prison
American Heritage Dictionary:
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pris·on
(prĭz'ən) 
n.
To confine in or as if in a prison; imprison.
n.
- A place for the confinement of persons in lawful detention, especially persons convicted of crimes.
- A place or condition of confinement or forcible restraint.
- A state of imprisonment or captivity.
To confine in or as if in a prison; imprison.
[Middle English, from Old French, alteration (influenced by Old French pris, taken) of Latin prēnsiō, prēnsiōn-, a seizing, from *prehēnsiō, from prehēnsus, past participle of prehendere, to seize.]
WORD HISTORY The word prison can be traced back to the Latin word prēnsiō, "the action or power of making an arrest." This in turn is derived from the verb prehendere or prēndere, which meant "to take hold of, take into custody, arrest." Prēnsiō then surfaces in the Old French of the 12th century with the form prison and the senses "capture" and "place of imprisonment." This new sense could have already been developed in Latin and not been recorded, but we have to wait until the 12th century to see it, the sense "captivity" being added in the same century. From Old French as well as the Medieval Latin word priso, "prison," derived from Old French, came our Middle English word prisoun, first recorded in a work written before 1121 in the sense "imprisonment." The sense "place of imprisonment" is recorded shortly afterward in a text copied down before 1225 but perhaps actually written in the Old English period before the Norman Conquest.
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Institution for the confinement of people convicted of crimes. Prisons are administered by state, provincial, or national governments and house inmates for relatively long terms. They thus differ from jails, which usually are under local jurisidiction and house inmates serving short sentences. Until the late 18th century, prisons were used mainly for the confinement of debtors who could not meet their obligations, of accused persons waiting to be tried, and of convicts who were waiting for their sentences of death or banishment to be put into effect. Later, imprisonment itself came to be accepted as a means of punishing convicted criminals. In early U.S. prisons, prisoners were kept in isolation; in the 19th century, they were permitted to work together, but only in silence. At the end of the 19th century, prison reformers successfully advocated segregation of criminals by type of crime, age, and sex; rewards for good behaviour; indeterminate sentencing; vocational training; and parole. In the late 20th century, prison populations in many countries began to explode as arrests for violent offenses and for possession of small amounts of illegal drugs increased.
For more information on prison, visit Britannica.com.
Roget's Thesaurus:
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prison
Gaol, jail, or place for confining criminals and segregating them from society. Prisons provided scope for rational planning to ensure efficient control over inmates, and many fine designs date from the later decades of C18 and the first half of C19. Piranesi's images of phantasy prisons (carceri), with their Sublime volumes, had considerable influence on Neo-Classical architecture and stage-sets. See Panopticon.
Bibliography
Architectural Review ,cxvi/694 (Oct. 1954)- Nicholson (1835)
- W.Papworth (1852)
- Pevsner (1976)
- Sturgis et al. (1901–2)
The full bibliography for this book is available to download as a pdf file.
Download the bibliography for A Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (PDF: 1.2MB)
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Up to the beginning of the nineteenth century monasteries and fortresses often served as prisons (tyurma from German turm = tower). The Russian prisons in about 1850 were mostly overcrowded wood buildings that had not been built for the purpose of the accommodation of prisoners, many of whom left the prisons with destroyed health. Russian authorities were more likely to use other forms of punishment, such as whipping and other corporal punishment for small offences and hard labor and exile to Siberia for serious crimes. As early as the eighteenth century there were fruitless attempts at prison reform. In 1845 the tsar compiled a new Code of Punishments that featured a hierarchy of incarcerations including preliminerary prisons, strait houses, correctional prisons, and punitive prisons. According to the model of the Pentonville Prison in England, the isolation of the prisoner was viewed as a condition for his improvement.
There was no uniform prison management. Supervision was exercised by the ministry of the interior (MVD), the Department of Justice, and the respective governors. The public prosecutor's office was responsible for the well being of the prisoners. The prison question became topical by the penal reform of April 17, 1863: Corporal punishment was deemed antiquated and prison sentences became more typical. Now for smaller offenses the punishment was up to seven days of custody. This reform led, therefore, to a quick increase of the prison population and chaos in management. In the 1860s and 1870s various committees dealt with reform of the prison system. In 1877 a newly formed committee called Grot petitioned for a new hierarchy of punishment with seven steps, from fines up to the death penalty. The prisoners were to be separated except for work details. It was suggested a Main Prison Administration (GTU) should be established within the Ministry of the Interior, to be responsible for all questions of the Russian prison system. The suggestions of the Grot committee became law on February 27, 1879. At this time there were about seven hundred prisons with a capacity of 54,253 inmates, but actually 70,488 persons were housed there. In the next few decades, significant efforts were undertaken in the repair of old prisons and the construction of new ones. Between 1879 and 1905, the GTU succeeded in improving the conditions in the Russian prisons, during which time, in 1895, the GTU was transferred from the MVD to the Department of Justice. As a result of the waves of arrests after the revolution of 1905, the number of prisoners doubled from 1906 to 1908. After the February 1917 revolution the GTU was renamed the Main Administration of Places of Incarceration (GUMZ), and many prisoners who had been granted amnesty were re-arrested.
