendant admitted to being at the scene. In Virginia a jury asked the judge why testing wasn’t done on a cigarette butt found at the scene. It was in fact ordered, but the results hadn’t been entered into evidence. The DNA evidence exonerated the defendant. Now, Massachusetts allows prospective jurors’ TV viewing habits to be questioned by prosecutors.
In my opinion, prospective jurors who watch forensic television programs should be exempted from jury duty. A juror’s only requirement is to look for the truth. Preconceived ideas about forensic science bias any potential juror. They expect to find mountains of infallible forensic information. They have unrealistic expectations of what the science behind the cases can show or how it should be interpreted. Cases have to be adjusted to fill in knowledge gaps or to show why certain forensic evidence or testing was not used. This increases the chances that either side can manipulate the jurors. Jurors lose sight of their main goal, to be fair and impartial.
References:
Roane, K. R. The CSI Effect. US News and World Report. Retrieved from
www.usnews.com.
Willing, R. “CSI effect” has juries wanting more evidence. USA Today. Retrieved from
http://www.usatoday.com/.
Stacie Suemoto
Article is copyrighted. All rights pertain.
Almost since the inception of television itself, viewers have been intrigued with various aspects of the criminal justice system. When I was growing up shows like Perry Mason, Adam12 and Quincy M.D. were popular. As time progressed viewers began to want more realism in their viewing. Special effects were commonplace in movies and now they were being used in television shows. Law and Order became the first big criminal justice program spawning 2 spin-offs that displayed various law enforcement divisions (Special Victims Unit and Major Case Squad). People could watch a crime from its reporting; follow the detectives through their investigation, right through the arrest of the guilty party. The next half hour showed us what goes on behind the scenes at the prosecutor’s office.
Fast forward a few years and we have CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. For the first time people could watch what crime scene investigators look for at a scene and how evidence is collected. After the mound of evidence is collected it is taken to the lab for detailed testing. Gone are the days when Quincy’s side kick Sam just peers into the microscope for helpful clues. Now there are high tech computer programs to enhance images (photographic or digital), on-site DNA testing, use of entomology, AFIS for instant fingerprint comparison, ballistics testing, dental and shoe print comparison software plus much, much more. Reenactments both in and out of the autopsy room allow us to see the actual crime take place and what actually killed the person. Was she pushed by her adoring new husband or did she accidentally fall off that cliff bumping her head repeatedly on the way to the bottom? Was the tyrannical mother of the bride dead before she was tied to the bumper of the 1955 Chevy Bel Air the bride and groom are driving off in?
From the time a crime scene is located in one 45 minute episode it is solved. There is little waiting in line for test results, just stop into an office and ask for the results, magically some of them happen to be printing out at that same moment. The CSI’s get to talk to witnesses and suspects. Collecting more evidence and getting answers along the way. Finally, the case is solved; the guilty admit their involvement and it’s case closed.
The record viewers for this program and its spin-offs CSI: Miami and CSI: NY have created a new television programming trend. We can now see Criminal Minds where the FBI uses behavior analysis to catch criminals, Bones where forensic anthropology is used and Justice where defense attorneys manipulate the criminal justice system for high profile and very rich clients. Dr. Michael Baden recounts his most memorable cases on HBO in Autopsy #1-11. In fact, over 73 million people tuned into the top 3 broadcast television crime shows in one week alone.
One can ask what is the harm in viewing these programs and what does it have to do with real life jury selection? In real life, testing takes time. It is estimated that over 200-300,000 DNA samples are backlogged for testing. It takes months for results. Time of death can’t be determined to within 30 minutes or less of actual death. Toxicology results take months. Crime labs are under-funded and can’t produce the results that are seen on TV. Sometimes forensic scientists make mistakes such as those in the high profile OJ Simpson case or sometimes results are fabricated. Investigators are not infallible and they do not look for every type of evidence at a scene when it doesn’t apply to the crime for “just in case” scenarios.
There has been much debate about the effects of these fictional shows on the jurors. Prior to this viewing trend, people watching the progress of the OJ Simpson trial had never really heard about DNA testing. Some felt the jurors were asked to make a decision based upon science that they couldn’t understand. It was too much detail and there were too many mistakes. Fast forward to the Robert Blake case where jurors felt there wasn’t enough direct evidence. In fact, jurors, who were asked, said they wondered why there weren’t fingerprints on the gun, why there wasn’t gunshot residue on Blake’s hands and why the eyewitness couldn’t be more precise. According to Joshua Marquis, an Oregon prosecutor, “prosecutors across the country are very concerned about this." Marquis found it disturbing that Blake jurors "seemed very dismissive of circumstantial evidence," he said. "Well, guess what? In most cases, ... you don't have physical evidence."
Prosecutors are seeing what is being coined the “CSI Effect”. Jurors have unrealistic expectations. They expect the prosecutors to put on an entertaining presentation of the case and they expect to be provided with mounds of infallible evidence linking the person to the crime. In fact, in one case with a confession, the jurors asked why they didn’t test a piece of evidence for DNA. There was a confession, means, motive and opportunity, so it was unnecessary. It’s making cases difficult to win if there is an absence of physical evidence. Prosecutors are being placed in the position where they have to explain why they didn’t run certain tests or why certain evidence is absent from the case. This is called “negative evidence witness”. ”If there are no fingerprints in evidence, more prosecutors are asking investigators to explain why, lest jurors take their absence as cause for doubt.” (Roane, K.) There are more and more incidences where jurors have questioned cases. In Phoenix a jury asked a judge why DNA testing wasn’t done on a jacket. It wasn’t done because the defendant admitted to being at the scene. In Virginia a jury asked the judge why testing wasn’t done on a cigarette butt found at the scene. It was in fact ordered, but the results hadn’t been entered into evidence. The DNA evidence exonerated the defendant. Now, Massachusetts allows prospective jurors’ TV viewing habits to be questioned by prosecutors.
In my opinion, prospective jurors who watch forensic television programs should be exempted from jury duty. A juror’s only requirement is to look for the truth. Preconceived ideas about forensic science bias any potential juror. They expect to find mountains of infallible forensic information. They have unrealistic expectations of what the science behind the cases can show or how it should be interpreted. Cases have to be adjusted to fill in knowledge gaps or to show why certain forensic evidence or testing was not used. This increases the chances that either side can manipulate the jurors. Jurors lose sight of their main goal, to be fair and impartial.
References:
Roane, K. R. The CSI Effect. US News and World Report. Retrieved from
www.usnews.com.
Willing, R. “CSI effect” has juries wanting more evidence. USA Today. Retrieved from
http://www.usatoday.com/.
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