Cja 234 - Prison System

Prison System Comparison

Jacinta Ingram

University of Phoenix

Introduction to Corrections

CJA234

John W. Hudson MS

August 29, 2011

Prison System Comparison

Introduction

State and Federal Prisons started back in the early nineteenth century, when they saw an increase in criminal activities taking place. This brought on an increase in prisons and jails. Based off each crime being committed, they chose to make different levels of security in State and Federal prisons to house the criminals correctly, which consisted of five levels.

History of State and Federal Prisons

State prisons were built back in the nineteenth-century, with the first prison being a penitentiary completed at Millbank in London, in 1816 (Foster, 2006). Although the first prison built was a penitentiary, it was based on the legal reforms of the eighteenth-century Age of Enlightenment (Foster, 2006). At this time scholars were looking for a more humane and reform-oriented alternative to death and corporal punishments of the day (Foster, 2006). Sir Thomas Beever opened the Gaol at Wymondham in Norfolk, England, in 1785, making the principles work, isolation and penitence to make confinement different for prisoners. Next was the Walnut Street Jail that was designed off Beever's ideas, called the first penitentiary in America, which opened in Philadelphia in 1790 (Foster, 2006). Later the Pennsylvania model or separate system and the Auburn model penitentiary were built, which became the American prototype because of its cheapness and economic productivity (Foster, 2006). There were work camps, industrial prisons, and agricultural prisons built during and after the post-Civil War era.

Whereas the Federal Bureau of Prisons was created by an act of Congress signed into law by President Herbert Hoover on, May 14, 1930 (Foster, 2006).Hoover had the office established within the federal Justice Department, as time went on more criminals began serving time in federal prisons. This was especially taken place after the Civil War when the crime rate started to grow out of control, more than it had ever been. Due to this, many state prisons and local jails started experiencing overcrowding problems while housing federal prisoners, and it became more difficult to place federal prisoners in these facilities (Foster, 2006). Congress passed the Three Prisons Act in 1891. Making the first U.S. Penitentiary an old military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, this housed federal prisoners in 1895. Then McNeil Island, Washington another older prison, designed in 1907, as a U.S. Penitentiary. The third one was a newly constructed federal prison in Atlanta, which opened in 1902 (Foster, 2006). Congress also had a women's prison built in Alderson, West Virginia, which opened on November 14, 1928, with over 174 women already being sent to Alderson from state prisons and jails, two-thirds of them being drug law violators and 70 to 80 percent suffering from "social diseases"- what we call sexually transmitted diseases today (Foster, 2006). By the end of the year 1930, the new system was made up of fourteen institutions with over 13,000 inmates. The main difference between the two prison systems is that the citizens out of fear of criminals created one and the other one was created by the President of the United States to help the state and local jails with overcrowding some of which federal crimes play a large part.

Different levels of Security in State and Federal Prisons

When looking at prisons, we do not realize there is more than one level to them. I will go over the levels so people will have a better understanding of them. First is going to be the state prisons, also known as the Department of Corrections (Foster, 2006). 1. Maximum-security prisons are often the older, larger, walled penitentiaries with the most rigorous security procedures, the lowest ratio of inmates to guards. There is one-step up from this level, the Supermax prison, which is permanent lockdown. 2. Close High-security prisons in some states, these are considered a kind of maximum security. Though the security measures are less restrictive, the ratio