Population
The current community assessment document is created to address an acute issue in the life of the identified population with regard to the current research findings and the reflection of the members of the affected community. The population selected for the community assessment includes prison inmates serving a life sentence without parole or the ability to give consent in Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility.
The facility is an all-male state prison incarcerating offenders having committed diverse types of crimes. The purpose this population was chosen is their inability to give consent and receive legal services once they were convicted of a crime. Under such circumstances, the inmates without parole are deprived of any rights to obtaining legal or therapeutic support on demand. Such a state of affairs makes the lifers and those serving long-term imprisonment a vulnerable population that needs protection and provision of treatment services.
An ongoing debate in the literature of correctional work addresses the need for social work with individuals that will never re-integrate into society. On the one hand, since such people are not expected to join communities out of prison, there is no need to help them facilitate social skills and resolve their psychological issues (Stearns, Swanson, & Etie, 2017). On the other hand, however, this population is disadvantaged and continuously exposed to the challenges of social isolation and a hostile living environment, which only aggravates the psychological burden and leads to an array of mental problems. Moreover, the men imprisoned for life face challenges of aging, which exposes them to the continuous need for appropriate physical and mental health care in accordance with their age requirements.
Needed Change
There exists an urgent need to implement change in the current system of service provision within the correctional facilities in the USA, where the inmates serving life sentences without parole have limited opportunities to access mental health care. They suffer from social isolation, the lack of legal support, and the burden of prison life, and become continuously exposed to various mental disorders, aggressive behaviors, and an overall unhealthy living environment.
Therefore, it is required to implement a change to the way correctional institutions treat inmates serving life from seeing them as invisible to acknowledging their mental health needs and addressing of thereof (Stearns et al., 2017). The change that is articulated in this assessment entails the endeavors to attract available community resources to facilitate social work services for lifers in a correctional facility to ensure their mental health and promote a favorable living environment in prison.
Current Research
The issue of the acknowledgment of prisoners serving life without parole by the authorities has occupied an important place in recent scholarly literature. Multiple research studies have been conducted to identify the main challenges of the correctional institutions in their attempts to provide appropriate therapy for their inmates. However, the majority of research efforts are paid to the needs of the offenders serving long terms with the opportunity to return to society (Clark & Duwe, 2015; Legislative Analyst’s Office, 2017).
The overall prevailing rehabilitating interventions are aimed at the preparation of the inmates to the life in the society and their ability to withhold from re-offense. Nonetheless, limited attention is paid to the needs of the inmates imprisoned for life due to their status of invisible to the public.
The research conducted by Stearns et al. (2017), identifies the long-ignored issue of “social death” of the prisoners serving life or long terms as the main mental health problem of the identified population (p. 2). The study emphasizes that the development of relevant therapy interventions for such inmates might be cost-effective for prison administration because it will improve the mental state of the imprisoned individuals and ultimately minimize prison violence and disruptive behaviors.
The research carried out by Samele, Forrester, Urquia, and Hopkin (2016) presents an overview of the possible ways to address the identified need of inmates and identifies that mere inclusion of public mental health services in prison settings is not sufficient. Such a challenge is imposed by the “greater and more complex mental healthcare needs” of the prisoners “when they are compared with community samples” (Samele et al., 2016, p. 589). The study found that it might be effective to combine in-prison services with the interventions provided by external agencies to achieve the best treatment results and facilitate the burden of social isolation and violence in a correctional facility.
As for the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility, the analysis of its inmate programs shows that the organization mainly concentrates on vocational activities, educational services, victim awareness, rehabilitation, religion, and substance abuse treatment (“Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility,” 2019). However, there are no special programs that would meet the needs of lifers specifically or the mental health challenges of inmates without parole. Although there are some proposed therapy approaches that might improve the situation for lifers, including cognitive behavioral therapy, treatment of substance abuse, and art therapy, the overall programs aim at rehabilitation and preparation for social re-integration rather than facilitation of life imprisonment support (Legislative Analyst’s Office, 2017).
Also, such programs as The Power of People and similar concentrate on helping the inmates to withhold from “rearrest, reconviction, reincarceration, and technical violation revocation” with no regard to mental health therapy for lifers (Clark & Duwe, 2015, p. 384). Therefore, the analysis of current research and the secondary data about the situation with social work for inmates serving life sentences shows the lack of attention to the problems of the identified population and the urgent need to implement change.