In April 1918 the new People's Commissioner's Office for Justice (NKYu) dissolved the GUMZ and formed the Central Penal Department (TsKO). Soon there developed in parallel to the activity of the NKYu a system of places of incarceration of the VChK (All-Russian Extraordinary Commission on Struggle against Counterrevolution, Sabotage and Speculation). In the prisons of the TsKO were housed the usual criminals; the VChK was responsible for putative and real opponents of the revolution. A principal purpose of prisons was the re-education of the delinquent; accordingly the TsKO was renamed the Central Working Improvement Department (TsITO) in October 1921. Hunger was common in TsITO facilities.
In early 1922 the VChK was integrated into the People's Commissioner's Office for Internal Affairs (NKVD). On July 1, 1922, the handing over of all places of incarceration from the NKYu to the NKVD was effected and the prison management was reorganized in the Main administration of Places of Incarceration (GUMZ NKVD). Additionally, the secret police (United State Political Administration, OGPU) had prisons under its jurisdiction. In the time of the Big Terror many prisoners were in the gulag. Under the new people's commissioner, Beriya, all prisoners able to work were removed from the prisons; in the Soviet Union after Stalin relatively few were incarcerated.
On May 7, 1956, the MVD of the USSR issued regulations for inmates, distinguishing between a "general" and an "austere" regime, the latter for prison who systematically violated regulations. On October 8, 1997, the penal enforcement system was subordinated by an Ukas of the president of the Russian Federation, moving again to the Department of Justice, where a State Administration for the Penal Enforcement (GUIN) was founded. Regardless of jurisdiction, however, the prisons continue to receive inadequate funding and, as they were in 1850, continue to be overcrowded, with inmates often afflicted with communicable diseases.
Bibliography
Adams, Bruce F. (1996). The Politics of Punishment: Prison Reform in Russia 1863 - 1917. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press.
—GEORG WURZER
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Columbia Encyclopedia:
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Prisons
prison, place of confinement for the punishment and rehabilitation of criminals. By the end of the 18th cent. imprisonment was the chief mode of punishment for all but capital crimes. At that time, largely as a result of the writings of Cesare Beccaria in Italy and John Howard and others in England, there was a wave of penal reform and improvement in conditions. The earliest North American reform centered in Philadelphia (1790) and in Auburn, N.Y., where systems of solitary confinement and congregate labor were introduced. These penitentiaries required the prisoners to maintain absolute silence. Reform efforts continued through the 19th cent., with two notable women (Elizabeth Fry and Dorothea Dix) among the reformers. British and Irish influences led to the practice of parole.
In the 20th cent. efforts were made in the United States to eliminate unsanitary and demoralizing prison conditions. Reforms included the individualization of treatment, psychiatric assistance, constructive labor and vocational training (see convict labor), professionalization of correctional officers, and the introduction of work release programs. In some places, however, corporal punishment is still used. Until the late 1970s, there was a growing tendency to regard the basic aim of imprisonment as rehabilitation of the criminal rather than as punishment or protection of society. That trend, however, has been reversed. Correspondingly the length of sentences has been extended, and the number of inmates increased substantially. From 1980 to 1990, the nation's federal and state prison population increased by 134% to 771,243 persons; by 2000 it was 1,381,892 persons, a 79% increase from 1990. From 1970 to 2000 the number of state inmates alone increased 500%. By 2005 the prison population appeared to be growing more slowly; some 1,446,269 persons were in federal and state prisons, only a 4.6% increase from 2000, due mainly to a slowing in the growth of the state prison population. An additional 874,090 persons were in local jails and other facilities; the local inmate population increased by 20% from 2000 to 2005. The increase in the number of inmates contributed to a fall in the crime rate, but increased sentences and other penalties appear not to have acted as a deterrent to crime among released inmates, who have become slightly more likely to be rearrested on average.
The chief types of prisons in the United States (with similar institutions in other countries) are the local jail, for pretrial detention and short sentences, and the state and federal penitentiaries, for convicts with long sentences. Special penal institutions are provided for juveniles, the sick, and the criminally insane. The rapid increase in prison population has led some U.S. jurisdictions to explore letting private contractors operate prisons. These private prisons increased from one or two in the mid-1980s to more than 150 by the end of the century. Some of these institutions proved problematic, often because they were not subject to government regulation or because they took in out-of-state prisoners. Juvenile delinquents are usually sent to reformatories or other correctional institutions. In the face of growing U.S. youth crime from the 1970s to the 90s, military-style "boot camps" for juvenile offenders were widely instituted. Many of these were subsequently criticized for brutality and high recidivist rates, and some were scaled back or closed. Among famous prisons in history are the Bastille in Paris and the Tower of London. In the United States, Sing Sing (see Ossining) and Alcatraz (now closed) are the two best known.
Bibliography
See D. J. Rothman, The Discovery of the Asylum (1971) and Conscience and Convenience (1980); M. Foucault, Discipline and Punish (tr. 1979); D. C. Anderson, Crimes of Justice (1988) and Sensible Justice (1998); E. Currie, Crime and Punishment in America (1998); B. Western, Punishment and Inequality in America (2006); G. C. Loury et al., Race, Incarceration, and American Values (2008).
