Josh and Anna 55: Settling in at Seagoville

[Father Son Holy Goat]

5 hours ago, Bad Wolf said:

My toenails are a red glitter. I'm pretty conservative about the way I dress (except that I mostly wear clothes that pertaineth to a man), but I love sparkly toenails. My fingernails don't often reach the point where I can get a manicure, but when they do the bling is on. Oh, and I'm an old grandma.

I just did mine a bright orangey red color. It’s very summery

[Melissa1977]

12 hours ago, Antimony said:

Women prisoners with children three years or under can lose their parental rights forever after six months, and the children adopted out

Aren't prisoners allowed to keep their babies? In any case? I find it heartbreaking. In Spain, female prisoners can keep their children up to 3 years old. They are in a special prison ward, only for moms. At 3 years old, children have to move with the family (or foster care).  Edit to add that keeping their children inside is not mandatory.

While I'm sure some of them loss custody because the whole mess their life is, the goal is them to keep the children. Most of them, and with most I mean an extremely high percentage, are very poor and from problematic backgrounds.

But jail terms here are far shorter than in US, which make things easier.

Imprisoned women here are a few, most of them are not violent and imprisoned mothers are an exception,  so I get that it's easier to help them.

Edited July 4, 2022 by Melissa1977
Clarify

[AussieKrissy]

14 minutes ago, Melissa1977 said:

Aren't prisoners allowed to keep their babies? In any case? I find it heartbreaking. In Spain, female prisoners can keep their children up to 3 years old. They are in a special prison ward, only for moms. At 3 years old, children have to move with the family (or foster care).  Edit to add that keeping their children inside is not mandatory.

While I'm sure some of them loss custody because the whole mess their life is, the goal is them to keep the children. Most of them, and with most I mean an extremely high percentage, are very poor and from problematic backgrounds.

But jail terms here are far shorter than in US, which make things easier.

Imprisoned women here are a few, most of them are not violent and imprisoned mothers are an exception,  so I get that it's easier to help them.

Women can keep their children in some cases (in Australia)

Some times it is not viable, if they mother classification is too high and therefore is not able to be at the gaol that allows the babies. Usually Mums and Bubs programs are at lower classification gaols so a high profile high sentence (for example) offender will not be eligible  to participate....

There are many things that can prohibit a mother having her child in custody with her... It is always a case by case situation and not the norm

[IsmeWeatherwax]

I visited Bodmin jail back in 97. What a god forsaken hole that was. Creepy and dank now, what it was like for the prisoners is best not thought about. Such harsh penalties for the tiniest transgression.

Tho the amount of Australians descended from Cornish sheep shaggers is quite funny. Odd lot the Cornish

[imokit]

Anna is breaking her instagram fast.  Me thinks she's with her sister near her hubby, waiting to see him as soon as she's allowed.

[gustava]

Do we know if any of Anna's children are with her in Texas?

[Giraffe]

Aww, Anna’s pretending her bestie comment was referring to her sister and not referring to chasing the convict bus on her anniversary. How sweet! 🙄

[Zebedee]

7 hours ago, AussieKrissy said:

Women can keep their children in some cases (in Australia)

I've been binging the greatest Aussie soap on earth - Prisoner: Cell Block H. Set in the late 70s/early 80s, where babies could stay until their first birthday. Is it still one year? Not that I take PCBH as being terribly representative of Australian prisons, so maybe it was never one year.

[Cam]

23 hours ago, Four is Enough said:

 

If you think touring an old, closed penitentiary is bad, try visiting your child at a functioning one. Starting with juvie, the sounds of the doors and gates closing before and behind you is penetrating. One door opens. Step into the space. That door closes. Then the door ahead of you opens. Step forward again. and repeat until you reach your goal.. reverse the procedure to leave the place. I hope never to hear those sounds again.

You can't take so much as a tissue inside, at the risk of giving something to the inmate. You are suspect as is the inmate.

I don't say this to try to garner sympathy, especially for Josh or his family, but I will say that it is very difficult to hear those sounds and walk through those doors and realize that this is your child's life every day. 

