Options
Prisoners banned from receiving books
TheTruth1983
Posts: 13,462 Forum Member
✭✭
This is probably one of the worst ideas I have come across in relation to dealing with prisoners.
Books are a vital rehabilitation tool because they help prisoners to improve their knowledge and gain skills that will help them re-integrate into society when they are released. Preventing that is just going to increase their risk of re-offending.
Books are a vital rehabilitation tool because they help prisoners to improve their knowledge and gain skills that will help them re-integrate into society when they are released. Preventing that is just going to increase their risk of re-offending.
0
Comments
It's only Cat D and some Cat C prisons that allow books to be sent in for prisoners. Some governors allow it and some don't. They have their reasons - primarily related to security and good order & discipline. The rules are overall quite draconian. You can get books from the prison library.
Mostly if someone sends a book in for you it ends up in your box in the stores and you get to see it when you are released or sent to a prison with a more relaxed regime.
Depends on the book, really.
Agatha Christie might give them some ideas on how to not get caught the next time.:D
Hmmm, not getting ideas for ingenious murders based on nursery rhymes might help.
I agree with the OP though. I'm not sure what is involved in the prison library service, but books surely tend to lead to peace and harmony. I doubt whether anyone has ever been stabbed with an impromptu knife over ownership of a book. .
I suspect however that as has been mentioned they'll have access to the prison library, and possibly able to get books from an approved supplier or purchased via prison staff (IIRC the "games consoles" you see the papers making a fuss about are usually purchased by the Prisoners own money, but via a member of staff going to an Argos or similar and getting an approved model).
This is where the prison guards have to do their jobs and make sure that does not happen.
You've never read any Dan Brown, have you?:p
Besides, the pen is mightier than the sword.
Or something.
How are prisoners even earning money in the first place?
I don't know about others, but here's one I know: http://www.finecellwork.co.uk/shop
They have paid jobs in prison like cleaning or cooking that can earn them as much as £10 a week.
You mean like rip the books completely apart?
As that's the only way to make sure they haven't got something hidden in there, you can get very thin ceramic blades that won't show up with a metal detector...
You'd need to run every single book past:
An x-ray machine - with qualified and experienced operator who is used to finding all sorts of contraband (good luck there, airports who have used such devices for decades and whose operators check tens of thousands of packages a day have, in random checks missed all sorts).
A metal detector with variable sensitivity (and possibly have it set off by anti theft tags).
Dogs who can check for various sorts of drugs (IIRC most drug dogs are trained to pick up on one or two families of drug).
Then the other checks...
Yeah, I suspect that restricting higher risk prisoners to books that have been brought in by the Prison is going to be far cheaper and more reliable.
You can't be too careful.
I used to be in correspondence with a prisoner in a high security prison in the states, he could receive only paper back books because they are almost impossible to hide anything inside. Birthday cards are another thing that have to be torn apart by the guards.
I cannot imagine why our prisons will not allow paper backs, as another poster said, books are a major source of knowledge.
One thing I always look forward to when I go to Butlins is having my friends and family send me books to read.
Hi di Hi.
I assume this is the kind of literature that most appeals to our incarcerated friends:
http://a5.mzstatic.com/us/r30/Publication/5d/e6/6a/mzi.sjsnzsna.225x225-75.jpg
I read that as Noddy.
Bloody Enid Blyton has a lot to answer for
That reminds me of a time I really put my foot in it. I was around my friends house and her boyfriend was due in court in the morning facing possible jail time. I told him to relax and take his mind of it he should play this game I was hooked on called Jail Break. You know when the words are out of your mouth before you even realise ....
Have you ever been in a prison library? I'm guessing not by that comment.
They are woefully stocked and are usually accessible only for a couple of hours a week. Many will only see the inside of the library during induction.
They can order books - yes, but generally these will take ages to come; probably be the wrong ones and more often than not will have pages missing and/or be filthy.
The banning of books is part of a larger measure of stopping parcels in general. Contrary to claims, this is not to do with security but changes to the incentives and earned privileges scheme. Other stuff banned include birthday cards made by children for their parents in prison. It is vindictive and stupid.
Of all the parcels sent to prison, how many are found to have contraband?
(Clue - it is miniscule).
The vast majority of prohibited items found in prison are likely there because of corrupt prison officers.
Children are not allowed to send a homemade birthday card.