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This entry contains information applicable to United States law only.
A public building used for the confinement of people convicted of serious crimes.
Prison is a place used for confinement of convicted criminals. Aside from the death penalty, a sentence to prison is the harshest punishment imposed on criminals in the United States. On the federal level, imprisonment or incarceration is managed by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, a federal agency within the Department of Justice. State prisons are supervised by a state agency such as a department of corrections.
Confinement in prison, also known as a penitentiary or correctional facility, is the punishment that courts most commonly impose for serious crimes, such as felonies. For lesser crimes, courts usually impose short-term incarceration in a jail, detention center, or similar facility.
Confining criminals for long periods of time as the primary form of punishment is a relatively new concept. Throughout history, various countries have imprisoned criminal offenders, but imprisonment was usually reserved for pretrial detention or punishment of petty criminals with a short term of confinement.
Using long-term imprisonment as the primary punishment for convicted criminals began in the United States. In the late eighteenth century, the nonviolent Quakers in Pennsylvania proposed long-term confinement as an alternative to capital punishment. The Quakers stressed solitude, silence, rehabilitation, hard work, and religious faith. Confinement was originally intended not only as a punishment but as an opportunity for renewal through religion.
In 1790 the Walnut Street Jail in Philadelphia constructed a separate cell house for the sole purpose of holding convicts. This was the first prison in the United States. The concept of long-term imprisonment became popular as the U.S. public embraced the concept of removing offenders from society and punishing them with confinement and hard labor. Before the existence of prisons, most offenders were subjected to corporal punishment or public humiliation and then released back into the community. In the nineteenth century, as the United States became more urban and industrial, poverty became widespread, and crime increased. As crime increased, the public became intolerant of even the most petty crimes, and viewed imprisonment as the best method to stop repeated criminal activity.
By the mid-nineteenth century, prisons existed throughout the United States. Prisoners were kept in unsanitary environments, forced to work at hard labor, and brutalized by guards. These conditions continued until the 1950s and 1960s, when heightened social and political discourse led to a renewed emphasis on rehabilitation.
The closing of one particular prison symbolized the change in correctional philosophy. Alcatraz Prison, located on an island off San Francisco, was used exclusively to place in solitary confinement convicts classified as either violent or disruptive. Rehabilitation was nonexistent in Alcatraz. The prison was filthy and rat-infested, and prisoners were held in dungeonlike cells, often chained to stone walls. Established in 1934, Alcatraz was closed in 1963, in part because its brutal treatment of prisoners symbolized an outdated penal philosophy.
By the mid-1960s, the stated purpose of many prisons was to educate prisoners and prepare them for life after prison. Many federal and state courts ordered administrators to improve the conditions inside their prisons, and the quality of life for inmates greatly improved.
In 1971 a bloody, day-long riot at the Attica Correctional Facility (Attica) in New York sparked a reaction against rehabilitative ideals. More than forty people were killed in the uprising in Attica. Shortly after the Attica riot, the Federal Bureau of Prisons began to transfer unruly federal prisoners to the Federal Penitentiary at Marion, Illinois (Marion), where they were held in solitary confinement. In 1983, after three killings in the prison, the prisoners in Marion were placed on permanent lockdown, making the entire prison a solitary confinement facility virtually overnight. Marion has remained on lockdown ever since.
By the 1980s most prison administrators abandoned rehabilitation as a goal. Pressured by an increasing problem with overcrowding and the resulting increase in violence, administrators returned to punishment and security as the primary purposes of prison. Though most prisons continue to operate educational and other rehabilitative programs, the rights of prison inmates have been frozen at the minimal number recognized by courts in the 1960s and 1970s. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled against prison guard violence, but courts have generally refused to expand the rights of prison inmates. In most cases courts have approved increased infringement of inmates' rights if prison officials declare that the restrictions are for security purposes.
Prisoners' Rights
Prisoners' rights are limited. For the most part, jail and prison inmates may demand only a "minimal civilized measure of shelter" (Union County Jail Inmates v. DiBuono, 713 F.2d 984 [3d Cir. 1983]). Generally, courts follow three basic principles when deciding whether to recognize a particular right. First, an inmate necessarily gives up many rights and privileges enjoyed by the rest of society; second, an inmate does not relinquish all constitutional rights upon placement in prison; and third, the constitutional rights retained by the prison inmate must be balanced against the security concerns of the prison.
The established rights of prison inmates include freedom of speech and religion; freedom from arbitrary punishment (i.e., restraints, solitary confinement) on the sole basis of beliefs, religion, or racial and ethnic origin; freedom from constant physical restraints; a small amount of space for physical movement; essentials for personal hygiene and opportunity to wash; clean bedding; adequate clothing; adequate heating, cooling, ventilation, and light; and adequate nutrition.
Prisoners' rights can be infringed for security purposes. Prisoners have the right to freedom of speech, but prison officials may search their mail, deny a wide variety of reading materials, and edit the content of prison newspapers. Prisoners have the right to adequate space, but they may be confined in isolation for long periods, even years. Prisoners have the right to freedom from restraints, but their ankles and wrists may be shackled when they are moved. They may also be temporarily strapped down or otherwise restrained if officials believe that they present a danger.
