| For more than a decade now, politicians have gotten
elected to their office on promises of getting tough on crime. The reality
of it is that crime still exists and always will. The state of the economy
and drugs are the two main factors that make crime rates rise and fall
in our nation. There are also bad people, and people who are good but under
certain circumstances made bad choices. It is the responsibility of the
lawmakers and Department of Corrections to separate both of these types
of people from society until he or she prove that they are remorseful for
what they've done, taken the initiative to change their lives, accept the
rules of society, and in turn they earn their way back into society.
However, in the 1994-1995 election year, George Allen
and Ron Angelone campaigned hard to convince the taxpayers of Virginia
that they would solve the crime problem at the time by abolishing parole
and keeping prisoners in prison for a very long time by reducing the good
time earned to 4.5 days for every 30 days served.
Virginia citizens bought into the campaign and elected
George Allen to Governor and he in turn appointed Ron Angelone to the Director
of the Virginia Department of Corrections.
This is when Rehabilitation all but vanished in this
system. There are certain programs offered to convicted felons in prison,
but are nothing but a walk through. The Commonwealth of Virginia is mandated
to do them because it receives federal funding. The facts behind it all
is that a substance abuse program is 8 weeks long at 1 to 2 hours long
per week! This puts an addict in a "program" for NO MORE than 16 hours
at most. Not to mention that the Counselor instructing the class is not
qualified to proctor a real substance abuse program. It is all just smoke
and mirrors to please the powers that be with statistics that say that
X amount of prisoners have completed the said program in order to get the
money. No thought is put into whether or not the prisoner learned anything
or whether he or she will be able to function in society.
With parole abolished and prisoners required to do
85% of their sentence no matter how much they've changed their lives, the
Virginia Department of Corrections (Va. D.O.C.) looks at it as if it doesn't
matter anyhow. The inmate is stuck here anyhow, they can't earn their way
back, so why put forth the effort to help them? That, is the attitude your
tax dollar pays for!
With rehabilitation the way it is in the Va. D.O.C.,
you have men and women being warehoused for years only to be pushed out
of the the door when their sentence is up in worse shape than they were
before their incarceration. Now you have a revolving door of prisoners,
and politicians taxing you to build more prisons in which they have financial
interest in because of the privatization of services in prison. (see
Privatization)
As you can see by the following legislative bills, education/rehabilitation
is an issue that is being brought up in our state's General Assembly but
seems to fail or does not have a sponsor. You as a taxpayer have the right
to ask why! It is your dollar that is being spent to warehouse prisoners
today that will be your neighbor tomorrow. It is the officials involved
in this mess that they created, who are responsible to ensure that a prisoner
is rehabilitated before release. It is clear that they are not doing so.
There is no method of risk assessment, no level of incentive for prisoners
to want to change, there is no bar to meet in order to get out. All a prisoner
has is a set date no matter what he or she does, and those still eligible
for parole (pre July 1, 1995) may as well be under this 85% law because
parole is not granted when it should be. (see Parole
Board Mismanagement)
All of the information on this site is well known to the State's
Lawmakers, but until those footing the bill for this huge lapse of reason
let them know you won't stand for it, they will continue to follow this
road simply because it is profitable business to them.
I ask you to read the article titled, "New Policy on Prisoners Urged"
by Frank Green of the Richmond Times Dispatch. Mr. Mark Early, our former
Va. Attorney General is now shunned by his peers because he spoke the hidden
truth about the Va. D.O.C. and it's lawmakers.
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