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VICTIMIZATION BEHIND THE WALLS: SOCIAL CONTROL IN MALE FEDERAL PRISONd A Report on Victimization in Male Prisons Prepared for The Correctional Service of Canada Dennis Cooley Department of Sociology University of Manitoba April 1992 HV 9507 C56 1992 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank the staff of the prisons where interviews were conducted for extending helping hands and easing the administrative difficulties involved in co- ordinating a large project in a small time. Thanks also to the staff of the Research and Statistics Branch, CSC for their assistance, especially Ray Belcourt, Evylyn McCauley, Audrey MacDonnell and Tanya Noewens. I would also like to thank Colin Kinsella who was a quick study, a most valuable interviewer and eager to assist in other capacities. Special thanks to Drs. Steven Brickey, Ken Hatt and Frank Porporino for offerring the greatest resource of all: time. This project would not have been possible without the co- operation of the men who struggle to fight another day in prison. One hundred and seventeen men shared their life with us so that we may develop an appreciation of what we do to them. This project was partially funded by the Correctional Service of Canada and the Social Science and Humanities Research Council. The views expressed are in this document are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of CSC or SSHRC. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Acknowledgements ii List of Tables List of Figures vii Chapter 1: Introduction 1 Chapter 2: Violence in Canadian Federal Prisons 7 Victimization Surveys Conceptualizing Victimization Criminal Victimization Surveys Prison Victimization Chapter 3: The Inmate Code and the Importation-Deprivation Debate 23 The Inmate Code The Deprivation Model The Importation Model Limitations of the Deprivation-Importation Debate Chapter 4: Methodology 44 The Sample The Questionnaire Definitions and Coding Rules for the Victimization Screening Schedule Limitations The Informal Rules of Social Control 57 '6.411formal Rules of Social Control Oper ion of the Informal Rules of Social Control summarÿ iii Chapter 6: The Informal Rules of Social Control and the Social World of the Prison 94 Solidarity and the Social World of the Prison The 'Pepsi Generation' and Solidarity The 'Rat System' and Solidarity Solidarity and the Informal Rules of Social Control The Prison Status Hierarchy Summary Chapter 7: Victimization in Prison 121 Victimization Incidents Personal Victimizations Property Victimizations Prison Victimization Rates and Official Rates of Security Incidents and Community Rates of Victimization The Victims Multiple Victimization Victims v. Non-Victims Predicting Victimization Summary Chapter 8: Victimization and the Partial Instability of the Prison 154 Property Victimizations Personal Victimizations Resolution and Order A Note on Minimum Security Prisons Chapter 9: The Informal Rules of Social Control and Conflict Management 184 The Deprivation-Importation Debate Forms of Conflict Management Conflict Management in Prison Future Research References 210 iv LIST OF TABLES Table Page 2.1 Major Security Incidents - 1970 to 1989 8 2.2 Major and Minor Violent Incidents, 1983 to 1989, Rates per 1000 Prisoners 9 4.1 Comparison of Potential Victimizations and Verified Victimizations 54 5.1 Number of Friends by Percentage of Prisoners 78 1 7.1 Victimization Incidents by Incident Type 123 7.2 Victimization Incidents by Degree of Aggression 124 7.3 Number of Victims by Victimization Type 132 7.4 Summary Table for Two-Group Discriminant Function Analysis 143 7.5 Canonical Discriminant Functions Evaluated at Group Means (Group Centroids) 145 7.6 Summary Table for Three-group Discriminant Function Analysis 145 7.7 Standardized Canonical Discriminant Function Coefficients 146 1 7.8 Comparison of Victimization Rates Per 1000, Prison v. Males in the Community 150 8.1 Victim's Previous Knowledge of Aggressor, Personal Victimizations 161 8.2 Relationship Between the Victim and Aggressor, Personal Victimizations 163 8.3 Percentage of Victims by Victimization Type, Personal Victimizations 165 Table Page 8.4 Victim-Aggressor Relationship by Type of Victimization, Personal Victimizations 165 8.5 Staff Awareness of Personal Victimization Incidents 176 8.6 Resolution of Victimization Incidents, Personal Victimizations 179 1 