Everyone always talks about rehabilitation, but no one seems to want inmates to have anything of value. There can be no greater contradiction. The vast majority of inmates will, at some point, be released. The question everyone should be asking themselves is, “do we want inmates to have everything they need to be successful, or do we routinely poke at and antagonize them so they are like wild animals when they come home?” Keep in mind, many of these inmates will become your neighbor or a neighbor to someone you know and love. Personally, I would hope our self described civil society demand we treat every person with dignity and respect. Yet, I keep reflecting on something Thomas Paine once wrote,”A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.”
For many years now, I have continually wrote proposals to allow inmates to obtain “stand alone” laptop computers. I know of many inmates who have spent the last 20 or more years in prison. They could not begin to tell you anything about operating a computer. If they were released today, they would be at a great disadvantage, and something of a social pariah. I am one of those people myself. A stand alone computer is one that is not connected to the internet in any way. Other options are to have institutional servers the computers could be connected to, and enable inmates to access the information they need from that server alone (by CAT5 cable or a limited wifi unit similar to the current JPay and GTL systems being used now).
Simply allowing inmates to learn how to utilize current computer operating systems makes them more employable, prepared for daily life, and able to communicate with others. Additionally, computers enable inmates to keep large amounts of information. Inmates who are working on their cases have thousands of pages of trial transcripts and documents that could all be loaded onto the laptop. In fact, many of the courts are going paperless, but have to send paper versions of everything to inmates. This could simply be e-mailed to them. Photos, music, personal letters and e-mails, educational materials, and a lot more could be stored on a laptop. This would drastically reduce the amount of property inmates possess.
With the technology of today, this can be accomplished without hazarding the general public. So, you may ask yourself, “why is this not being done in prisons today?”. The reason is simple. Large billion dollar conglomerates, and the politicians they pay for, have not figured out how to make money from it. The phone companies charge horrendous amounts for the calls inmates use to stay in contact with their families. JPay, charges inmates and their families for e-mails, music that is free to the general public, and games you can download for free to your cell phone. The worst part is, these systems are anything but reliable. The so-called tablet they sell us costs over $150, but out there they are around $20. I bet if a tech company was to analyze one of these tablets, they would find software that throttles the battery, and causes the tablet to malfunction. We get “Critical Updates” to them that can either wipe out all of the information they contain, or make them completely unusable. To fix the problem, your family has to purchase a new tablet for you. Would you stand for this treatment?
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