Autor omawia kwestię odpowiedzialności odszkodowawczej z tytułu szkód wyrządzonych w zakładach karnych (aresztach śledczych). Przedstawiona jest wykładnia przesłanek prawnych powołanej odpowiedzialności w orzecznictwie sądowym, jak również jej społeczny rezultat w postaci finansowego obciążenia Skarbu Państwa w przypadku wyroków zasądzających odszkodowania (zadośćuczynienia). Wskazane są szczegółowo faktyczne przyczyny dochodzonych przez poszkodowanych roszczeń oraz ich kwalifikacja prawna. Analizie poddano powództwa cywilne związane z pobytem w zakładzie karnym (areszcie śledczym) obejmujące roszczenia o zadośćuczynienie (odszkodowanie) jak również roszczenia o charakterze niemajątkowym z tytułu szkód niemajątkowych (naruszenia dóbr osobistych). Ponadto scharakteryzowano roszczenia związane z naprawieniem szkód majątkowych w mieniu i na osobie wywołanych postępowaniem funkcjonariuszy (pracowników) Służby Więziennej. W artykule postuluje się ukierunkowanie polityki penitencjarnej na takie ukształtowanie organizacji Służby Więziennej, która eliminowała by przypadki skutecznego dochodzenia roszczeń ze strony osób przebywających w zakładach karnych (aresztach śledczych) ze względu na ich bezpodstawność.
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The paper discusses the question of liability for damages suffered in penal institutions (remand centers). It presents the interpretation of legal premises for the said liability as stemming from court decisions, as well as the social effects of such liability, i.e. financial burden for the State Treasury in case of judicial decisions to award damages (compensation).We discuss in detail actual causes for claiming such compensation and their legal qualification. The analysis covers civil lawsuits concerning the stay in the penal institution (remand center) as well as non-property claims for non-property prejudice (infringement of personal rights). Moreover, we describe claims for compensation for property damage caused to the name and to person as a result of the conduct of officers (staff) of the Prison Service. We suggest that the penitentiary policy should be reoriented to foster the organization of the Prison Service in order to eliminate effective claims enforcement by detainees at penal institutions (remand centers), i.e. to make their claims groundless.
Within twenty years of Second Polish Republic over 20,000 prisoners passed through the Criminal Prison "Mokotów". Nearly 13,000 prisoners of this group came from Warsaw. Thanks to the well-preserved original documentation, which consists of the personal records of prisoners of Mokotow prison, the chance to begin research on the functioning of that specific environment opens for historians. Especially that until now all the historical narratives describing the society of the Second Republic neglect the thread of crime and criminals in social history. This article is the result of search query that started in 2010 and includes qualitative and quantitative analysis of more than 20,000 archiving units from archive of Criminal Prison „Mo-kotów”. The research was conducted thanks to a scientific grant funded by the National Cen-tre for Science (Grant No. NN108268139). The final result of the query should be a study of the environment of the interwar prisoners detained in Mokotów, as well as other selected pris-ons of smaller prison districts like Płock, Łowicz, Sieradz, Łódź and Lublin. The subject of the analysis contained in the article is a community defined as "convicts from Warsaw", i.e. prisoners who lived within the limits of the then Warsaw, when placed in the institution. The selection of this group of prisoners, rather than the presentation of the whole environment, is a result of two factors. The first one is the volume of the article that prevents one from a presentation of a comprehensive picture of the whole criminal environment. On the other hand, the geographical restriction allows the query to cover a very actual social group, which was a part of the interwar capital’s reality. The archives of Mokotów prison in addition to the documents on the operation of the institution primarily consist of personal acts of the detained. They are the basis of the analysis presented in the article. A little more than 2,000 files from among more than 20,000 thousand personal sheets of prisoners detained between 1918 - 1939 were selected to complete the analysis. There was no any special key of selection established, every tenth folder was selected. The collected statistical material based on data which were contained in all the questionnaires and which can be analyzed over the entire twenty years. The appearance and the content of the questionnaire changed three times. There was a fixed set of data, which remained unchanged in every version, and certain positions occurring only in one of each versions. For example, in the first version of the questionnaire the information about the number of children and military service were given. Since the mid-20s the questions about these issues disappear from the personal sheet. The available data allowed to create a list of characteristics on which the analysis presented in the article was carried out.
