REPORT ON THE D.C. CRIME AND CORRECTIONS WORKSHOP
(Excerpted from D.C. BAR JOURNAL, Aug. .Dec. 1970, Vol. 37,
Nos. 8-12)
The district of columbia conference brought together about 110 representatives
from all segments of the criminal justice system-judges, prosecutors, police,
defense counsel, corrections, probation/parole authorities, and private
citizens. Fully participating "consultants" to the Conference
included 18 inmates of D.C. correctional institutions (men, women, and youth),
who were indispensable. We came away with a deep sense of community and
individual responsibility for the problems to which we were exposed.
A parolee's first interview with her parole officer upon release demonstrated
the "spirit of coercion that victimizes us all"-accountability
for crime in Washington was passed on and on through the interconnecting
labyrinth of the parole officer's superior, judge, press, city council,
mayor, frightened citizens, congressman, and finally the congressman's constituency
in a cow-pasture in Texas at election time. A black convict who started
off an unwanted child born in a latrine in a South Carolina public park,
was passed from mother to grandmother, to aunt, and back to mother all his
juvenile delinquent life, and became a big-time narcotics dealer in and
out of ineffective prisons-is in prison now as an old man. In contrast was
a scrappy white potential juvenile delinquent whose parents had the supportive
love and wherewithal to straighten him out toward a successful life.
I was a full-fledged inmate at Lorton Reformatory for a day and a night.
Yes, the prisoners knew who we were-they had to guarantee our safety. At
11:30 P.M. when lights were out, I lay back and thought to myself: What
if I knew I was not going to get out of here for years? That ceiling settled
down upon me like a great lead blanket, suffocating my humanity with feelings
of powerlessness and beginnings of bitterness.
. . . a deep and intense debate ranged around the question of racism and
its impact on every question of crime, correction and indeed upon the very
viability of life in our community and our country. . . . We all did agree
that no progress could ever be made on our agenda or on any other in the
country until all men learned to live and love and work together. It was
not until we could say this to each other and reveal that we meant it that
we could. . . seek improvements for our criminal justice system and to suggest
complementary alternatives to do it.. (Excerpt from the Conference Report)
-PETER H. WOLF: Chairman, Young Lawyers Section, Bar Association of the
District of Columbia
THE CONFERENCE NOT ONLY established a useful dialogue between judges, prosecutors,
defense counsel, police, parole officers, correctional officers, and citizens
but it illuminated their mutual awareness through the presence-and voice-of
the offender who meets them each in turn. The voice of the inmate was sometimes
loud, sometimes soft, but always compelling. No one was stronger than the
inmates on the need to be tough and vigilant in coping with pushers operating
at schools.
Imperishable in memory was that moment of truth when a hushed conference
was confronted by the inmates' recount of the hard facts of homosexual rape
and the correctional officers' admission that their persistent efforts could
not eradicate this stain.
A judge staying at Lorton overnight cannot have been given purely routine
treatment-he must have been shielded from the more volatile and possibly
dangerous malcontents. But the routine was certainly not a "soft touch."
The exhaustive strip search for narcotics, the first meal without forks
and knives, the guard flashlights that jump in every hour of the night "to
see flesh"-these are some of the obvious differences from, say, Army
life.
I was unprepared for the high proportion of young. They have developed their
own Youth Guidance Council that seems to give some of them self-awareness
without pity or self-condemnation. The Black Muslims light a path for others.
There were many men with really long sentences-necessary for the truly incorrigible.
But some of the men just didn't strike me that way. Is there not a time
when the apple is ripe to be set free from the tree, and cannot be kept
on without a spread of rot?
-JUDGE HAROLD LEVENTHAL: Circuit Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the District
of Columbia
IT WAS AN INTELLECTUAL, PERSONAL and intimate nine days in which many people
discovered that they neither understood nor appreciated that the criminal
justice process involves people-not numbers of arrests, or criminal case
jackets, or statistics on the rate of conviction, or mandatory versus minimum
sentences-but people who as either victims or offenders are affected for
the rest of their lives by what is done by administrators of the criminal
justice process.
-DAVID T. AUSTERN: Chief, Grand Jury Section, U.S. Attorney's Office, District
of Columbia
THE CONFERENCE DEALT HEAVILY with the "Black-White" problems in
corrections. The prisons are jammed with "blacks," indicating
to them that "whites" are seldom incarcerated for crimes. This
has caused continuous frustration among the black inmates, especially when
the correctional force is predominately white. The Conference ran head on
into most of these problems and prejudices. The "soul searching"
that took place was beautiful, and the oneness that was apparent during
the last days indicated that men of different races are now on the right
track by working toward rehabilitation of youth in the community instead
of punishment and prisons.
-EDWARD FAISON, JR.: Acting Chief of Classification and Parole Officers,
Lorton Youth Center, D.C.
I WAS STRUCK BY THE "tell it like it is" atmosphere of the Conference.
I learned we offer little chance for rehabilitation; the system especially
penalizes the poor, the black, and other minorities; the system denies human
dignity to its clients and breeds hatred and hostility. I saw judges learn
from convicts the beginning of changes in attitudes, disbelief and hostility
turn toward credibility and acceptance. Appreciation developed both for
"protection of society" and "demand for human dignity"
as the philosophy "I am my brother's keeper" deepened. Men and
women from all walks of life asked: What can I do, what must I do, to change
the system?
-FLAXIE M. PINKETT: Businesswoman, D.C. Democratic National Committeewoman
