Corruption In Prisons

Prisons being a contained environment is prone to inmate abuse because it is somehow shielded from the public eye. The matter is made worse because of the public’s little or no interest in what goes on behind the prions wall; the public lackadaisical attitude towards what goes on in prison might not be unconnected with the widely held belief that whatever pains and anguish that inmates experience was “brought it on themselves. “(Souryal, 2009. P. 21). Little wonder, they become more dangerous when they are released. According to a Georgia state legislator in the ongoing public hearing on parole process, “among less than 3% of all criminals who are paroled, 152 of whom have been re-arrested since the beginning of 2016, and 24 of whom were convicted of a new violent crime since last year” (WSAV, 2016). This statistic confirm that something is not right within the prison system. The above stated reason might explain why prison corruption and abuse thrives.
Survey conducted by Stohr, Hemmens, Kifer, & Schoeler, (2000), showed that the jail and female correctional staff were more likely to score higher on the possible responses on the ethics summary variable. The lesser scores for prison staff may be …show more content…
(Souryal, 2009. P. 21). The question remains, ‘how do we ensure an ethical work environment’ in such a contained environment as prison. Souryal (2009) states, “the more ethical the work, the lower the chances the workers will be corrupt” (p. 27). Achieving civility in prison according to Souryal (2009), will require a robust anticorruption program based on upgrading the quality of correctional personnel, ensuring quality-based rather than the traditional quantity-based supervision, strengthening fiscal controls, and emphasizing true ethical