Prison inmates often attempt to establish new rights in court. Issues such as prison overcrowding, medical treatment, media access, even exposure to secondhand cigarette smoke, are among the issues courts face.
Another sensitive issue in prison is the use of prison guards of the opposite sex. Women prisoners may receive more privacy in this regard than men prisoners. For example, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held in 1985 that the practice of assigning female guards to conduct strip searches on nude men and watch them while showering, urinating, and defecating did not violate any constitutional rights (Grummett v. Rushen, 779 F.2d 491 [1985]). However, in 1993, the same court held that it was cruel and unusual punishment to allow male guards to conduct searches on female prisoners while the female prisoners were clothed (Jordan v. Gardner, 986 F.2d 1521 [9th Cir. 1993]).
Prisoners retain some rights aside from those concerning living conditions. Most prisons "classify" prisoners and place them in various units according to the categories. For example, violent criminals and persons suspected of gang affiliations are often housed in high-security areas of prison, separate from the rest of the general prison population. When an inmate is reclassified, he or she is entitled to notice of the reclassification and a citation of reasons for the move.
Congress and most states authorize the allowance of "good time" for prison inmates. Good time is credit for time served on good behavior, and it is used to reduce sentence length. For example, an inmate may receive one day of good time credit for every three days that he behaves well. Other states withhold recognition of good behavior until the defendant has served a certain portion of the minimum sentence imposed by the court. In New Hampshire, for example, an inmate may be released for good behavior after serving two-thirds of the minimum sentence (N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 651-A:12 [1983]). When an inmate has good time credits taken away, she or he is entitled to notice, a hearing before the prison board, and an opportunity to present evidence in her or his favor.
Inmates may also gain early release from prison through parole, which is granted by the parole board. Prisoners have no right to parole, and the matter of early release is left to the graces of the parole board. Once released on parole, a parolee may be returned to prison for breaking one of the many conditions that are normally imposed. A parolee has no right to an attorney at a parole revocation hearing, nor does an inmate have the right to an attorney at a parole hearing.
Solitary confinement is used in many prisons for violent inmates and those inmates perceived as having gang-related affiliations. Some prisons are designed specifically for it. The original prisons, as envisioned by the Quakers, called for solitary confinement, but the practice was halted because of the detrimental effects it had on prisoners. However, the practice never completely ended. In the 1980s solitary confinement became a regular feature of prisons, and it has become the sole form of incarceration in so-called Security Housing Units or Supermax prisons.
In a Supermax prison, the cells are eight-by-ten feet and windowless. The cells are grouped in "pods." The cell doors are perforated with holes large enough for guards to see inside the cell, but small enough to obstruct the prisoner's vision and light. All a prisoner can see through the door is another white wall. Each cell is furnished with a built-in bunk with a toilet-sink unit. Nothing is allowed on the walls. Prisoners may be allowed television, radio, and books, but these are taken away as punishment for any rule infractions.
Prisoners in solitary confinement are kept in their cells, under surveillance, for twenty-two-and-a-half hours a day. Unlike the rest of the prison population, inmates in solitary confinement may not take advantage of educational or recreational programs. The ninety minutes outside the cell may be divided between visiting a small library, washing, and exercising in a pen connected to the pod. Prisoners are strip-searched by the guards before and after visiting any place and are placed in waist restraints and handcuffs when being escorted.
The assignment of a prisoner to solitary confinement is made by prison officials. In assigning supposed gang members to solitary confinement, it is the policy in some prisons to require that the perceived gang member "debrief" officials on his or her gang activity and renounce his or her gang affiliations before being released back into the general population.
One of the most important rights possessed by prison inmates is access to the courts through habeas corpus petitions. After an inmate has exhausted all the motions and appeals available to contest the conviction and prison sentence, a final round of limited judicial review is provided through the writ of habeas corpus. Through the ancient writ of habeas corpus, a court may order the release of a prisoner wrongly held.
Habeas corpus petitions are granted only for certain constitutional violations in the prosecution of a criminal defendant. The Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, 28 U.S.C.A. § 2261 et seq., placed certain limits on this form of relief.
See: preventive detention; sentencing.
Devil's Dictionary:
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prison
A cynical view of the world by Ambrose Bierce
n.
A place of punishments and rewards. The poet assures us that --
"Stone walls do not a prison make,"but a combination of the stone wall, the political parasite and the moral instructor is no garden of sweets.
Word Tutor:
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prison
IN BRIEF: A correctional institution where persons are confined while on trial or for punishment.
A pedestal is as much a prison as any small space.
— Gloria Steinem
LearnThatWord.com is a free vocabulary and spelling program where you only pay for results!
Quotes About:
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Prison
Quotes:
"To assert in any case that a man must be absolutely cut off from society because he is absolutely evil amounts to saying that society is absolutely good, and no-one in his right mind will believe this today."
