Earlier this month Prisoners in North Carolina received notification (attached below) that new restrictions would be placed on their trust fund accounts (prisoner’s version of a bank account). The new policy once instated would limit their ability to receive funds from those on the outside to only the people on their visitation list effecting over 38,000 people incarcerated North Carolina. Knowing that prisoners already have very little access to consistent streams of revenue, aside from working a very low paying job or receiving funds from the outside, there is no other way for someone who is incarcerated to do earn money. The jobs offered to incarcerated people are few and far between, many positions even have a waitlist. Even after getting hired in prison, inmates are constantly under the threat of losing it due to retaliation from their behavior.
Poverty Breeds Violence not Safety
The job market is so competitive in prison that anything could result in losing a job, especially with dozens of others ready to take the position. I had a friend in Michigan’s Department of Corrections who lost his job as a dog trainer and was transferred when he told an officer not to pet his puppy. Because of these volatile and unstable conditions, many prisoners depend on those on the outside to send them money. Those include people that they may have went to school with, family members, friends and even strangers willing to lend a helping hand in a crucial time of need. Prisoners are creative in the way that the raise funds for themselves, some even start businesses selling art, writing poetry or providing services like cooking food for or styling hair for fellow inmates. Restricting the ways that inmates can receive money, only works to oppress them and restrict their ability to participate in what little enterprise that they have available in their environment .
To bring in the New Year administrators from the North Carolina Department of Public Safety notified prisoners that “Effective February 5, 2019, Prisons will restrict depositors into JPay to only those identified as approved visitors, for that offender.” The department stated that this was an attempt to limit the, “probability of offender on offender assaults”. Unfortunately the illusion of ‘Safety and security’ have been the key phrases used in departments of corrections attempt to enforce blatantly ridiculous policies. Just this past September, in Pennsylvania ‘safety and security’ was said to be the reason why visitations would be banned for women wearing feminine hygiene products. Then in November, in Washington, ‘safety and security’ were the concerns used to blanket over new food restrictions for inmates placed in segregation. Both of these senseless policies were overturned before they could even take effect. This was mainly due to the fact that prisoners were able to get the word out to outside activists who were able to respond effectively and this policy is just as ridiculous.
Raise Prisoners’ Wages Before Restricting their Funds
With inmates’ ability to earn funds being so limited, restricting inmates’ ability to receive funds is detrimental to the entire prison population. The illusion of Safety and security is obsolete in an unproductive environment, meaning that if prisoners have nothing to do and no way to make use of their time due to the extreme lack of funds (and the extreme lack of programming), then that is exactly what would dramatically increase the probability of violence. Prisoners who are unable to afford the products that they need, visits to the medic (because those cost), the chips that they love, music, books or other entertainment will feel complete hopeless under the extreme weight and pressure of their destitute conditions.
Administration should not place restrictions on prisoners ability to receive funds, especially if they haven’t raised their incarcerated employee’s wages and found a way to employ and financially support more of their incarcerated population. We cannot allow the cries of thousands of people incarcerated in North Carolina to go and unheard. We also cannot allow this policy to take effect threatening the status of other states and their ability to receive deposits.
Loved One’s Can’t Always Visit, They Should Still be able to Send Funds
The policy doesn’t at all take into an account that there are a limited number of people allowed on each prisoners visiting list and that there are many reasons way a person on the outside may choose to send money exclusively. Due to this, restricting depositors to those on one’s visitation list is an inefficient means for achieving a safer environment, from South Carolina’s McCormick Correctional Institution one prisoner presents the question, “What about the prisoners who have no one on their visitation list because of several different reasons: the prisoner has no family, only friends that send him funds when needed [or] the prisoner’s family as myself stay five states away and are too busy to come visit, so they weren’t added to my visitation list, but they send the funds”. There are many people who cannot accommodate the long drive or flight that a visit to prison may require. This policy only works to completely destroy their ability to support the prisoner.
From Columbus Correctional Institution in North Carolina, Jelani shares, “Many offenders have funding from individuals that may not be able to visit them due to the facts ranging from working at another prison [or] not being able to enter the prison due to previous charges, I myself have a friend of the family that sends money but will probably never come see me…what happens to the brothers and sisters that have no family or friends but a stranger wants to be generous?” He goes on to explain that these matters are “Onerous concerning the safety, peace and financial stability of the conglomerate of the inmate population here in North Carolina.” People who are financially unstable are not at peace and are much more likely to engage in violent behavior and prisoners have expressed their heavy discontent and fear for this policy change. Those incarcerated in North Carolina have presented a number of reasons as to how it would detrimentally affect the majority of the incarcerated population however for some reason administrators don’t hear them as clearly if we on the outside aren’t chiming in with them. Below I’ve included the contact information for North Carolina Department of Public Safety and for the director of prisons, Kenneth E. Lassiter. Please reach out to to express your concern, especially if you are someone who sends funds to an offender for which you are not included on their visitation list.
EPSON004Contact North Carolina Department of Public Safety: 512 North Salisbury Street; Raleigh, NC 27604
Twitter: @NCPublicSafety
Kenneth E. Lassiter- Director of Prisons – Phone: (919) 838-4000
Fax: (919) 733-8272
Courier # 53-71-00
