the great wall of deceit

Corporate Corrections of America the great wall of deceit

Otay Mesa, San Diego, California

Stand Up! Complied with. Turn around! Complied with. Do not move! Complied with. Carlos followed every directive without ever saying a word. The door opened and 5 guards rushed in and threw Carlos to the ground, with the noise of teenage hooligans out to cause mischief the guards stomped on him and secured all 5’7 145lbs of him but again Carlos did not say a word. The guards whisked him off to the hole and before long Carlos heard another cell door open, he was thrown in this cell and the training began. The lead guard demonstrated how you subdue an inmate and remove his restraints, then for them the fun began, the lead guard shouted rip his shirt off, flip him over pull his pants off, leaving him naked, standing over him, high fives abound, and accolades a job well done were echoed, they all looked down at Carlos who of course was completely naked and smiled and walked away, slamming the cell door as they left. Carlos still never said a word. Carlos looked around and saw this cell had one unique feature, there was a hole in the middle of the room and that was it. The hole and the cell smelled like feces. Carlos was appalled. Why was he naked? Well enter the counselor who told him that he was in this cell and naked because the report stated he was suicidal. Carlos could not believe it, “who wrote that”, he asked, I am not suicidal, nor will I ever be… after just ten minutes speaking with Carlos the counselor agreed and summoned the captain for Carlos to be moved immediately. The guards had falsified this finding so as to be able to train their staff and this was at the expense of Carlos… what precipitated this event, well Carlos did tear up his cell, why you ask? Well the constant mind games of lights on and lights off and the constant private personal, medical information being leaked to other inmates who want to hurt Carlos had reached a point, but what pushed him over the edge was his commissary delivery or the lack there of it. I call the prison when something is not right and Carlos complains to me, I happened to speak with the commissary manager in the morning and as usual the arrogance of a CCA employee showed thru, I spoke about their oversight and their mistake of not delivering to Carlos, well she made it a point to tell me that Carlos needed to speak to anyone who worked in commissary as they always are around and he could just ask someone when he saw them. Well I shared my point with her and then shared her point with Carlos…….Carlos followed that instruction and the next time he saw the guy who delivered commissary he spoke to him, “hey man! You forgot about my delivery, can you check please”? This employee looked at Carlos and shouted “fuck off”……and kept on walking………………….Carlos had enough and rightfully so, so he took his frustrations out on his cell and then laid down and waited.. I have as well had enough of this corporation and our government must now step in and revoke their licenses. Google this company and see all the discord, see all the human rights violations, see the deaths , see the corrupt employees, see the corrupt officers of this company. They over crowd for profits sake, they have been sited for this but yet still practice this. They hold back meals, they traumatize the families of these inmates who patiently wait to see them, the area that you must wait in gets very hot and yet only one umbrella, they make them line up to hand in their paperwork, making them stand for up to an hour in the sun before the employee comes out to collect the paper work. Also this is a holding facility not a prison, the shackles on the ankles are a form of torture , look at Carlos’ ankles and tell me it is not, this should be abolished. It has been said that if you went to the facility and wore a blindfold you would not be able to distinguish who the inmates or who the guards were. I myself have waited for my visit and have had shift changes happen, older men and women along with children were waiting as well and all of us are forced to hear words such as “mother fucker”, “asshole”, bitch, dike, fag…..is this really what we should put up with. Is this really where we should trust our loved ones, Is this really where we should reward these kinds of behavior. I know that running an operation such as this is not easy but with that said, if you fail at something look for something else to do. The one thing you owe us, those of us who have loved ones in your care is that they will be safe and treated with respect and dignity. You have failed at all three, you harbor an environment of hate and discontent for the human life and this can not be tolerated.

Mark O’Brien