Prison Life: Violence, Gangs, and Rape

Criminals don’t stop committing crimes and unethical acts just because they are locked up. Hardened criminals and prison veterans take advantage of weaker and new inmates using coercion and violence to exploit them for money, power, status, sex and drugs. Prison staff tries hard to fight such occurrences but with minimal personnel and ramped overcrowding, predation is ordinary in prison. This occurs because prison environments inevitably mix non-violent criminals with violent or sexual offenders and young adults with hardened older prisoners. 

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With so much violence and aggression coupled with the void of intimate or sexual interaction, prison rape is a fact of life. Whatever the reports on rape and victimization conclude, the results should only be inflated. Neither victims nor the aggressor want to acknowledge the occurrence of rape which creates a conspiracy of silence perpetuated by all parties. These conditions and occurrences are not only distasteful, shocking, upsetting, and unacceptable but they promote more sinister and violent aggression. As one can imagine, rape is one thing prisoners will fight to the death over. 

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The problem is that staff is not only suppose to keep the institution running smoothly but also keep prisoners from hurting each other. This becomes a challenge when it is all too common for prisons to be overcrowded--which also means they are understafffed. This makes aggressive retaliation and outbursts able to occur at any time. One can only imagine how mentally draining it could be to never be able to relax.
Prisoners either join a gang or face the prison society alone, having the propensity to fall prey to anyone in such an unsympathetic environment. Many, understandably, choose gang membership out of fear. (See Prison Overcrowding for more on why prisoners join gangs.) In exchange for protection many members must perform acts that are self-defeating such as stabbings, battery, and even homicides often leaving those individuals with longer sentences, or if sentenced to life, put in incarceration.

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