Prisoners re-enter society

Some of what you say may be true. I know a man who is not from a minority, and who can make more money honestly in two months than I can in six, but who spends most of his time in prison. In and out, constantly. There are character issues and desperation, and natural propensity to consider.

i remember this almost exact same question posted a few weeks ago..
Odd.


One of the reasons people are faced with poverty after getting out of prison/jail or what have you.. is because people will not rent to, hire, or otherwise accommodate someone with a felony as they would a regular person.


90% of apt complexes DO background checks.
And it is up to them if they want to rent to you. MOre then likely they will not.
Taco bell, McDonalds and other fast food places require a time frame between the conviction or release date, and the time they will hire you. One year.. six months, etc.

Almost ALL regular -legal- jobs do a background check as well and again... do not hire people with felonies. Some places ONLY worry about felonies and not misdemeanors.

There are many jobs, job titles, locations and things people with felonies are not allowed to DO at all.. no matter what.

Example, work at a bingo hall. It does not matter if you are just the cleaning crew, window washer, or parking lot attendant. It is against the LAW for a person with a felony no matter what it is for, to work in a bingo hall. This includes churches who have (for money) bingo games...


It is not always about the criminal/felon/person/lifestyle.
It is genuinely difficult , sometimes beyond the scope of acceptable, to make a living as a normal person, and find a place to LIVE as a normal person and support yourself when you have a felony.

Most people do not realize this and they just look at the criminal and shake their heads.

Re: Prisoners re-enter society


Welcome to A2K!

It is true that former felons have a difficult time entering society. I think that it is unfair to throw in the "race card". There are plenty of poor non-minorities and minorities who never enter a life of crime. It is a choice.

I agree with shewolfnm. If a person is just out of prison, his job options are limited. He needs to build a "track record" of employment. Might he be eligible only for the lowest level types of employment? Probably. But that is the price that one has to pay for behaving in a criminal fashion. Very few decent companies want people who have been recently incarcerated.

I do belive that with some felons are actually bright people who potentially would do well in society. Problem is, that they choose to use their brains to concoct illegal schemes, rather than to take that intelligence and put it to profitable, legal use.

Re: Prisoners re-enter society


If poverty leads to crime then how do you explain white collar crime?

And how do you explain poor folks who are honest and never commit crimes?

There's a genuinely thorny problem here.

On the one hand, felons getting out of prison definitely have their choices and opportunities circumscribed by their criminal record. As you've observed, lots of jobs aren't open to them, they have trouble finding a place to live, etc, etc.

At the same time, it's difficult to do anything about that, as it were. People are genuinely allowed to inquire into your past before entering an employment or housing relationship with you (with your permission, of course, but if you say "no" they're not gonna rent to or hire you). And having a felony conviction really does make you a bigger risk - you're much more likely to commit a further crime than the average Joe, leaving your apartment unpaid yet full of what passes for your furniture, and your job unfilled without notice.

But what can you do? Making it easier on the recently released convict is going to be associated with increasing the level of danger for everyone around him. I don't want my boss hiring a thug for my co-worker because background checks weren't allowed in my industry anymore. Since the criminal is the one who was convicted of the crime, society's okay if things are a little tough on them...

No.
Having a felony conviction does not make you a bigger risk. It makes the person who is to evaluate you think of you as some kind of hideous outcast to society who they should be scared of. So they react accordingly.
Even a person with a felony on their record from 20 years ago and no crimes since... is still facing the same issues of not being able to rent for those very same reasons...

Yet dumbass kids walk out of leases ALL the time simply because they got bored with the apartment they were living in, or fell in love for the 20th time in a year and moved with their new soul mate. Or got into a fight with the neighbor and dont want to live next to them... or found something cheaper.. and they leave their trash, bust holes in walls because it is funny, destroy furniture.. you name it.

Antsy employees , more concerned with how green the grass is on the other side, job hop on a monthly.. even weekly basis. People are so unhappy and unbalanced, job hoping is almost considered NORMAL these days.. yet, people who leave their job before they are trained can cost the company thousands.. but because they do not have a felony.. they dont count? Even though those types of people cost a company MORE then any other type of employee...

Everything has to be so PC lately that the slightest glance in someones direction can lead them to the door with their entire desk packed and squawking about being mistreated.

THAT happens more often then anything else .

