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Prison Myth Number Two
As I write this article, it is 9:45 am, Christmas Day. I have been a team player in the give and take of gifts and good wishes. The game is over; team members are dispersing; it is time for reflection until the next group meeting in a couple of hours.
Who were the great team players in human history? Certainly not Gandhi, the author of non-violent protest; not Jesus of Nazareth, who refused a coronation by His followers; not Galileo, who was tried and convicted of heresy against his church for daring to suggest that the sun did not revolve around the earth. Nor was Martin Luther a team player. He was tried, convicted and condemned to death (never carried out) for valuing truth over tradition. His name-sake, King, Jr., was assassinated for daring to challenge long-held traditions of bigotry and hate covered with a veneer of religious conviction.
There don’t seem to be many, if any, team players who have been associated with change, success or victory. The exception is basketball, where kudos are given to the player who passes off rather than takes the low-percentage shot outside the circle – provided the team wins, of course. Basketball, however, is a very public game, which distinguishes it from prison.
Maine State Prison is anything but a public game. The taxpayer has every interest in applauding team players at MSP – staff and prisoners alike. Who wants to be reminded of our failures? Nestled in the midst of 1,100 acres of farmland outside the beaten path of US Rte. 1, MSP is a monument to law and order, housing within its razor wire barriers 1,000 men serving out their sentences for anti-social behavior – failing to be team players.
Within its walls, however, is a bee hive of activity – moving paper from one department to another and logging nearly every 15-minute segment of the day. It is the quintessential example of a team committed to a process of tamping down anything that fails to fit comfortably within the boundaries set by 200 years of human warehousing unless mandated by a court order.
Needless to say, low-percentage shots outside the circle are systematically blocked at MSP.
Initial interviews of the new warden, Patricia Barnhart, from Michigan, have highlighted team building as the strength she brings to the job. In the past, team building from the Commissioner on down has placed a premium on the three-monkey defense – “see no evil; hear no evil; speak no evil.” We can only hope that Warden Barnhart, while working on staff morale, will not herself become a typical Corrections Department team player at a time when cracks are beginning to appear in the three-monkey defense.
A long history of team players has held MSP culture to a 19th Century prison model within a 21st Century shell. I am reminded of the past history of religious convents, benign on the outside but seething with conflict and denial within. Bring to the attention of a Deputy Warden violations of security and medical care, and you are likely to receive in return a policy manual or an unpleasant private meeting with the Warden.
The death of prisoner Sheldon Weinstein was a watershed moment for team players at the Department. Having died unattended in solitary confinement 4 days after an assault, there was no way for team players to circle the wagons. The best they could do would be to gently move aside Warden Jeff Merrill, who now serves as a traveling consultant to the Department on such matters as energy and prison industries, and discipline less than a handful of security people at the bottom of the food chain.
The recent death of prisoner Victor Valdez, while preceded by discomforting circumstances, was not unattended and therefore falls under efficient team player dispatch.
As I reflect on these events, even the Attorney General’s Office struggles with the team player syndrome, knowing that the minute they get an indictment against the inmates who assaulted Prisoner Weinstein that fails to implicate staff as accessory before or after the fact, they open a can of worms. That, along with what will prove to be a very public lawsuit by Weinstein’s widow, should blow the team cover sky high. Stay tuned!
So, what is a team player in a prison? Is it someone who ignores what is wrong in the interest of promoting what they perceive as the greater good? Do Chaplains ignore violations of human rights because of the greater good of contributing to the spiritual welfare of prisoners? Does the Education Department turn a blind eye to physical abuse by security so long as they are teaching illiterate inmates how to read? Is it about putting window dressing on training programs mandated by the federal government without accountability from those being trained?
So long as team players commit to circling the wagons at every crisis and keeping the media at arm’s length, MSP will retain its history of 19th Century culture in a 21st Century box, regardless of how many tongue-in-cheek memos are sent from the Commissioner’s Office encouraging reporting of violations.
The Department of Corrections has many capable, devoted and committed employees. They have, however, been muzzled, creating the appearance of teamwork without the innovating tactics of a winning team. Team membership trumps a strategy of success. There is, trapped under the surface, a chafing at the restraint on creativity and reform. It pervades throughout the system and will prevent the Department from forging success out of society’s failures in its keeping.
Being a team player does indeed require ignoring nonessentials in favor of the greater good. Human rights and dignity, however, are not, as we learned at the Nuremburg Trials, nonessentials. Neither is “greater good” about keeping a lid of secrecy on operations. Being a team player requires another ingredient – courage. Courage to offer innovative ideas; courage to speak out against abuse; courage to strive for a system that will not wilt under public scrutiny; courage to turn sound bites into viable programs; courage to admit when you are wrong – those are just some of the necessary qualities of being a team player.
We wish the new warden well. There are, however, elements of her hiring that show signs of pouring new wine into old wineskins, destined to crack and leak. The question remains, “Will she be willing to risk her job in pursuit of what is decent and right?”
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