- Albert Camus
"In jail a man has no personality. He is a minor disposal problem and a few entries on reports. Nobody cares who loves or hates him, what he looks like, what he did with his life. Nobody reacts to him unless he gives trouble. Nobody abuses him. All that is asked of him is that he go quietly to the right cell and remain quiet when he gets there. There is nothing to fight against, nothing to be mad at. The jailers are quiet men without animosity or sadism. All this stuff you read about men yelling and screaming, beating against the bars, running spoons along them, guards rushing in with clubs -- all that is for the big house. A good jail is one of the quietest places in the world. Life in jail is in suspension."
- Raymond Chandler
"In prison, those things withheld from and denied to the prisoner become precisely what he wants most of all."
- Eldridge Cleaver
"We are all serving a life sentence in the dungeon of the self."
- Cyril Connolly
"We are all conceived in close prison; in our mothers wombs, we are close prisoners all; when we are born, we are born but to the liberty of the house; prisoners still, though within larger walls; and then all our life is but a going out to the place of execution, to death."
- John Donne
"Prison continues, on those who are entrusted to it, a work begun elsewhere, which the whole of society pursues on each individual through innumerable mechanisms of discipline."
- Michel Foucault
See more famous quotes about Prison
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categories related to 'prison'
- Prison and Punishment - prison: state or federal institution for long-term confinement of convicts, usu. felons; Slang big house, can, clink, coop, joint, slammer, stir
See crossword solutions for the clue Wikipedia on Answers.com:
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Prison
"Jail" and "Gaol" redirect here. For other uses, see Jail (disambiguation).
For other uses, see Prison (disambiguation).
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The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with the United States and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please improve this article and discuss the issue on the talk page. (January 2012) |
A prison (from Old French prisoun)[1] is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime. Other terms used are penitentiary, correctional facility, remand centre, detention centre, and jail or gaol. In some legal systems some of these terms have distinct meanings. In the United States the difference between jails or detention facilities and prisons is primarily a function of the length of incarceration. Jails and detention facilities, under city or county jurisdiction, typically hold offenders awaiting trial or serving short sentences. Correctional facilities and prisons are more often run by the state or federal governments and house offenders serving long-term sentences.[2] Similarly Ontario, Canada, jails and detention centres are used to hold remanded prisoners awaiting trial, sentencing or other court proceedings. Jails are typically small facilities originally designed to serve the local community and have been gradually replaced with large regional detention centres. Jails and detention centres are run by the provincial government. Once an offender is sentenced, he or she would be transferred to either a provincial correctional centre (if the sentence is less than two years) or a federal penitentiary (if the sentence is two years or more).[3]
A criminal suspect who has been charged with or is likely to be charged with criminal offense may be held on remand in prison if he or she is denied or unable to meet conditions of bail, or is unable or unwilling to post bail. A criminal defendant may also be held in prison while awaiting trial or a trial verdict. If found guilty, a defendant will be convicted and may receive a custodial sentence requiring imprisonment.
As well as convicted or suspected criminals, prisons may be used for internment of those not charged with a crime. Prisons may also be used as a tool of political repression to detain political prisoners, prisoners of conscience, and "enemies of the state", particularly by authoritarian regimes. In times of war or conflict, prisoners of war may also be detained in prisons. A prison system is the organizational arrangement of the provision and operation of prisons.
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Contents
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History
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This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (May 2010) |
For most of history, imprisoning has not been a punishment in itself, but rather a way to confine criminals until corporal or capital punishment was administered. There were prisons used for detention in Jerusalem in Old Testament times, and the Bible details the imprisonment of Joseph in Egypt.[4] Dungeons were used to hold prisoners; those who were not killed or left to die there often became galley slaves or faced penal transportations. In other cases debtors were often thrown into debtor's prisons, until they paid their jailers enough money in exchange for a limited degree of freedom.
Only in the 19th century, beginning in Britain, did prisons as known today become commonplace. The modern prison system was born in London, influenced by the utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham. Bentham's panopticon introduced the principle of observation and control that underpins the design of the modern prison. The notion of prisoners being incarcerated as part of their punishment and not simply as a holding state until trial or hanging, was at the time revolutionary. This is when prisons had begun to be used as criminal rehabilitation centers.
Britain practiced penal transportation of convicted criminals to penal colonies in the British Empire, in the Americas from the 1610s through the American Revolution in the 1770s and in Australia between 1788 and 1868. France sent criminals to tropical penal colonies including Louisiana in the early 18th century.[5] Penal colonies in French Guiana operated until 1951 (in particular, infamous Île du Diable (Devil's Island)). Katorga prisons were established in the 17th century in Tsardom of Russia in underpopulated areas of Siberia and the Russian Far East that had few towns or food sources. Since these times, Siberia gained its fearful connotation of punishment.
Design and facilities
Male and female prisoners are typically kept in separate locations or separate prisons altogether.[6] Prison accommodation, especially modern prisons in the developed world, are often divided into wings. A building holding more than one wing is known as a "hall". Many prisons are divided into two sections, one containing prisoners before trial and the other containing convicted prisoners.