Felons are not all child molesters, murderers , rapists, theives and other stereotype dangers. Someone can almost literally become a felon with large amounts of traffic tickets if the pay off amount is NOT acceptable under the misdemeanor terms, outlines and rules.. .


Of course.. there are crimes that are automatically felonys for a reason ( some stated above) But not all who are slapped with this title earn the media fed idea of being 'dangerous'.

It would be helpful if there was a rehabilitation program for ex-prisoners.
They could work at a state funded facility doing carpentry or some other assembly work etc. for six months to a year, and go from there to explore
other opportunities.

At least it would be a start to get a work history and some financial
funds to make a living.

Prisoners re-enter society
This is a very good issue to discuss about as it is concerned with the human race and deals with the real problems faced in the society. The Second Chance Act is taken in this way and hope that it brings a new dawn for the people. I believe you can also express your views on this on Edit [Moderator]: Link removed which is good place to know your comments on such issues.

Re: Prisoners re-enter society


I suspect that the overwhelming majority of people would agree with you. Until that ex-con tries to live in their neighborhood anyway. At that point the excuses why he/she shouldn't live there pop up all over the place.

OOooof.
That made me think. And ya know.. you are right.

I can spout off over and over how I dont care WHO you are, and that everyone needs to be treated equally.. yet...

I search the internet watch dog sites at least once a month for our neighborhood and I read the convictions, look at the photos.. then watch out of the corner of my eye.. these exact felons.

In my defense.. the felons that live here are child perps with 2 of them convicted of doing things to kids my own daughters age. I SHOULD be paying attention..

but.. yeah.. I too may have thought of some reason they should not live here.

Our neighborhood isnt the shining example of american diversity , nor is it a place that the local Hummer dealership advertises..but even those guys I silently wish would move.

Shewolfen
Do you mean the Hummer dealers?

The subject of this thread arrest my attention to air my views.
Nelson Mandela was a prisoner like Mahathma Gandhi.
Oscar wild was a prisoner.
Prision polpulation statistics are manipulated
to serve the corporate, religious interests.
I had never been in prison
but i had visited so many innocent prisoners for their simple mistakes..
Society with all kind of Channle5 and high sounding words project the prisoners are criminals
and others outside the prisions are INNOCENTS.
Let me shed my tears and drink.
Cheers.

Sami Al-Arian was supposed to have been released from prison April 11 after more than five years behind bars. Instead, the former University of South Florida professor is facing another extension of his incarceration–and has been forced to take desperate action in protest.

In March, Al-Arian began a new hunger strike, his third since he was first imprisoned in February 2003. As Socialist Worker went to press, he was on day 50 with no food and had reportedly lost more than 34 pounds.

According to his daughter, journalist Laila Al-Arian, the latest hunger strike is “in protest against what the Department of Justice is doing to him. His scheduled release date is April 11, but they’re trying to ensnare him in a whole other trial, just to increase his prison time, even though he’s already spent five years in detention. They’re trying to keep him locked up indefinitely.”
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/04/persecution-without-end/
I hope that this quote is admixed with funny numbers. like 8002345

one of the American had this starting sentense in his article.

"Americans, perhaps like all people, have a remarkable capacity for tuning out unpleasantries that do not directly affect them. I'm thinking here of wars on foreign lands, but also the astonishing fact that the United States has become the world's most jail-loving country, with well over 1 in 100 adults living as slaves in a prison. Building and managing prisons, and locking people up, have become major facets of government power in our time, and it is long past time for those who love liberty to start to care.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/prison-nation.html
He is not a communist nor Rama fuchs

(Let me make your job easy by quoting the few sentenses from that author)

Before we get to the reasons why, look at the facts as reported by the New York Times.
The U.S. leads the world in prisoner production.
There are 2.3 million people behind bars. China, with four times as many people, has 1.6 million in prison.
In terms of population, the US has 751 people in prison for every 100,000, while the closest competitor in this regard is Russia with 627. I'm struck by this figure: 531 in Cuba.
The median global rate is 125.

The world has been filled with prisons and dungeons, with chains and whips, with crosses and gibbets, with thumb-screws and racks, with hangmen and headsmen – and yet these frightful means and instrumentalities and crimes have accomplished little for the preservation of property or life.
It is safe to say that governments have committed far more crimes than they have prevented.
As long as society bows and cringes before the great thieves, there will be little ones enough to fill the jails."
http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/prison-nation.html