Analysis of Ted Conover's Memoir- Newjack Essay

Johnny sacks consist of a baloney sandwich, peanut butter and jelly sandwich, an apple and a pack of mustard with a small bag of chips in a brown paper bag. Johnny sacks were usually passed out to inmates for chow during the booking process. One inmate yelled “This is some hoe ass shit” and throws his against the wall. I threw my Johnny sack away because of the pork, and I don’t eat peanut butter and jelly but ate the apple and the chips. I thought to myself “Damn was I hungry!” It was more acceptable to throw food in the garbage than to allow another prisoner to even insinuate that he is applying to take it. Experienced prisoners constantly observed the going-on of everyone and everything in the tank. These prisoners listened to the other prisoner’s tones of voice next to them when they spoke and observe their posture, and the personal space that he commanded within the jail tank.

An example of what happens when prisons become overcrowded took place in Trenton, New Jersey in 1952. The small prison was made up of "sexual psychopaths, passive homosexuals, aggressive 'wolves' with long records of fights and stabbings, escape artists, agitators and incorrigibles of all ages" (Blackwell). While Trenton’s overcrowding was minimal compared to today’s standards, there was 1,312 inmates in a facility designed to hold 1,190. The cells were old and rundown, barely lit, and infested with rats that were fed better than the inmates (Blackwell). The prison began hiring tougher, more rugged correction officers to combat the rowdy inmates. The inhumane treatment of the inmates contributed to an unstable and volatile emotional state among the inmates. Around midnight on March 29, 1952, the inmates began to tear apart their cots, using the metal legs to pry open their cell doors. The inmates “chased their guards out of the wing, barricaded the entrance and wrecked everything they could lay their hands on. They smashed cell toilets, shredded beds, broke windows and set fires” (Blackwell). The guards broke the will of the inmates after 46 hours by using tear gas and water hoses. Two weeks later, a group

In part 3, Morris (2002, p.171) discusses why prison conditions matter and why penal reformers, including himself, have devoted their lives and travelled thousands of miles

Specifically, the treatment of the many prisoners at the hands of the guards had really stood out to me. How handcuffs, leg-irons, strip searches, and comments such as “spread’m, Tonto” had become his day to day routine. In just a small section of the book, he shows the attitude that many guards take when dealing with people they are arresting or who are already incarcerated. They disrespect the inmates, not because they have to, but almost because they want to.

Most of his time at Sing Sing was consumed being in close contact with the inmates, in dining halls and housing galleries, doing strip searches, searching cells, writing disciplinary infraction reports, and confiscating inmate contraband. In addition, because they live in an enforced state of near powerlessness, answering to inmates who required support with a seemingly endless range of personal complications occupied much of Conover’s time. Conover’s account of the correctional officer’s role is consistent with those opinions offered by others who have firsthand experience of prison life. Virtually all serious, firsthand interpretations of correctional work define a gap between the training and the realism of the job, official policies and procedures that require routine avoidance, poor associations between line officers and administrators, and the undermining power of stress on professional conduct and personal life.

This book is comprised of nineteen chapters, 153 pages that are aimed at an audience of sociologists, and academicians in all areas of criminal justice administration. Its major themes are that of violence and disorganization as experienced by inmates in the 1980 New Mexico State Prison Riot and, in precise ways, it discusses the impact of such violence in the day-to-day experiences of those involved – the inmates and prison staff. This riot lasted only two days and more precisely, 36 hours, but the turmoil experienced by the inmates and prison staff during that time will last a lifetime. This book should alert prison officials of the need to run prison facilities in a humane way, but this book demonstrates almost the opposite.

Ted Conover’s book, New Jack, is about the author's experiences as a rookie guard at Sing Sing prison, in New York, the most troubled maximum security prison. He comes to realize that being a correctional officer isn’t an easy task. This is shown from the beginning when he is required to attend a 7 week training program to become a correctional officer. He comes to realize what inmates have to endure on a daily basis. Throughout his experience into a harsh culture of prison and the exhausting and poor working conditions for officers, he begins to realize that the prison system brutalizes everyone connected to it. New Jack presents new ideas of prisons in the United States in the ways facilities, corrections officers, and inmates function with

This book is an honest account of life in Leavenworth Prison, Kansas based on interviews with notorious inmates and numerous other individuals. The book begins with introducing inmates such as Carl Bowles, Dallas Scott and William Post and offers insight information on the cultural aspect inside the prison itself. Once the basics are known to the reader, the author Pete Earley, develops the character of the prisoners and thus of the penitentiary as a whole.