Facilities
Amongst the facilities that prisons may have are:
- A main entrance, which may be known as the 'sally port' or 'gatelodge' (stemming from old castle nomenclature)
- A religious facility, which will often house chaplaincy offices and facilities for counselling of individuals or groups
- An 'education facility', often including a library, providing adult education or continuing education opportunities
- A gym or an exercise yard, a fenced, usually open-air-area which prisoners may use for recreational and exercise purposes
- A healthcare facility or hospital
- A segregation unit (also called a 'block' or 'isolation cell'), used to separate unruly, dangerous, or vulnerable prisoners from the general population, also sometimes used as punishment (see solitary confinement)
- A section of vulnerable prisoners (VPs), or protective custody (PC) units, used to accommodate prisoners classified as vulnerable, such as sex offenders, former police officers, informants and those that have gotten into debt or trouble with other prisoners
- A section of safe cells, used to keep prisoners under constant visual observation, for example when considered at risk of suicide
- A visiting area, where prisoners may be allowed restricted contact with relatives, friends, lawyers, or other people
- A death row in some prisons, a section for prisoners awaiting execution
- A staff accommodation area, where staff and prison officers live in the prison, typical of historical prisons
- A service/facilities area housing support facilities like kitchens
- Industrial or agricultural plants operated with convict labour
- A recreational area containing items such as a TV and pool table
Prison design
Prisons are normally surrounded by fencing, walls, earthworks, geographical features, or other barriers to prevent escape. Multiple barriers, concertina wire, electrified fencing, secured and defensible main gates, armed guard towers, lighting, motion sensors, dogs and roving patrols may all also be present depending on the level of security. Remotely controlled doors, CCTV monitoring, alarms, cages, restraints, nonlethal and lethal weapons, riot-control gear and physical segregation of units and prisoners may all also be present within a prison to monitor and control the movement and activity of prisoners within the facility.
Modern prison designs have sought to increasingly restrict and control the movement of prisoners throughout the facility while permitting a maximal degree of direct monitoring by a smaller prison staff. As compared to traditional large landing-cellblock designs which were inherited from the 19th century and which permitted only intermittent observation of prisoners, many newer prisons are designed in a decentralized "podular" layout.
Smaller, separate and self-contained housing units known as "pods" or "modules" are designed to hold between sixteen and fifty prisoners each and are arranged around exercise yards or support facilities in a decentralized "campus" pattern. A small number of prison officers, sometimes a single officer, is assigned to supervise each pod. The pods contain tiers of cells arranged around a central control station or desk from which a single officer can monitor all of the cells and the entire pod, control cell doors and communicate with the rest of the prison. Pods may be designed for high-security "indirect-supervision", in which officers in segregated and sealed control booths monitor smaller numbers of prisoners confined to their cells.
An alternative is "direct-supervision", in which officers work within the pod and directly interact with and supervise prisoners, who may spend the day outside their cells in a central "dayroom" on the floor of the pod. Movement in or out of the pod to and from exercise yards, work assignments or medical appointments can be restricted to individual pods at designated times and is generally centrally controlled. Goods and services, such as meals, laundry, commissary, educational materials, religious services and medical care can increasingly be brought to individual pods or cells as well.
Despite these design innovations, overcrowding at many prisons, particularly in the U.S., has resulted in a contrary trend, as many prisons are forced to house large numbers of prisoners, often hundreds at a time, in gymnasiums or other large buildings that have been converted into massive open dormitories. Lower-security prisons are often designed with less restrictive features, confining prisoners at night in smaller locked dormitories or even cottage or cabin-like housing while permitting them freer movement around the grounds to work or activities during the day.
Security levels
The levels of security within a prison system are categorized differently around the world, but tend to follow a distinct pattern. Most developed countries divide prisons into separate security classes depending on the inmate population and the security needed to keep them under control. Accordingly, most developed countries have classes ranging from the most secure, which typically hold violent prisoners and those judged most likely to escape, to the least, which are most often used to house non-violent offenders or those for whom more stringent security is deemed unnecessary. Below are some different examples of prison classifications from around the world.
England and Wales
Main article: Prisoner security categories in the United Kingdom
In England and Wales, prisoners are assigned security classes when they are sentenced. Thus prisons are given security classifications depending on the prisoners they are designed to hold. Therefore, prisons classified as "A" would typically house prisoners assigned the "A" category during sentencing, and be designed with the level of security necessary for that class. The categories of prisoners in descending order are:
- Category A: prisoners are those whose escape would be highly dangerous to the public or national security.
- Category B: prisoners are those who do not require maximum security, but for whom escape needs to be made very difficult.
- Category C: prisoners are those who cannot be trusted in open conditions but who are unlikely to try to escape.
- Category D: prisoners are those who can be reasonably trusted not to try to escape, and are given the privilege of an open prison. Prisoners at 'D Cat' (as it is commonly known) prisons, are, subject to approval, given ROTL (Release On Temporary Licence) to work in the community or to go on 'home leave' once they have passed their FLED (Full Licence Eligibility Dates), which is usually a quarter of the way through the sentence.
The British prison system is also divided into "Open" and "Closed" prisons. Categories A-C are considered "Closed" prisons as prisoners cannot be trusted to interact with society, while category D prisons are generally "Open", meaning that prisoners with a good record and who are approved can be allowed limited function in society such as home-leave or a nominal employment.
