Surviving prison, mentally, physically, and with your record intact, requires a set of skills and strategies that nobody teaches you before you go in. The adjustment is enormous, and how you handle the first days and weeks sets the tone for everything that follows. This section covers the practical realities of daily life inside a correctional facility, how to navigate the social environment without becoming a target or a participant in activities that will extend your sentence, how to protect your mental health during a long sentence, what the research shows about maintaining family connections and why they matter for survival, how to use the time productively rather than letting it use you, and what the people who come out strongest have in common. The guidance here comes from someone who served 66 months in the federal system and built a business around helping the people left behind. Do the time. Do not let the time do you. See also our sections on Prison Violence, Prison Discipline, and Re-entry and Rehabilitation.
Subject: Survive prison
Lockdown is something imposed for the safety of the operation of the jail. There are no limits to the amount of time they can keep inmates in lockdown. There are no statutes that require inmates to have any liberties, and lockdowns occur when the inmates have done something against the rules.
Subject: Survive prison
County jail is probably the most boring of the venues to do one's time. The days begins with a wake up, lights one routine. Inmates will then be brought breakfast. After breakfast there is a clean-up period where the inmates will make their bed and mop their cells. There are a couple of inmates that clean the general area. After the morning chores are completed, there is a period of time where inmates are all in one area of the...
Read moreSubject: Survive prison
There is NO jail, or prison, or detention center that has "co-ed" housing. Female inmates are segregated from male inmates, always. Inmates are allowed out of their cells for most of the day in the general population of the pod they are housed in (unless there is a group punishment). Inmates are in their cells for "count time" and sleep.
Subject: Survive prison
If you have not been sentenced yet, you need to discuss guidelines and points with your attorney. There is a basic graph to the lines a judge follows unless you have some aggravation points. Jared from Subway was famous and that fame cost him at least 5 extra years. Federal time is easier to do than state time - our guess is it might be ten years.
Most inmates do not talk about their charges, it's almost forbidden. But, there are...
Read moreSubject: Survive prison
Prison life is defined by the type of prison you do your time in. Maximum security prisons have the offenders with the longest sentences for the worst crimes. Those inmates have little to lose when it comes to imposing their will on other inmates in there. It can be brutal at times and there are some really violent episodes that occur. Generally, as the custody level lowers, so does the level of brutality but this is certainly not without exceptions....
Read moreSubject: Survive prison
There are many things that might have caused the delay. If he has no minutes left on the card, if there was some sort of group punishment where the phone use was restricted, or he could have lost his phone privileges. Being in jail is not like he's staying at a hotel. He is told when to go to sleep, when to wake up, when to eat, when to go to rec, when to shower and on and on. You...
Read moreSubject: Survive prison
Our advice is to call the facility and try to speak to the counselor first and see where that gets you. If you feel stonewalled, call the chaplain. If that gets you nowhere, you have to go to the head of the jail, whether that is the warden or a captain and express your concerns in the most humble and respectful manner. If you are convinced after trying a few people that they are not helping you get the information...
Read moreSubject: Survive prison
It is not going to be easy but it definitely can be done. If this is a jail with heavy gang activity like Cook County, Illinois or Los Angeles County, California there might be the need to align with people of your own race. This is more important if you have a long sentence.
If
somebody
is
threatening
y ou
in
jail,
you
need
to
make
some
friends.
People
won’t
be
as
likely
to
fight
with
you
if
you
have
friends
because...
Read moreSubject: Survive prison
How other people in their case got shorter sentences and that they snitched to get a reduction.
Subject: Survive prison
Inmates are basically the property of the jurisdiction they are held by and there is very little people on the outside can do to effectuate change on the inside. We have of course heard of stories similar to what you are referring to. But, we would caution you to not take everything your inmate says as 100% accurate. Inmates are notorious for currying favor from their loved ones with stories of abuse - amplifying your imagery of jail life.
This causes...
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