Correctional Officers are a very important part of the Justice System because it keeps high profile criminals off the street and locked up even before they are proven innocent or guilty. The Correctional Facility in many ways is a lot like a jail, from what I saw when I toured the new Pre Trial Centre in Port Coquitlam. There are large thick metal doors to

After reading the book I have gained a new understanding of what inmates think about in prison. Working in an institution, I have a certain cynical attitude at times with inmates and their requests.

In America, everyone seems to have a different idea about what goes on behind the grey, dismal walls of prison. For many of us, the idea itself conjures images of coiled barbed wire fences, chains dragging across the ground, somber faces behind rusting bars and those bright orange jumpsuits. These visions come from a variety of sources-- movies we’ve seen, the stories that we’ve been told and our own imagination that is constantly at work. However, the reality of prison life in America can only come from those who have stepped foot inside. Through memoirs written by Danner Darcleight and Ted Conover, I’ve had to reconsider some of these previously held visions of prison life. While Conover writes about the abusive relationship between the correctional officers and the prisons, through Darcleight’s writing we see the rewarding powers of having social life and the hopeful possibility for anyone to attain redemption. The first chapter of Concrete Carnival, by Danner Darcleight, as well as Guarding Sing Sing by Ted Conover has led me to re-evaluate these previously held visions of prison life, including the relationship between guards and inmates, social systems, and redemption.

In the case of the California’s Corcoran State Prison the prisoners were being mistreated. The situation that brought this case to the forefront was Dryburgh (2009) found that “Preston Tate was shot and fatally wounded by a corrections officer after Tate and his cellmate fought against two rival Hispanic gang member. Tate death was at the hands of a prison guard prompted two whistle – blowers to approach the FBI with tales of abuse and brutality toward inmates by correction officers”. Moreover, this was not the first time that an inmate had been shot by a correctional officer.

At any given time, a single corrections officer, can expect to be outnumbered by upwards of 400 inmates (Conover, 2011). It can be chilling to work in the midst of hundreds of inmates, some of which initiate attacks and inappropriate relationships. However, other issues have impacted the psychological health and physical safety of the staff. Detrimental factors have included heavy workloads, the prisons physical structure, and a lack of support from both peers and superiors. Each workplace issue has been in addition to role problems, specifically role ambiguity and role conflict (Schaufeli & Peeters, 2011). It is believed that anyone of these undesirable facets of prison should be enough to deter the public from attempting to enter such

In the book NewJack: Guarding Sing Sing, the book discussed the life of a guard. Most people feel that the guards are bad guys in the criminal justice system and with the politics of the criminal justice systems there are many assumptions of the way in which the stereotype of prison guard’s life should be. The author Ted Conover explains first hand on the experiences behind the scenes that many guards experiences throughout their careers that is an untold story of the truth in the prison system. Conover was curious about the subculture of the prison guards’ duties and wanted to know the truth about if the assumptions that most have about the prison guards is truthful. Conover entered the Academy with many other young men and a few women who wanted good jobs with security. The training was modeled after boot camp for the military. Those who had been in the military fared better than those who had not been so initiated. Once Conover crossed the training hurdle, he was tossed over to Sing Sing for his first assignment.

When we do research on daily prison life, we come across two typical but less than ideal situations: either social imaginaries cloud our judgment or information provided by the prisons themselves hide certain weak or bad aspects that they do not want to make public. We can also find information on TV, but most of the time it either exaggerates or minimizes the facts. In order to obtain more reliable information, we have to have access to people who are working or have worked in this institution, and such will be the sources of this essay. We will be describing and giving examples of prison violence according to three types of violence: sexual, physical and psychological violence.