United States
Main article: Incarceration in the United States
In the United States, "jail" and "prison" refer to separate levels of incarceration; generally speaking, jails are county or city administrated institutions which house both inmates awaiting trial on the local level and convicted misdemeanants serving a term of one year or less, while prisons are state or federal facilities housing convicted felons serving a term of more than one year. On the federal level, this terminology has been largely superseded by a more complex five-tier system implemented by the Federal Bureau of Prisons that ranges from low security "Prison Camps" to medium security "Correctional Institutions" and finally maximum security "Penitentiaries". Federal prisons can also house pre-trial inmates.[8]
The exact classification systems differ between county, state, and federal systems. Some common types of prisons include:
- Supermax: As the name implies, the custody level goes beyond Maximum by segregating "the worst of the worst" in a prison system, such as terrorists deemed a threat to national security and inmates from other prisons who have a history of violent or other disruptive behavior in prison or are suspected of gang affiliation. This level is also used for non-terrorists who have been deemed too dangerous or too high-profile to ever be in a normal prison. These inmates have individual cells and are kept in lockdown for 23 hours per day. Meals are served through "chuck holes" in the cell door, and each inmate is permitted out of their cell for one hour of exercise per day, alone. They are normally permitted no contact with other inmates and are under constant surveillance via closed-circuit television cameras.
- Administrative: Administrative security is a classification of prisons or detention centers that are for a specific purpose, such as housing mentally ill offenders. These range in levels of security from Minimum to Administrative Maximum Security (ADMAX), as in the case of ADX Florence in Florence, Colorado.
- Maximum: A custody level in which both design and construction as well as inmate classification reflect the need to provide maximum external and internal control and supervision of inmates primarily through the use of high security perimeters and extensive use of internal physical barriers and check points. Inmates accorded this status present serious escape risks or pose serious threats to themselves, to other inmates, to staff, or the orderly running of the institution. Supervision of inmates is direct and constant.
- High: The "Middle Ground" for violent crimes, High security institutions have highly-secured perimeters (featuring walls or reinforced fences), multiple- and single-occupant cell housing, the highest staff-to-inmate ratio, and close control of inmate movement.
- Medium: A custody level in which design and construction as well as inmate classification reflect the need to provide secure external and internal control and supervision of inmates. Inmates accorded to this status may present a moderate escape risk or may pose a threat to other inmates, staff, or the orderly running of the institution. Supervision remains constant and direct. Through an inmate's willingness to comply with institutional rules and regulations, increased job and program opportunities exist.
- Close Security: Close Security prisons are institutions which house inmates too dangerous for Low Security, but who did not commit a crime worthy of incarceration in a Medium Security Facility. These prisons are rare, as most inmates fall into either "Medium" or "Low" Security Classifications. These facilities are often located in separate areas of a Low or Medium security Prison.
- Low: A custody level in which both the design and construction as well as inmate classification reflect the goal of returning to the inmate a greater sense of personal responsibility and autonomy while still providing for supervision and monitoring of behavior and activity. Inmates within this security level are not considered a serious risk to the safety of staff, inmates or to the public. Program participation is mandated and geared toward their potential reintegration into the community. Additional access to the community is limited and under constant direct staff supervision
- Minimum: The lowest level of security to which an inmate can be assigned directly. This type of prison is typically a "prison farm", or other work-oriented facility, and most often houses petty or "white collar" criminals.
- Pre-release. A custody level in which both design and construction as well as inmate classification reflect the goal of restoring to the inmate maximum responsibility and control of their own behavior and actions prior to their release. Direct supervision of these inmates is not required, but intermittent observation may be appropriate under certain conditions. Inmates within this level may be permitted to access the community unescorted to participate in programming, including but not limited to work release or educational release.
Special types of prison
Juvenile
Main article: Youth detention center
Prisons for juveniles (people under 17 or 18, depending on the jurisdiction) are known as young offender facilities or similar designation and hold minors who have been remanded into custody or serving sentence. Many countries have their own age of criminal responsibility in which children are deemed legally responsible for their actions for a crime. Countries such as Canada may try to sentence a juvenile as an adult, but have them serve their sentence in a juvenile facility until they reach the age of majority, at which time they would be transferred to an adult facility.
Military
Main article: Military prison
Prisons form part of military systems, and are used variously to house prisoners of war, unlawful combatants, those whose freedom is deemed a national security risk by military or civilian authorities, and members of the military found guilty of a serious crime.
Political
Main article: Political prisoner
Certain countries maintain or have in the past had a system of political prisons; arguably the gulags associated with Stalinism are best known.
Psychiatric
Main article: Psychiatric hospital
Some psychiatric facilities have characteristics of prisons, particularly when confining patients who have committed a crime and are considered dangerous. In addition, many prisons have psychiatric units dedicated to housing offenders diagnosed with a wide variety of mental disorders.
Population statistics
See also: List of countries by incarceration rate
As of 2006, it is estimated that at least 9.25 million people are currently imprisoned worldwide.[9] It is probable that this number is much higher, in view of general under-reporting and a lack of data from various countries, especially authoritarian regimes.