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 7.1 Value of Stolen or Damaged Property 127 II 7.2 Victimization by Security Level ' 130 II 7.3 Multiple Victimization 134 7.4 Victimization by Age 135 11 7.5 Victimization by Aggregate Sentence 136 7.6 Victimization by Admission Date 137 II 7.7 Victimization by Offence Type 138 II 7.8 Victimization by Warrant Expiry Date 139 7.9 Victimization by Previous Federal Terms 140 11 7.10 Comparison of Survey Data and Security Data 149 II .1 .1 V11 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION They don't give a fuck about what goes on after four o'clock, the shit stays here and they go home. If there is any oppression it is indifference. People really don't care - the guards, your CO, the NPH, nobody. This isn't unique to prisons - that's life but here things are magnified. You can't lose yourself here like you can in the community. The prison is not a microcosm of free society. By its very nature the prison is deviant. It houses people who have been declared deviant by those in power. Rightly or wrongly, these deviants are placed in an environment, a total institution, that deprives them of their liberty, their freedom to move and associate with whom they desire, their freedom to communicate with the outside world and their freedom to engage in creative, productive activity. Some of these freedoms are returned to prisoners, although not in the absolute but as privileges subject to the 'good order of the penitentiary' and the requisites of a 1 bureaucratic structure. In this environment deviants become prisoners. Within this deviant environment, prisoners are 'encouraged' not to be deviant. All are given a bed and food, which is more than some had on the street. Most are subjected to a barrage of psychological testing to determine strengths but mostly weaknesses, and those most in need may be provided with psychological or psychiatric services. Some are offered programs - anger and stress management to assist them in learning coping skills, cognitive restructuring to make them think correctly, vocational skills to teach them to spot weld, Alcoholics and Narcotics Anonymous to relieve chemical addictions, or spiritual services for those who are so inclined. Most are given employment, however menial some jobs may be, and an income to and luxury items. Some turn their back purchase some necessities on what is offered, others accept it out of necessity, boredom or the seduction of an early release. What is most remarkable about this deviant world is that some prisoners are 'rehabilitated'. Whether assisted by correctional services or in spite of them, some prisoners re- adjust to street life with little or no further contact with the criminal justice system. This is remarkable because the prison world in which they temporarily lived is one of violence and exploitation. 2 Over the past decade the problem of prison violence has been given a great deal of attention by prison researchers. The majority of this research has been directed at establishing correlates between individual and system level variables. For example, variables that have been associated with prison violence include the transiency of the prison population (Myers and Levy, 1978; Clements, 1982; Ellis, 1984; Gaes and McGuire, 1985; Porporino, 1986), age (Porporino, 1986; Flanagan, 1983; Anno, 1985; DeHeer, 1985), the racial composition of a prison (Gaes and McGuire, 1985; Leger, 1988), the absolute number of prisoners in a prison or prison system (Farrington and Nuttal, 1980; Winfree, 1987; Fry, 1988), the population density of a prison or prison system (D'Atri and Ostfeld, 1975; Nacci et.al ., 1977; Megargee, 1976; Jan, 1980; Cox et.al ., 1984), and the presence of prisoners convicted of violent crimes (Bonta and Nanckivell, 1980; Gaes and McGuire, 1985; Porporino, 1986). The existing state of knowledge regarding the relationship between these variables and prison violence, however, is not at all conclusive. While some of the literature on prison violence displays a high degree of methodological sophistication, Rice et.al . (1989) argued that one consequence of attempting to establish correlates between individual and system level variables and prison violence has been the paucity of innovative theoretical advances in attempting to understand the dynamics of prison violence. The 3 Prison Victimization Project represents an attempt to fill this void.