Leading in the Jails

Blue Canary: For Cops By a Cop

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In the United States there are 3,116 local jails, 1,566 State Prisons, and 98 Federal Prisons. But let’s not forget the 1,323 Juvenile Corrections Facilities, 142 Immigration detention facilities, and 80 Tribal jails. These facilities house a little over 1.2 million prisoners.

These facilities are staffed with approximately 393,000 corrections officers.

At first glance that might seem like a lot.

A lot of facilities,

A lot of prisoners,

A lot of jailers,

But it isn’t.

Let’s take a look at crime for a minute. The causes of crime have been studied for decades, and while some of the results may fly in the face of what we have been told over the years, facts are facts. For example, poverty does not cause crime, and the number one way to lower crime is through incarceration. You want your neighborhood to be safe. Easy, lock up the criminals. Consequences matter and holding people accountable for their actions has proven time and time again to be an effective deterrent.

Studies also show that 1 percent of the population commit over 60 percent of crime in America. Today there are a little over 1.2 million prisoners accounting for .36 percent of the US population. I would also argue that statistically we are living in a period of very high crime rates.

In 2008 the US prison population peaked at almost 2.5 million prisoners and you wanna know what else happened. Our crime rates were at a historic low.

Don’t believe me look it up.

There are around 800,000 police officers in the US today and they seem to garner most of the attention. They get most of the praise, the complaints, the glory, and the training … what little there is of that.

But what about those 393,000 corrections officers. They seem to be left behind when it comes to the praise, glory, and specifically training.

We refuse to do that.

[Insert Intro]

Jeff Carter retired in December of 2018 as the Deputy Director of the Fayette County Detention Center in Lexington, Kentucky. Over his 20-year career, he has worked all levels of custody inside a 1,300-bed correctional facility located in the horse racing capitol of the world. Jeff was an instructor for 5 years inside the academy, where he trained over 700 recruits, molding them into successful leaders in the Corrections field. While promoting through the ranks, he commanded the Professional Standards Unit where he specialized in Internal Affairs investigations and Gang Intel for 7 years.

I asked Jeff to talk about leadership, specifically in the jail system, but most of his advice is relevant no matter where you work.

[Insert Interview]

And that’s the story we have to tell.