The key thesis in humanistic criminology is based on the premise that criminal behaviour in individuals is always an effect of their sovereign decisions, even if – as this is the case in every the type of human behaviour – it is influenced by a variety of factors. The main problem is the origin of a crime, understood as an individual process leading to a crime, or in cases where minors are involved as perpetrators – to a punishable act. The origin of crime would then be concerned with a varied and mostly complex phenomena of the human psyche. The core notion here being the volitional process, which is pivotal when deciding if law has been broken. In humanistic criminology, empirical research is not only about diagnosing objective premises leading to a crime, but also about analysing the behavioural patterns displayed by a particular individual, with such person's specificity, realm of experience, the relevant psycho-logical components and their core element, i.e. the act of will. The aim of this paper is to present a criminal biography of a person sentenced for participation in an armed organised crime group and to attempt an interpretation of the biography from the humanistic criminology perspective, as proposed by L. Tyszkiewicz. The analysis employed the biographical method and a case study concerning a concrete perpetrator. The course of life of the researched individual and his involvement in the crime group was de-scribed on the basis of an interview. The accuracy of thus obtained data was verified against the body of evidence included in the files of the inmate. The research was conducted in the penal institution where the convict serves a life sentence. The detailed results of the research are included in the article.
The circumstances in which the Civil Police assumed responsibility for convoy and protection duties on behalf of the justice system until 1939 (in practice, until now). The legal and financial aspects of performing convoy and isolation functions on behalf of the Department of Justice. The unsuccessful attempts to transfer these tasks to the Prison Guard. The methods and tactics deployed in performing convoy and protection duties towards criminal and political prisoners. Convoys on foot and by train and other means of transport. Chronic occurrences and extraordinary events during convoys. How fulfilling these duties effected the Police’s other statutory obligations. The role of isolation in Police arrests. The prevailing conditions. The rights and duties of prisoners. The supervision of prisoners. Extraordinary events and chronic occurrences. The function and purpose of police holding cells for juveniles. Their isolation and rehabilitation functions. The Civil Police in performing their duties in connection with municipal arrests. Police assistance to the Prison Guard in extraordinary situations, especially riots. Protecting prisoners from external attacks. Searching for escaped prisoners. Operational and evidentiary work. Operational and procedural activities against people attempting to communicate with prisoners. Civil Police operational work in prisons. Information exchange between the Civil Police and the Prison Guard. The practice of prison authorities informing the police about people released from prison and the legal basis for doing so. The attitude of politicians and the press to the Civil Police carrying out functions on behalf of the prison service.
