Prison report: No accountability

Pub date October 6, 2009
WriterTim Redmond
SectionPolitics Blog

By Just A Guy

Editors note: Just A Guy is an inmate in a California state prison. His dispatches run twice a week.

By Just A Guy

There are a lot of things I would like to talk about, to be more explicit about, but fear of retaliation stops me, for now.

One of the things I find disconcerting is how many of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation staff and administrators have the ability to lie to cover up things without any thought of being held accountable. CDCR’s staff are able to do whatever they want, with impunity, because they believe that most people just don’t care what happens to inmates.

Sadly, this belief is mostly true — they can lie, cover up, spend your money and do whatever they want to inmates. They can, and they do.

When the jailer becomes guilty of the same sins as the jailed, but is allowed to continue because he or she is “just doing it to inmates” something is fundamentally flawed.

Some of the CDCR staff justify their behavior because it’s the only way many of them can sleep at night. The fact is that if you do things at the expense of others for personal gain or to protect yourself you are wrong, just as most of us were wrong in the crimes we committed that hurt other people and landed us in prison.

“People are sent to prison as punishment, not for punishment.”

How can the same people that say they are protecting the public use diabolical means and excuses to do whatever they want to inmates, but not be judged for it?

What makes those people at CDCR guilty of such acts exempt from investigation or suspicion? I guess Abu Ghraib is okay when it’s inmates in California.