The United States currently has the world's largest prison population. There are over 2 million people in American prisons or jails, up from 744,000 in 1985.[10]
If observers of prisons can agree upon one fact, it is that American prisons are overcrowded at the moment. In the United States, as of 2009, California had 158,000 inmates in prisons that were designed to hold 84,000. The result was that almost 14,000 inmates were sleeping in very tight spaces, or in hallways or on floors. Prisons all over the nation are overcrowded, and people are being incarcerated at an increasing rate, whereas the new prisons cannot be built fast enough. [11]
See also
References
- ^ Online Etymology Dictionary, retrieved on 2009-10-12.
- ^ The Difference Between Jails and Prisons, by Margo Schlanger, prepared for the Prisons Seminar, Harvard Law School, spring 2003
- ^ Frequently Asked Question, Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services
- ^
"Prisons". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1913. - ^ Taylor, Alan. American Colonies. Penguin: London(2001).
- ^ International Profile of Women's Prisons (144p), International Centre for Prison Studies, April 2008
- ^ Report of the Surveyor-General of Prisons, London, 1844 reproduced in Mayhew, Criminal Prisons of London, London, 1862
- ^ "BOP Information". BOP. http://www.bop.gov/inmate_locator/index.jsp.
- ^ Walmsley, Roy (October 2006). "World Prison Population List (Seventh Edition)" (PDF). http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/law/research/icps/downloads/world-prison-pop-seventh.pdf. Retrieved 2007-12-15.
- ^ "Inside America's $37 billion prison economy". CNNMoney. March 15 2007.
- ^ "[Engdahl, Sylvia. "Prisons". Farmington Hills: Greenhaven Press (2010).
Further reading
- Carlson, Peter M.; Garrett, Judith Simon, Prison and Jail Administration: Practice and Theory, Jones and Bartlett Publishers, 1999.
- Diiulio, John J., Governing Prisons: A Comparative Study of Correctional Management, Simon and Schuster, 1990. ISBN 0-02-907883-0.
- Harnsberger, R. Scott. A Guide to Sources of Texas Criminal Justice Statistics [North Texas Crime and Criminal Justice Series, no.6]. Denton: University of North Texas Press, 2011. ISBN 978-1-57441-308-3
- James (Jim) Bruton, Big House: Life Inside a Supermax Security Prison, Voyageur Press (July 2004), hardcover, 192 pages, ISBN 0-89658-039-3.
- Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, New York: Random House 1975.
- Ted Conover. Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing. Knopf, 2001. Trade paperback, 352 pages, ISBN 0-375-72662-4.
External links
 |
Look up prison, jail, gaol, or penitentiary in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Prisons |
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Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Prison |
- Interactive world map showing number of prisoners per 100,000 citizens
- Australian Prisons
- Historic Prisons
- Victorian Prisoners' Photograph Albums from Wandsworth prison on The National Archives' website.
- World Prison Population List (fourth edition) UK Home Office, 2003. ISSN 1473-8406.
- User Views of Punishment: The comparative experience of short term prison sentences and community-based punishments Research Report by The Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research
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This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
Translations:
Top
Prison
Dansk (Danish)
n. - fængsel
v. tr. - fængsle, lukke inde
idioms:
- prison camp fangelejr
- prison cell fængselscelle
Nederlands (Dutch)
gevangenis, gevangenisstraf
Français (French)
n. - prison, emprisonnement
v. tr. - emprisonner
idioms:
- prison camp camp de prisonniers
- prison cell cellule de prison
Deutsch (German)
n. - Gefängnis, Haft
v. - gefangensetzen
idioms:
- prison camp Gefangenenlager
- prison cell Gefängniszelle
Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - φυλακή, δεσμωτήριο
idioms:
- prison camp στρατόπεδο κρατουμένων ή αιχμαλώτων
- prison cell κελί φυλακής
Italiano (Italian)
prigione, detenzione, imprigionare
idioms:
- prison camp campo di prigionia
Português (Portuguese)
n. - prisão (f)
idioms:
- prison camp campo de prisioneiros
Русский (Russian)
тюрьма, тюремное заключение, посадить за решетку
idioms:
- prison camp исправитель- но-трудовая колония, лагерь
Español (Spanish)
n. - prisión, cárcel
v. tr. - encarcelar
idioms:
- prison camp campamento para prisioneros
- prison cell celda carcelaria
Svenska (Swedish)
n. - fängelse
中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
监狱, 拘留所, 监禁
idioms:
- prison camp 囚犯集中营, 战俘集中营
- prison cell 牢房, 囚室
中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 監獄, 拘留所, 監禁
v. tr. - 監禁
idioms:
- prison camp 囚犯集中營, 戰俘集中營
- prison cell 牢房, 囚室
한국어 (Korean)
n. - 옥, 교도소
v. tr. - 감금하다, 투옥하다
日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 刑務所, 監獄, 拘置所, 閉じ込められた場所, 監禁, 禁固
idioms:
- prison camp 捕虜収容所
- prison cell 独房
العربيه (Arabic)
(الاسم) سجن, حبس
עברית (Hebrew)
n. - בית סוהר
v. tr. - כלא, הכניס לבית סוהר
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