The article discusses studies on models of incarceration in Polish prisons. The object of the study was to determine if resocialisation model of this punishment dominates in practice, or other models, including official-formal of ostensible resocialisation, dominate and what are the factors determining this. Analysis of this problem was based on opinions by prison personnel and convicts from three prisons in the district of Greater Poland Voivodeship. Disscussion is opened by a critical reflection how much the resocialisation model suits modern penitentiary policy and to what degree it is reflected in current executory provisions of law. Discussion stars with a polemics with an opinion, quite common in Polish penitentiary literature, that incarceration should be based on this particular model as it is better than other ones. Resocialisation model does not take into account diversified needs of influence on prisoners. Some of them do not need improvement (e.g. unintentional, accidental perpetrators). Others, because of their already shaped negative personality traits will never be fit to come back to the society (e.g. perpetrators of most grave crimes of the highest degree of demorali-zation). In the end of theoretical discussion of various model of work with convicts during incarceration, the author draws one’s attention to the fact that provisions of executory criminal law can reflect resocialisation conceptions only to a limited degree. Practical model of penitentiary influence is hence not a uniform and clear pedagogical model but has an eclectic character. It is demonstrated that from such point of view, assessment of work of prisons based on the criterion if and how much they resocialise, is based on wrong premises. They are criticized in the article. In the second part of the article the author discusses the results of the empirical studies. It starts with the description of used research method and a general characteristic of the re-spondent group. The research was conducted in June and July 2010. It consisted in collecting opinions in questionnaires and in focus interviews with prisoners and prison staff. The groups were chosen in a random manner (132 prison officers and 350 prisoners) and they were representative for the population of the imprisoned in the regional authority of detention centres. Presentation of the most significant conclusions of the research starts with the fact that vast majority of convicts were imprisoned in a normal system had in practice a decisive influence on content and type of penitentiary influence. This system does not require corrective influence and thus penitentiary work concentrated on ensuring that the imprisoned are placed in conditions at least compliant with recommendations of European Prison Rules. In practice these conditions are included in prison rules. Most of all, they concern living space and prison regimen conditions without focus on education and correction work.
A series of mysterious deaths in prisons made the issue of persecution organs functioning, but first and foremost question the effectiveness of controls within the prison system, returned to the newspapers’ headines. In the large part the debate has been concerned with the safety of persons who may have important information regarding ongoing criminal proceedings. Opinions are divergent, and their authors often refer back to fundamental issues. The most important and arousing the strongest emotions ones among them are as follows: where is the limit of permitted prision isolation, and how should the special units for specific categories of offenders operate? The presented study is the result of research entitled “Wstępna ocena funkcjonowania oddziałów dla więźniów niebezpiecznych” (“Introductory assessment of wards for particularly dangerous criminals”) which I carried out in 2007-2008. In the research, I examined the subject of the borders of the prison isolation, with particular emphasis on the effects of its escalation, for those who are the subjects, and for those who are executors of enhanced isolation alike. The research consisted of 10 case studies carried out on prisoners, who stayed in the special prison units with a very high degree of isolation for the longest time. Their period of stay ranged from 7 to 14 years. Penitentiary records of these individuals and the material gathered during the in-depth interviews were analysed. In addition to the presentation of the data collected during the research also contains an attempt to present a useful analytic scheme to describe and understand the functioning of this segment of the prison system, which is responsible for the isolation and control of the most dangerous criminal offenders and the most recalcitrant prisoners. The unit analysed was, so-called N ward, treated as an element of the prison culture and culture in general. The primary data source is the materials and documents related to the functioning of this segment of the prison system and the awareness of individuals participating in this social phenomenon. The latter is consistent with the assumptions of humanist criminology, in which an individual experience is a key vehicle for knowledge of the culture, and the knowledge should be searched there. The essence of this approach to the study of social phenomena is a recommendation by F. Znaniecki to study it with “the humanistic factor.” The study reconstructed the origins of wards with a high degree of isolation and it systemic rationalisation. The information collected, justify the hypothesis that the system of N wards in Poland was not prepared well enough. Ultimately there are 16 branches and with over more than 400 specially protected places of imprisonment created, despite the considerable cost, only because they were presented to decision-makers as one of the key instruments to combat the organized crime.