It’s a busy week for me and it’ll be awhile before I catch up reading more posts after yours, but I did want to comment on this. Definitely walking through a closed penitentiary is different than visiting your child in a current one. I can only imagine what your experience was like and I’m so sorry that this is something you had to deal with. Your post doesn’t come off as sympathetic towards Josh at all; you are describing the reality of what it was like for you and it sounds heartbreaking. I very much appreciate your insights and your honesty and making it very real.

[Four is Enough]

10 hours ago, Bastet said:

  If drugs were legalized you could get a prescription for it and if things were handled correctly you could get it covered by insurance. So why would you steal? 
   Many of the health dangers of illegal drugs are due to their being illegal. They are cut with another substance —fentanyl for instance—that, among other problems, make the dosage unpredictable.  Overdosing should plummet with pure and reliable drugs.  People could live pretty normal lives with heroin from a pharmacy. They do so now with methadone which is really just another opiate.
   

You'd think that, wouldn't you? (bolded) But addiction is a variable thing, and the addiction needs to be fed. Many of you will not remember Len Bias, a young and very talented basketball player at the University of Maryland, who was a first round draft pick for the NBA in 1986. Very shortly after the announcement, Bias was found dead of an overdose. 

People were warned of the "new, frightening, potent" heroin out on the street.. and they flat out asked for "that Len Bias", wanting the high and willing to risk death to get it. 

People are willing to ingest fentanyl to get that high. They're willing to ingest impurities to get that high. They want to go higher. They need to take more to get high. That's the nature of addiction. 

Even the people who have marijuana cards will go to the streets and risk arrest and impurities to get their bud, because it's cheaper than the taxed and limited bud available at the dispensaries.

 

Ever go to a methadone clinic? Or a Suboxone dispensary? There are people in the parking lots just waiting to take or buy your medication from you.

 

8 minutes ago, Cam said:

. I very much appreciate your insights and your honesty and making it very real.

The screeching of the gates; the "thud" of the metal doors. You think you know, if you hear that sound from Law and Order. But you don't. Not wanting to hear that noise would sure deter me from committing a crime.. but didn't work for my kid..

[BlackberryGirl]

Inhumane treatment of prisoners, whatever their crime harms us as much as it harms them. They are human beings who did horrific things in many cases, but when we dehumanize them, allow their humanity to be degraded we are degraded. 

[imokit]

2 hours ago, gustava said:

Do we know if any of Anna's children are with her in Texas?

Mac was seen in a pic with some Spiveys and I think Justin last week, so I think we can assume that the kids are there.

[Bastet]

2 hours ago, Four is Enough said:

People are willing to ingest fentanyl to get that high. They're willing to ingest impurities to get that high. They want to go higher. They need to take more to get high. That's the nature of addiction. 

Even the people who have marijuana cards will go to the streets and risk arrest and impurities to get their bud, because it's cheaper than the taxed and limited bud available at the dispensaries.

 

Ever go to a methadone clinic? Or a Suboxone dispensary? There are people in the parking lots just waiting to take or buy your medication from you.

This is the behavior of addicts when drugs are illegal.  If it were legal you could get a higher dose if that’s what your addiction demanded, and there would be little motivation to buy or sell your methadone on the street if it and other drugs were legal and available. 

[QuiverFullofBooks]

10 hours ago, Melissa1977 said:

Aren't prisoners allowed to keep their babies? In any case? I find it heartbreaking. In Spain, female prisoners can keep their children up to 3 years old. They are in a special prison ward, only for moms. At 3 years old, children have to move with the family (or foster care).  Edit to add that keeping their children inside is not mandatory.

While I'm sure some of them loss custody because the whole mess their life is, the goal is them to keep the children. Most of them, and with most I mean an extremely high percentage, are very poor and from problematic backgrounds.

But jail terms here are far shorter than in US, which make things easier.

Imprisoned women here are a few, most of them are not violent and imprisoned mothers are an exception,  so I get that it's easier to help them.

