The Inside Scoop

Life in prison is never a walk in the park, but in the USA no one is to blame but ourselves. This is certainly not the case in third-world countries as well as a few others. If I had to speculate, I’d say that the quality of living in a country is directly related to the quality of living in its prisons. Most of them do not provide opportunities to better oneself. The gangs are given freedom to control what goes on inside and inmates are mistreated by staff. They are notoriously unsanitary, the food is sparse, and the justice system that populates those prisons are usually as corrupt as can be. All in all, I’m very happy I’m not doing time in a different country, even though it can be hard to have our human rights recognized, at least we have a fighting chance here. I would like to say thank you to all of the inmates and advocates who fought to have our rights recognized in the previous years. We are already separated from society—I don’t believe that there is any reason why someone ...

This week I’m sharing an “assignment” we were given not long ago regarding our feelings/opinion etc. about covid: When I first heard of covid I was in Calipatria State Prison, which is a level 4, so there isn’t a lot of freedom. I was lucky enough to drop points (your points determine what level you go to by how good or bad you are) and be one of the last buses to transport prisoners before covid restrictions came into effect. I found my self on a pretty decent level 3 that was fairly close to where I used to live (and where my family still lives). I was also very lucky that the prison yard I was on barely had a handful of cases throughout the pandemic, so not only did I not get covid, but we never went into full quarantine lockdown like a lot of other prisons did. I was recently able to get vaccinated, so I’m glad for that. It makes me feel much safer. One thing I will always remember is watching covid seep into television—at first it was all over the news, then slowly but surely ...

Contact with friends and loved ones is very important to inmates. The impact of being locked in a cell all day, or being around convicts all day, can really have an effect on your emotions and attitude. The ability to make phone calls is great, and it makes a huge difference in our day-to-day lives, but they usually only last 15 minutes, which isn’t really enough time to hold a meaningful conversation. Since the pandemic, CDCR has implemented video visits that allow us an hour to talk with an approved visitor face-to-face. These video visits allow for lots of people, who wouldn’t normally be able to get a visit, to see the people they care about. If our loved ones are ill or live very far away, it could be very difficult to make the journey. There are laws that state they can’t provide video visits instead of contact ones unless there is a pandemic or some other reason, so we usually don’t have that option available to us. Some people are working to keep them going in a limited capac...

Our so called “Golden State” has an unacknowledged dark side. It may not be a big deal to everyone, but at least half the state knows somebody who has been to jail or prison. California has a very complex and extensive sentencing procedure. It was explained to me, by a judge, that people study for years specifically to calculate sentences and they have to keep studying just to keep up with all the changing laws. These “new laws” contradict and counteract old laws to no end, and therein lies the problem. They rarely ever get rid of an old law, no matter how bad it is. They just revise and refine, so they never have to give up more than they want. Even with the federal government breathing down their necks. We’ve all heard that processed food isn’t good for us, so why would refined laws be good for the state? For the individuals being sentenced, it’s very frustrating not being able to double-check or hold them accountable. Sometimes your public defender or lawyer will tell you one th...

  Since I’ve been down, I’ve been to a few prisons. I did time at Tracy Reception Center (DVI) and that place is really run down. It’s a good thing they’re shutting it down. I’ve done a layover in Wasco, and that place was very dirty, plus the food was terrible.  So far, most of my time was done in Calipatria (CAL). It wasn’t dirty and the food was halfway decent, but there were no options for jobs or self-help programs, and there wasn’t a lot of dayroom or yard… but it’s a level 4.  The place I’m in now is Sierra Conservation Center (SCC) in Jamestown, CA. When I showed up it was Disneyland. All day programs, lots of job options and self-help programs. But, ever since covid hit, all that pretty much cut in half, which is better than most other places.  I have heard that Mule Creek, Stockton, and Donovan are pretty nice, but everyone has their own opinion of nice. It’s all still prison. If anyone feels like they would like to write to me personally, that’s fine wit...

Ever since this pandemic started, all the prisons in the world went to some sort of modified program… among those is my prison (Sierra Conservation Center). A modified program consists of below normal amounts of yard, dayroom, and/or jobs, and self-help groups. We understand that it’s because of Covid-19 and we’ve gotten kinda used to it, but for the past couple months my prison has been going through some sort of bureaucratic bull-crap that doesn’t have anything to do with inmates—but affects inmates. Randomly, throughout the week, multiple correctional officers won’t show up to work and we won’t get yard, or any program at all, and sometimes this happens multiple days in a row. Now, I’m not exactly sure why this is, but I’ve heard a couple of rumors. One is that the union cut a deal so they can take away vacation days whenever they want, just because they feel sick. The other is that nobody wants to work with the new sergeant that took over second-watch. Regardless of all of this,...

So, imagine what your kid eats at meals and I mean like a 7 or 8 year-old. If you don’t have kids, just imagine a Happy Meal from McDonalds. That’s about how much food we get—just of lower quality. According to rumor, people used to eat pretty good in prison, but within the past ten years they have been slowly diminishing the size and quality of our meals. They say it’s for health reasons, but how is a 200 lb. young man with a high metabolism supposed to keep himself in shape when he barely gets 3000 calories a day? That might seem like enough to people who want to sit on their butts all day, but that’s not a healthy lifestyle. How can a 3000 calorie diet promote good health? On top of all that, they’ve taken sugar out which doesn’t prevent diabetes. People need to learn self-control—otherwise, too bad! The replacement for the sugar is much worse than the real stuff. I’ve personally stopped using sugar substitutes because people say they can cause cancer. I’ve had bowel issues, cog...