Rehabilitation and Child LWOP by Jim Childers - Nov. 7

[Jims]

This is a guest editorial written by James Childers, an inmate serving his sentence at Menard Correctional Center:


Rehabilitation as defined in Webster’s Dictionary is: to restore to a former capacity, rank, or right. Compassion is defined in Webster’s Dictionary as: Sympathetic feeling, pity, or mercy. Responsibility is defined in Webster’s Dictionary as: the quality or state of being responsible, which in turn is defined as: Liable for personal accountability.

These three words, in the grand scheme of things in regards to our justice system and particularly our sentencing scheme, are intertwined. Just as human beings are intertwined with one another and, as John Donne first said, “no man is an island,” so are our beliefs, languages and characteristics that make us human.

Human beings are considered the greatest species on the planet. We are thought to be more refined and evolved, and possess higher intelligence than other animal species. Yet, on a daily basis, human beings end up destroying other human beings, betraying our evolutionary roots. At the end of the day, though, we’re left scratching our heads and asking ourselves, “why?” Why do human beings do so many terrible things to one another?

I suppose there are many different reasons, different causes for the behavior of human beings. I am certainly no expert on this question. If I were, if I had all the answers, maybe I wouldn’t be sitting here writing this paper from a 6x9 foot cell.

I am 45 years old and for the last 28 years I have been incarcerated in the Illinois Department of Corrections serving a Natural Life Without the Possibility of Parole sentence for crimes for which I was convicted at 17. I am in a place where rehabilitation is not practiced or even encouraged by the system. I am in a place where compassion is considered a weakness and where responsibility is a word rarely heard.

I live amongst the worst of the worst sent here for their crimes, and I also live amongst those who still believe in right and wrong in spite of their crimes. They believe in taking responsibility for their actions, they believe in having and showing compassion, and they believe in the concept of rehabilitation, that most people can change if they desire it enough.

In reality, the world in which I live behind these walls and barbed wire is not all that different from the world beyond these walls and barbed wire. We all wish life could be less violent. We all wish for peace and harmony in the world. Contrary to public perception, prisons are not full of unremorseful, predatory criminals who enjoy violence. We all have families and friends, many have children, and grandchildren, wives and sweethearts, and we worry for their safety just as those outside the walls worry about the safety of their own. Perhaps we worry more because we can’t control what happens, and too, we’ve seen those inmates who are the exception and are true psychopaths and know what they’re capable of. I’m telling you, they are rare even in this environment full of machismo and anger and hostility. Most of the inmates in here can be reached. It’s just that no one tries.

What separates us in here from those out there is the stigma permanently attached to our crimes and the belief by those in the free society that once a criminal, always a criminal; once a murderer, always a murderer. I ask, at what point are we to be forgiven? How much remorse is enough, how much regret, how much time? Are we, those of us serving natural life sentences who have been thrown away like trash into a heap of inhumanity, to never be given the opportunity to atone for our actions? I can’t accept that. I won’t accept that. I’ve seen the humanity behind these walls that is being lost, the vast amount of human resources that is going to waste.

Why do some kids grow up to do bad things? That’s the million-dollar question but I believe we’re getting closer to finding out definitive reasons. No child is born a criminal. Kids learn by what they see and hear around them. They are molded according to the environment in which they live. With all my heart I believe in what Hillary Clinton was saying in her book “It Takes a Village.” It takes community involvement to raise kids, to mold them into successful adults with positive self images and good self esteem. Too often the community is lacking. Lacking in response due to a lack of resources, a lack of knowledge, a lack of involvement and commitment.

There is one factor that ties together most offenders: a history of childhood abuse or neglect. Take 100 inmates and ask about their childhood, and 97% of them will have been abused and/or neglected. There are more safeguards in place than when I was a kid to let authorities know, but it still isn’t enough. Bruises and broken arms might raise eyebrows at the school. If the kid goes to school. A broken spirit is harder to detect. They now say that verbal abuse and neglect is more harmful and contributes to the making of a criminal more than outright abuse. Apparently any attention is worse than no attention at all.

It takes a whole village and it takes good parenting. But we all know that too often this isn’t the case. Let me just be blunt and say it: there are a lot of really bad parents out there. Who’s watching them? How well do we know our neighbors? Do we know what goes on behind their doors? Can we hear verbal and emotional abuse? On the whole, we don’t know enough.

Not knowing your own kid from A to Z does not make you a bad parent; it only makes you an unaware parent. At some point, that happens. Kids aren’t always in their parents’ sights, and most parents hope and pray their kids will stay out of harm’s way when they’re away from home. The fact is, most kids at some time in their lives, will mess up. Sometime, they will be faced with decisions that could change their lives permanently if they make the wrong choice. Current research into brain development shows clearly that the part of an adolescent’s brain that controls emotion, judgments, and rational decision making is not fully developed until the person is as old as 22 or 23 years old. Yet, we want to hold our kids accountable for their mistakes when they’re 15, 16, 17 years old, and sometimes even younger.

Kids are being sent away for life when they’re barely more than a decade old! The United States is the so-called greatest nation on earth, and take the lead on most human rights issues around the world. Yet, right here in our own backyard, we have no problem passing judgment on our children, the very ones we failed to protect and are now willing to simply throw away. We do so because as long as we’re not directly affected, as long as the kids being thrown away aren’t our own flesh and blood, we don’t really care.

But we should care. Because it is the right thing to do. It is the human thing to do. I pray that no child ever has to go to prison and I pray that if a child does have to go to prison then that child will one day be given a second chance if he earns it through paying his time.

I pray that child will not be forgotten or lost in a system gone mad or be devoured by the system that too often sees the crime and not the child. For anyone who believes that rehabilitation should not be a part of prison I say shame on you!! Rehabilitation can work. It does work. We owe it to our children to make it work.

Lastly, and this has nothing to do with the topic above, but it’s been on my mind. I want to apologize to a child, a child no more than probably 5 years old who was recently seen visiting his father in the visiting room. I apologize for not standing up and helping to be noticed when this child had to go to the bathroom and was told by staff he would have to wait because they had no extra staff at the moment to escort the child to the restroom.
   
The child waited and waited and asked again and was told the same thing. About 20 minutes after his first request, the child could not wait any longer and peed his pants, and there he sat until finally he got to go to the restroom. By then, they had to just end their visit so the little guy wouldn’t have to sit there in wet clothes. I saw on this little boy’s face shame and embarrassment and humiliation and I felt in my heart how sad, how wrong not only for what happened to the child but for me not speaking up and expressing my outrage to the staff in charge. I did not do the right thing by him, and I was wrong.

Maybe if I had spoken up, maybe the child would have gotten to go to the restroom. I doubt it, though. What would have happened for sure is that I would have been put in seg for violating the new rules which prohibit cross visiting between visitors. The children who come into this place, only to see their fathers, deserve more respect and more compassion.

In closing let me just say thank you for reading this and let me again say to that little boy, I’m sorry for not speaking up and I’m sorry for what this place put you through. And to the so-called experts out there, I ask you to rethink policies that have our prisons overcrowded with human beings who committed crimes as children. I beg of you to rethink your position on rehabilitation, on compassion, and responsibility and to do the right thing.

Jim Childers