The article presents the results of research on the assessments of the programmed influence formulated by the prisoners. There were a lot of hopes pinned on this system introduced to the penitentiary policy by the Executive Penal Code of 6 June 1997. The system proposed modern educational interactions based on cooperation of the prisoners with the prison staff and assumed active participation of prisoners in its implementation. The key issue of the system is to negotiate the individual schemes and voluntary commitment to respect them by prisoners participating in such negotiations. Enforcing convicts’ activity, particularly the juvenile ones, was supposed to create a chance of individual choice of more efective meaures to influence them and to shape a sense of responsibility – and at the same time to prevernt from return to crime. Since this system came into force on 1 September 1998, now almost 11 years ago, an vital task was to investigate not only the various aspects of its implementation, but also an opinion about this system, formulated by members of the prison community, especially by prisoners. So far there were few empirical studies of this system in everyday prison reality. More extensive research in this field includes studies of A. Nawój and E. Silecka, M. Bramska, A. Kurek and D. Schmidt, and A. Szymanowska. With this as the point of departure, the author of the article carried out a survey in the year 2008 to gather the views of the prisoners about the system and its performance. The study included 540 prisoners selected by the criterion of purpose, and participation in the system imprisoned in facilities subordinate to the District Inspectorate of the Prison Service in Poznan. A survey was conducted from October 2008 to March 2009 in 3 closed units in order to obtain homogeneity of the survey sample. Test groups were randomized. It should be emphasized that the randomisation was made in a way which maintained the proportions between the juveniles and adults indicated above. Surveys with opinions of convicted were supplemented with structured interviews with a group of 30 prisoners selected by the randomization from the group surveyed. Studies have focused on issues such as motives of joining of the criminals to the system programmed interaction, participation of criminals in constructing individual programs of interactions and its determinants, the contents of individual programs, interactions, objectives, tasks, rights and obligations of prisoners, cooperation between the prisoners and their teachers in drafting of schemes. The results of the survey lead to the conclusion that the evaluation of the test by the respondents is generally positive in all the subgroups under study. Nevertheless, the prisoners clearly indicate that the use of this program had a formal, official character.
The article discusses the problem of young adult offenders in the light of provisions of current Polish criminal law and of criminological studies on this category of convicts over the years. Polish criminal code of 1997 in the article 115 paragraph 10 defines a young adult offender as a person 21 years old who commits a crime or a person under 24 years who is tried in a court of first instance. Two basic issues are involved in the notion of a young adult offender. First the age limits of the subject, second the character of penal measures to be used towards this particular category of offenders. Both issues are discussed at length in the article, particularly with respect to the fact that criminal law makes use of scientific findings from sociology, psychology and medicine to create normative regulations concerning conditions of liability of young adult offenders for their unlawful acts. As an example, one may discuss particular normative directives of the sentence provided for a young adult offenders as the court is obliged to, most of all, educate and resocialise. Educational and resocialisation aspect of the punishment does not mean that young adult offender are treated leniently, sometimes it may indicate a longer time of resocialisation and, at the same time, a longer imprisonment sentence to execute this objective . While sentencing a young adult offender, the court should decide in such a manner so that the liability of the accused is directed more into educational model than repressive one, yet this does not denote resignation from administering the penalty of unconditional imprisonment. Still, it needs to be admitted that in the Polish legal system there are few concrete provisions of law which define in detail how a young offenders should be treated which, according to the author, is somehow concerning. There are significant differences in criminal execution law. First, as a rule, young adult offenders should be imprisoned separately from adult ones. This is understandable because of susceptibility of young people to influence and pressure from adults. Moreover, young adult offenders are subject to system of programmed educational and resocialisation measures during imprisonment, which on one hand seems right, on the other evokes a series of questions and reservations. Discussion of normative situation of young adult offender are illustrated with selected criminological studies carried out so far concerning this category of offenders. Reported results of research show that young adult offenders have typical features characteristic for the whole group. Information on dysfunctional families and alcohol problems are always present. It is accompanied by low education level of their parents and their unemployment. Problems in the behavior of such offenders appear already in kindergarten age and increase during school education while the education process itself leaves a lot to be desired.