Affected Population’s Perspective
The studies found for the community assessment allow for retrieving some personal attitudes of the affected population toward the needed change. The inmates sentenced to life imprisonment feel socially isolated and perceive themselves as defected individuals. The feeling of social participation is vital for them to mitigate isolation and withstand social death (Stearns et al., 2017). The prisoners experience mental health disorders related to isolated living and the elimination of any ways of expressing individuality due to the numbers instead of names used in the facilities and standard clothes.
The inmates cannot manage their disorders with the help of the available in-prison programs due to the continuous exposure of the individuals to the same living environment and the programs’ generalized character (Samele et al., 2016).
According to Stearns et al. (2017), the visits of family members and friends are of great importance for the inmates and their psychological stability because they feel their significance in someone else’s life. However, the inmates feel more socially integrated when they are visited or contacted by someone outside of the circle of individuals responsible for visiting. It means that the acknowledgment of the existence of lifers and the addressing of their problems will enhance their mental health.
Also, the lifers identify that personal visits, phone calls, letters, and media consumption help them mitigate the burden of isolation and improves their self-identification as social beings. These observations suggest that the mitigation of social isolation for lifers is possible; the existing programs need to be improved, and specialized interventions need to be developed to provide appropriate treatment for the target population.
Community Assets
When attempting to resolve a social problem or address a needed change, social workers do not only need to concentrate on the causes and effects of the issues but also on the available resources that might help resolve it (Zastrow, 2008). Despite the failure of some programs to meet the treatment needs of lifers, they provide significant implications for further improvement of the situation. Indeed, as the research conducted by Clark and Duwe (2015) implies, the integration of the “programs not originally designed for correctional systems” into prison settings might bring positive results (p. 384). Therefore, it is necessary to apply the services of outside community-based social facilities to provide qualified therapy for lifers. In terms of fundraising, local organizations might be integrated into cooperation to cover costs for therapy implementation. It is possible to attract volunteers from community-based social work facilities to participate in the program.
As the description of the current programs in the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility demonstrates, there are some interventions initiated by community service crews (Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility, 2019). These crews might be attracted to the creation of treatment groups for the target population. Since the work with lifers requires specific knowledge about behavior management and psychological issues, social workers involved in the implementation of the interventions need to obtain educational preparation and training to be able to meet the needs of the population.
Therefore, it is essential to engage educators in the field of correctional social work and specialists from local mental health institutions to research the issue and provide proper training for social workers and volunteers. Also, another crucial community asset is the given correctional facility as an organization. By establishing cooperative communication with the administration, social workers will be able to implement change to the living environment of inmates sentenced to life.
Conclusion
In summation, the inmates serving life imprisonment in Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility are identified as a vulnerable population due to their limited human rights and lack of parole or consent. The burden of social isolation and the understanding of their life-long deprivation of freedom impose an array of mental health issues. The current correctional system perceives lifers as socially dead and invisible individuals.
However, it has been identified that these individuals have significant mental health needs, ignoring which imposes difficulties for prison administration. Indeed, in-prison violence and disruptive behaviors are more characteristic of lifers and those serving long terms. Therefore, the prisons might benefit in terms of costs spent on physical injury treatment as a result of violence. Thus, it is necessary to employ all available resources and community assets to develop a system of social therapy services for lifers to mitigate the burden of isolation and stimulate the adoption of coping skills.
References
Clark, V. A., & Duwe, G. (2015). An outcome evaluation of a prison-based life-skills program: The power of people. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 59(4), 384-405
Legislative Analyst’s Office. (2017). Improving in-prison rehabilitation programs. Web.
Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility. (2019). Web.
Samele, C., Forrester, A., Urquia, N., & Hopkin, G. (2016). Key successes and challenges in providing mental health care in an urban male remand prison: a qualitative study. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 51(4), 589-596.
Stearns, A. E., Swanson, R., & Etie, S. (2017). The walking dead? Assessing social death among long-term prisoners. Corrections, 1-17. Web.
Zastrow, C. (2008). Social work with groups: A comprehensive workbook (7th ed.). Belmont, CA: Cengage Learning.