I don’t think that American women are ever allowed to have children with them in prison. Have you watched “Orange is the New Black” on Netflix? A lot of things about it aren’t accurate, but it gives you a general sense of what American women’s prisons are like. One of its saddest moments is when an inmate gives birth and then is taken back to her prison ward in a wheelchair without her baby. Everyone else had been standing around chatting with their cliques and all of the disparate groups stop talking and stare at the woman in pity. It’s season one, episode eight.

[Antimony]

17 hours ago, Bastet said:

I’m sure you have answered this before, but I must have missed it: do you see any role for holding people against their will—be it in a prison or a mental health facility? What do we do with serial murderers, for instance? 

Sorry, I took some time off. I assume this is a good faith question, it just can be a little tiring to be the like go-to representative of broad political philosophy (though I understand I've put myself in this position, whups).

Prison abolition is primarily two things (I promise I'm getting to your question I swear)
1) A reworking of the justice system towards restorative and transformative justice rather than solely punitive justice (which is what we have now)
2) An end to mass incarceration. 

Any incarceration system I could get to would have to be so distinctly unrecognizable from the current prison system that we couldn't even call it that, if that makes sense. There are prison abolitionists who believe in limited incarceration for exactly the people you're talking about, and yes, I can definitely get there. But, as somebody so rightly pointed out, as we all learned via COVID-19, being enclosed in a space for a long period of time, even a nice house, was crazy-making. Many people left COVID isolation with mental health flare up, etc. and what we should have learned from that is that incarceration and isolation, are, in of themselves, punishments. (And also, extremely bad for humans. Just the opposite from how we're meant to live.)

I see no compelling reason towards justice to make prisons as uncomfortable and dehumanizing as they are. To me, it serves no purpose to prevent anybody from having books, or music, or space to walk, or the ability to see something more than 6 feet away. The only reasons I can fathom we do it are cost minimization (so, this is a problem with for-profit prisons, but those aren't the majority of prisons. It's also because we incarcerate so many people) and schadenfreude. I'm obviously not above schadenfreude (I am here, on the make-fun-of-fundamentalists board, after all) but it has no place in a justice system. Schadenfreude in a justice system either promotes or is born from dehumanization, in a little vicious cycle.  

I also think, even if I believe in schadenfreude or justice, anything I'm willing to do to an inmate, I must also find relatively morally acceptable to do to an innocent man. And I'm not there. Can't do it. Bryan Stevenson illustrates this problem in his 2015 TedTalk perhaps better than I ever could;

Quote

Death penalty in America is defined by error. For every nine people who have been executed, we’ve actually identified one innocent person who’s been exonerated and released from death row. A kind of astonishing error rate — one out of nine people innocent. I mean, it’s fascinating. In aviation, we would never let people fly on airplanes if for every nine planes that took off one would crash. But somehow we can insulate ourselves from this problem. It’s not our problem. It’s not our burden. It’s not our struggle.

So, if I'm willing to incarcerate people who have committed capital crimes on a limited basis, that incarceration must be sufficiently humane that I can sleep at night with the 10% innocent that are there as well. For our system now, I can't do that for even small crimes, partially because I can't even fathom the "schadenfreude justification" for small crimes. 

I also think most prison abolitionists would agree that we are at the very start of a movement. Like, a baby movement. Maybe a toddler. There will be a lot more work to do and questions to answer. I hope this has been somewhat helpful.

On the subject of serial killers (and like, genuinely, this is all musings and thoughts this question dug up) but not really about prison exactly, I think they're interesting because they seem to be in decline. It's hard because we don't have stats. But, the "classic height" of serial killers is depicted as the 70s, 80s. I was able to find this;

Quote

Of 2,604 identified serial killers in the United States during the twentieth century, an astonishing 89.5 percent (2,331) made their appearance between 1950 to 1999, with 88 percent of those appearing in just the three decades from 1970 to 1999—the 'epidemic' peak years,” Vronsky notes in his book.