This article focuses on the dilemmas of working in prisons with people serving the two most severe sentences, viz. 25 years imprisonment and life imprisonment. The author examines this from two angles. The first concerns the doctrinal and theoretical controversies surrounding the aims and purposes of serving long sentences. The author reviews the most prominent viewpoints in this area while pointing out the associated problems and dilemmas. The second is an attempt to relate the theoretical controversies surrounding the aims and purposes of the long prison sentences to the realities of prison practice, based as it is on three uniform systems of executing prison sentences, viz. standard (1 month to 15 years), 25 years and life. The author reports the results of his empirical research in this area. The author devotes special attention to the dilemmas that arise when a prisoner serving a very long sentence participates in a program of planned activities, some of which are ethical in nature. He keeps this in mind when attempting to evaluate prison practice. The fundamental question he poses should prompt a debate on the adequacy of this use of the rehabilitation model of executing a prison sentence and its consistency with the aims and purposes of this type of punishment, generally considered to be the best and most versatile. The author takes up the debate and examines the essence and the arguments of the controversy surrounding the purposes of long prison sentences. He considers which of the aims and purposes that appear in the prison literature are suitable for use in executing these sentences. The author consequently questions the purpose and moral acceptability of correctional activities. He points out that the main purpose of long sentences is to remove prisoners from society, which is difficult to reconcile with their corrective and rehabilitative functions. This illustrates the ethical ambiguity of correctional measures. The author later discusses the results of his own empirical studies, undertaken from this theoretical perspective. These focused on the following: 1. working with prisoners serving very long sentences in practice, and in particular, the sentencing regimen to which they are subjected; 2. the tasks and goals that prison staff set themselves in this connection; 3. whether and to what extent the designated ethical dilemmas are recognised in day-to-day prison work. This study comprised a diagnostic survey (a questionnaire and structured interviews), indirect observation (examining prison documents e.g. the personal files of prisoners serving very long sentences, prison work programs, prison regulations etc.). The questionnaire was completed by 71 prisoners serving the most severe sentences, including 15 life prisoners. Sixty two questionnaires were suitable for compilation. More than 5 interviews were conducted with life prisoners and 11 were conducted with prisoners serving 25-year sentences.
The article discusses the problems of health service in prisons in relation to health of prisoners. It refers the results of conducted empirical studies which assumed that the ailments of the imprisoned, specific to their age, actual health service needs, expectations and needs related to health service of prisoners, are indicators of their health. A conception of prisoners’ social service by penitentiary administration without pressure on corrective influence formulated by Henryk Machel was the theoretical basis of the study. The study aimed to answer what was health of the prisoners examined, defined by their general health, needs and expectations concerning health service and to what degree they are answered by the health service in prison. The study was conducted in prisons under District Inspectorate of Prison Service in Poznań, i.e. remand institution in Poznań and prison institutions in Rawicz and in Wronki. All three institutions are of a closed type. The study was conducted between January 2011 and November 2012. It included analysis and explanation of acts of law concerning health service in prisons and questionnaires and interviews with prisoners and prison staff . 279 of them were suitable for further study. Structuralized interviews included 30 doctors and 30 prison carers. The results were analysed statistically. They show opinions of the respondents on the problem of health service in prisons. Young and middle age adults were the majority of the respondents (67,03%). There was a statistically significant relation between general health declared by the respondents and their age. The younger a prisoner was, the better his own general health declared, and vice versa p> 0,001, x2 = 23,245). The data show that half of prisoners declared that imprisonment contributed to deterioration of their health. This is in contrast with a relatively low number of diseases found by doctors after imprisonment. Among various ailments declared by prisoners, psoriasis and sleep deprivation were the most frequent ones. The most detrimental factor to health was prison stress. Its role was indicated by as much as 17 doctors (62,97% of all doctors in the study). Every fourth doctor indicated bad living and sanitary conditions in prison (25,93%). The same number concerned other factor, i.e. nicotinism among prisoners. This shows that many prisoners assume detrimental health habits in prison conditions. Results of the research show that, in practice, response to the need of health protection in penal institutions was very diverse. Health protection was a secondary issue and it was a part of various modules of prisoner treatment. They were characterized by