“He needs a beatdown.”
Many incarcerated people have heard prison staff utter those words. The mere suggestion of a beating causes residents to pause, lose their breath and wonder who the threat is directed at.
They might think, “I hope those words aren’t about me,” as they grapple with a sad reality: Abuse and retaliation by prison staff is systemic. In one study of nearly 7,000 inmates across 12 state prison systems, 21% reported at least one incident of physical assault at the hands of prison staff.
The impact from this misconduct is wide-ranging and stifles people’s growth and rehabilitation inside prisons. And there are few pathways for protection or recourse against abusive staff.
In most cases, staff can justify and get away with their behavior on the basis of a few common excuses:
“They’re inmates.”
“No one’s going to believe them.”
“We have lawyers. We are above the law.”
There are a variety of ways incarcerated people experience abuse from staff, including assault; theft or destruction of one’s property; a failure to protect incarcerated people; or other failures to perform their duties. Other forms of retaliation include residents being moved to another unit, losing their job, or being denied a right or privilege.
Some staff engage in retaliation themselves, while others simply spread rumors among the prison population, claiming a resident is an informant, which can make that resident vulnerable to harm.
Many staff will support abuse, or refuse to report it or otherwise disclose the truth. For example, one staffer at my prison agreed to file a false disciplinary report because a supervisor asked him to, according to emails that I’ve seen.
In another situation, nearly every prisoner who wrote grievances at one living unit were moved to another unit. The investigator claimed it wasn’t retaliation because they were moved in a group.
While residents may have legal recourse, most have no legal training and no access to judicial opinions. Residents may also wade through court proceedings alone, which is a daunting task, even for the most seasoned litigant. A claim of retaliation is easy to allege but very difficult to prove.
On the other hand, prison officials, armed with lawyers, often get away with their behavior. As this pattern of behavior continues, it emboldens staff to continue. Even if caught, they rarely receive any real discipline beyond: “Be more careful next time.”
I’ve not only seen acts of retaliation and heard stories about it from others — I’ve experienced it myself. I was issued a false disciplinary report, found guilty, sanctioned, moved to a maximum security unit, then sent to another unit. Because of this, I lost my job, pay, property and friends. And I had to endure fear of additional reprisal by prison employees.
I filed a formal grievance and the prison used its informal process to “resolve” the retaliation complaints. Eventually the prison dismissed my disciplinary report, but I had already served the sanctions.
In response, my complaint was emailed to one of the retaliators — a staff member — who in turn forwarded it to another staff member with the words: “He needs a beatdown.” That beatdown never happened, but the entire experience was still harmful.
Retaliation from staff is scary, unnerving and hampers our growth in prison. They are supposed to protect our rights. We know that we may be moved or beaten, or that we’ll lose our job or friends. That forces many of us to remain silent and never advocate for ourselves. These often result in prisoners, as a whole, acting out in negative ways.
What staff does to us doesn’t have to be where the story ends. We can each come together and challenge the status quo through the legal process. I currently have pending litigation connected to the mistreatment I have experienced in prison, and the fact that staff have never faced any consequences for it. I believe courts will listen if we present the facts by working together toward a common good.
People return to prison for two main reasons: because they didn’t change their mindset, or their previous incarceration didn’t contain an environment conducive to change. The way a person is treated on the inside affects their behavior on the outside.
Learning to accept that reality and changing those two things will help you to return to society as a productive and accountable person. But residents alone shouldn’t be held accountable for their actions — staff should be too.