Are they getting better at it? I doubt it, but clearance rates of crime are down so maybe. Some people, like Freakonomics author Stephen Dubner, suggests that Roe v Wade is what led to our overall reduction in crime. It's....a shaky hypothesis but it's not impossible. (We're about to test it! I hate it here! [insert existential screaming]) Could that impact serial killers? Maybe. I don't know any prison abolitionist who isn't pro-choice, so I tend to find we're interested in these kinds of public health questions. Some studies have shown that 1 in 4 serial killers had some sort of head trauma as a young child. Is it seatbelt laws? Unleaded gasoline? Is it some sort of combination where families started to have more control over the children they wanted, that make them fiscally more stable, in an era where there were more seatbelts and cars were less of death traps and children stopped falling off tractors or whatever so much? Whatever it is, it suggests to me that there are plenty of "ounce of prevention" things we could do that fall under "public health, reproductive rights" and it would be even better if we knew that those things were, definitively. (Dubner isn't a bad economist, but I'm just a little skeptical of him because the man's job is to sell the shocking trends of Freakonomics....so...grain of salt on him, but for that particular case, his reasoning does make sense.) 

Finally, am I worried about serial killers, like, personally? No. They're just such a rarity. This doesn't mean they don't have impact but for my everyday life, this falls under like, "Panicking on an airplane when I drive to work everyday." I do worry that the true crime media, the sensationalism of it all, surge has sold paranoia to us at the cost of our daily lives, if that makes sense. Selling paranoia in exchange for clicks and podcasts and reruns of DiscoveryID. I really have a hard time with ideas like, "If we didn't have police, there would be serial killers just walking around!" because like....there are...serial killers...just walking around...now. Its already happening and the funding we do give the police doesn't go towards solving this problem anyway. 

I also have a hard time thinking, "Ah, cops, the answer, surely" when the police handed Dahmer one of his victims right back to him (really!! really!!) and the Golden State Killer was an officer. That kind of stuff really fricks with any ability I had to trust a justice system. 

Anyway, that's enough on serial killers. In short, I don't think they're representative of the justice system in anyway, and they should not be used to justify the treatment we have towards other incarcerated peoples. It's weird that we seem to have fewer of them and I would like it if we had a good handle as to why, because that would be actionable. 

Back to, "You can't possibly learn everything about Prison Abolition from Antimony because she's just one person and it's a large philosophy and movement" -- I am, once again, going to post my reading list. I share this a lot, and not just here but elsewhere, because I think it's good. 

Big Prison Abolitionist Reading List, Now with Short Descriptions to Guide You and Options for those of us Who Don't Want to Read Tons of Stuff:

• Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Davis - Foundational text, relatively short.
  • The Prison Industrial Complex, 1999, Angela Davis -- a recorded album of Davis' speeches. This is perfect if you find "Are Prisons Obsolete?" to be a little dense, which many do. On Spotify. 
  • Angela Davis Speaks - 2012 - Also on Spotify. 
• We Do This 'Til We Free Us - Mariame Kaba - often considered the "modern companion" to "Are Prison's Obsolete?". A collection of essays, some written after the George Floyd Protests, so slightly more up to date.
  • http://www.usprisonculture.com/blog/ - Kaba's blog. A lot of the posts will be really granular but there is also an "Essential Reading" tab there and resources on Transformative Justice. 
• If They Come in the Morning - Edited by Angela Davis, collection of works by civil rights activists, focusing on policing. 
• American Prison: A Reporter's Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment by Shane Bauer - Local journalist goes undercover into a prison as a guard and has an awful time. Alternates chapters covering the history of the prison system and his experience as a guard. 
  • My Four Months a Prison Guard - Shane Bauer for Mother Jones - the article he wrote prior to the book. He originally went undercover for just an article but there was too much to say. This is a good option if you don't want to read the book, or just like shorter reads.
• Just Mercy - Bryan Stevenson (this has been mentioned here before)
  • Bryan Stevenson has a 2015 TED Talk titled "We Need To Talk About an Injustice" 
• Resistance Behind Bars: The Struggles of Incarcerated Women by Victoria Law - Law recounts many stories of incarcerated women she has known. 
• Usual Cruelty: The Complicity of Lawyers in the Criminal Injustice System by Alec Karakatsanis - A takedown of the American justice system by a lawyer and a call to action to young lawyers. I think this is about 6 hours on audiobook.
  • You can also follow Karakatsanis on Twitter where he is very active and comments on on-going legal issues frequently. 
• The New Jim Crow - Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander - This has shown up on this thread before. The title really says it all, but breaks down the way our justice system functions into disgusting granular detail. Enraging. 
• The Master Plan: My Journey from Life in Prison to a Life of Purpose - Chris Wilson - A memoir about being in prison and how hard it was to rise above it. Chris Wilson is clearly exceptional (he learned Italian in prison by watching soap operas...) but he recognizes how the system was stacked against him constantly and offers insight into it. 
• I try not to recommend stuff that isn't on my personal shelf, but there is a full reading list at https://abolitionistfutures.com/full-reading-list that might be helpful. 

Anyway, before anybody assumes that I'm like, an always perfect nerd about justice systems and that I'm absolutely no fun, let it be known that I'm back on my Death Note obsession, a piece of media that asks important questions about justice, like, "Does power corrupt?" and "Where is the line for punitive justice?" but most importantly, "What if there was weird little frog looking dude and he was a detective, would that be fun?" 

[Bastet]

29 minutes ago, Antimony said:

Sorry, I took some time off. I assume this is a good faith question, it just can be a little tiring to be the like go-to representative of broad political philosophy (though I understand I've put myself in this position, whups).

Thanks a lot. I am grateful for the time this took. I am in agreement with the bulk of this but wish it were called something else. Most people who see Prison Abolition Movement will just say, “Well that’s just crazy. Way too many people are locked up, but any group that thinks there aren’t some people who need to be has nothing to say to me.”  I persisted because I respect you and knew you were neither crazy nor stupid, so I suspected the name was misleading. I also wish the Defund the Police adherents, with whom I also agree, had come up with a more accurate name. 
  My son is correctional officer, and you can take it from me that it isn’t just the prisoners who are dehumanized by prisons as they are currently constituted. 😔

Edited July 4, 2022 by Bastet

[Antimony]

24 minutes ago, Bastet said:

Thanks a lot. I am grateful for the time this took. I am in agreement with the bulk of this but wish it were called something else. Most people who see Prison Abolition Movement will just say, “Well that’s just crazy. Way too many people are locked up, but any group that thinks there aren’t some people who need to be has nothing to say to me.”  I persisted because I respect you and knew you were neither crazy nor stupid, so I suspected the name was misleading. I also wish the Defund the Police adherents, with whom I also agree, had come up with a more accurate name. 
  My son is correctional officer, and you can take it from me that it isn’t just the prisoners who are dehumanized by prisons as they are currently constituted. 😔

For you, then, I would actually move Shane Bauers work to the top of the suggestion list because he definitely covers how COs are treated and paid. More so in the book than the article, I think, because he has space to develop a relationship with the reader over many chapters, but it's an important part of the book. He talks about sleep deprivation, the fear of losing himself in the system, the creeping paranoia.

It's a very good read, well paced, I like the alternating chapters system a lot.

[Shannonsnarks]

On 6/29/2022 at 8:01 AM, EmCatlyn said:

It will be interesting to see how Anna settles into the life of a prisoners wife.  Whether or not she moves to Texas (and I can’t guess which it will be), the rhythm of how they related when he could talk to her several times a day while in prison is going to change.

I could see her staying at the Duggar compound and just traveling to visit Josh once every couple of weeks.  If it is not possible to see him more than twice a month, why move?  On the other hand, this is Anna.  She may want to be close enough to gaze adoringly at the walls of his prison.

If she actually believes that the appeal may work, however, she may feel that she may as well keep to the present living arrangements, not uproot the kids or go through the hassle of moving because Josh may be coming back soon.

Whatever she does, I hope she will think of her kids first.

 

I think she fully expects him to be freed on appeal 

[Giraffe]

6 hours ago, QuiverFullofBooks said:

I don’t think that American women are ever allowed to have children with them in prison. 

Technically the answer's not "never." Nine states have nurseries for mother/babies. There aren't a lot of slots so it's not accurate to say "yes, mothers and babies can be together!!" because there are strict guidelines for a relatively low number of slots. The women have to be incarcerated for 30 months or less* and be convicted of a non-violent crime. 

*Not all of them say 30 months. Some are 12 months or less. 

 

https://www.cwla.org/babies-behind-bars/

Edited July 4, 2022 by Giraffe

[Jackie3]

18 hours ago, Melissa1977 said:

Aren't prisoners allowed to keep their babies? In any case? I find it heartbreaking. In Spain, female prisoners can keep their children up to 3 years old.

Depends on what kind of mother she is. I had a client (a ten year old boy) whose mother was imprisoned for beating someone to death. Is it best for his two year old sister to be with mom in prison? Is the prison environment -- with it's poor food, constant noise, and low quality email system-- in the best interest of the child? That is the standard of care when making decisions like that.

Paternal rights are equally important. Should Josh Duggar have his baby with him in prison? Should Josh Duggar be allowed to take the M baby and toddler to jail with him?  Is it heartbreaking that he cannot do so?

Perhaps this privilege is limited to just the NonViolent Drug Offender population. But is it safe to assume that this group all have strong parental nurturing instincts, good affect regulation, and few dysregulation and dissociation issues? Would you want your infant brought up by such an inmate, in a prison environment? Then why is it OK for these (mostly BIPOC) infants? Maybe we should want something better for those kids.

Even if we assume they have a good inmate/parent, that parent cannot be with them 24/7 in prison. 

Ultimately, it's really not about how sad the inmate might be. It's about giving the infant/toddler the best chance in life. Small children can bond with others beside their mother. If there's a healthy, stable family member who can take the child, that might be best for the kid.

Edited July 5, 2022 by Jackie3

[sixcatatty]

On 7/3/2022 at 7:57 PM, GuineaPigCourtship said:

I think there are 3 broad categories (I think) available for people who have committed heinous crimes.

1. Imprison/contain for a period of time up to life.

2. Treatment programs and the releasing back into the general population.

3. Execution.

We currently seem to pick from the list or mix and match a bit in the USA. I am absolutely opposed to capital punishment, but it does exist in some states and, unfortunately, is still used. 

Statistics say what we're doing isn't working, and to me that means we are putting money towards the wrong things.  Putting people in prison doesn't stop them from reoffending. Killing them does, of course, but that's neither humane nor practical.  We should be working to create more/better treatment protocols.

Sure, the adult in prison did something to put themselves there if you assume everyone is rightfully imprisoned. But the trauma their families - who are innocent of wrongdoing - suffer is significant enough that it is not okay to throw our hands up and shrug.

I read this morning that Oklahoma has opened enough death warrants that without some sort of clemency, it will execute 25 people in not quite two years. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/01/us/oklahoma-executions-scheduled.html

I've had that last phone call from a client--25 years ago this past Thursday--I've also seen how going through that many executions affected colleagues and friends who worked in Texas. I have another client who has been jailed with high bail since 2007. He was tried in 2011; I got it reversed in 2013. We're supposed to go to trial in August.

I'm not sure what else to say. Since Dobbs came down, I've wondered why I went through hell going to law school and passing the Bar.

[JermajestyDuggar]

I’m sorry if this has already been posted and I missed it. 
 

How far is Josh’s prison from David and Cil?

[BensAllergies]

11 minutes ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

I’m sorry if this has already been posted and I missed it. 
 

How far is Josh’s prison from David and Cil?

48 miles and a straight shot on I-20 from the church to the prison.

I don’t know where they live however.

[JermajestyDuggar]

4 minutes ago, BensAllergies said:

48 miles and a straight shot on I-20 from the church to the prison.

I don’t know where they live however.

Oh that’s an easy drive. I have a feeling Anna and the kids will be staying with David and Cil quite often. 

[Giraffe]

I might be too cynical at this point but I don’t see Anna being closer to Cil as a positive for her or her kids’ long term mental health. (Eta: I’m assuming David & Priscilla also think Josh has been framed)

Edited July 5, 2022 by Giraffe
Clarifying