various intensity of health service. It was established that the modules were as follows: control and security (63,36% indications in general). In practice, in penal institutions included in the study, this module occurred in two forms: social and health (providing security and order, prisoners’ control under prison rules, social service and above-standard health care), social (providing security and order, prisoners’ control under prison rules, social service and standard health care), security and rehabilitation (66,67% indications, providing security and order, providing a minimum level of social service and basic health care, rehabilitation). Only the first of the above forms allows to fit the problem of health care fully into penitentiary actions. The study allows for a conclusion that, in the face of the crisis of penitentiary rehabilitation, the role of health care of prisoners will increase – as a consequence of “non-rehabilitationˮ modules of prisoner treatment being more and more frequent. Health care, along with ensuring suitable living conditions and social service, may thus become a part of good penitentiary practice. Health care, and to be exact, medical cal care and medical services for the imprisoned must fit their actual needs. In general, the research has shown that the objective health condition of the imprisoned included in the study is better than their declarations. However, their health varied from a person to another, most of all related to age. The greatest health needs were declared by seniors and their expectations concerning health care and medical assistance ensured by the prison were greatest too. A practical model of prisoners' medical treatment must take this into account. I was established that penitentiary practice employs, most often, modules with basic medical treatment. This is due to the relatively modest prison infrastructure but also to limited budget. Thus, a security - control - pro-health treatment module seems to be a good penitentiary practice. It includes ensuring security to the prison and the imprisoned, order maintenance, above standard health care and social care according to European Prison Rules. Thus, a good practice must be of an eclectic character. Health care and health protection have an important place in such practice. From this point of view, the research shows a diversified picture of penitentiary reality. On the whole, it is relatively positive.
The cultural diversity of people serving custodial sentences in Poland is an issue that requires intensive research and analysis. In theory, the number of foreigners in Polish prisons might not seem great enough to warrant the interest of either researchers or practitioners. There are said to be around 500 such people (in custody and provisional detention) annually in a population of approx. 80,000. It has to be borne in mind, however, that the presence of people with a completely alien, and therefore often incomprehensible, cultural code in such a closed environment as a penal institution poses a great challenge, despite their small numbers. This article discusses the results of research conducted on foreigners in selected Polish penal institutions in 2014. The methodology involved analysing case files and conducting in-depth interviews with Prison Service officials and employees as well as the foreign prisoners themselves. These examinations attempted to determine, inter alia, the extent to which the cultural differences that incarcerated foreigners bring with them affect the status of foreigners serving custodial sentences and the way penal institutions function, and how well adapted the Polish prison system is to dealing with people from other cultures. One of the aspects discussed is the issue of accommodating foreigners given custodial sentences. This is analysed from the standpoint of possible cultural differences. According to the current legislation, foreigners are subject to the same rules as Polish prisoners when serving their sentences. The officials who were interviewed stressed that the rules for accommodating foreigners in detention centres and penal institutions are no different from those that apply to Poles – and nor should they be. As the interview progressed, however, these same officials would give examples of situations where the cultural differences of incarcerated foreigners affected e.g. the way they were accommodated in their cells and certain additional difficulties they had in adapting and relating to the prison subculture. Therefore, in practice, despite the lack of regulations and/or recommendations from above, these officials are forced to respond to the additional challenges resulting from the fact that foreigners do not speak Polish and exhibit behavioural patterns that differ to a greater or lesser extent from the norm. The experience and “penitentiary intuition” of the official actually turned out to be the only guide in these situations. The attitude of the foreign inmates themselves is no less important for the proper functioning of a penal institution. The examination shows that most of them are not looking for extra hassles but are trying to serve their sentences with as little trouble as possible. In view of the above, it would seem legitimate to argue that the main reason for there not being greater problems with foreigners in Polish prisons is that there are so few of them.
The article consists of two parts. The first systematises definitions of penitentiary law and presents relations between penitentiary law and other branches of law and fields of science. The voices in discussion on penitentiary law sometimes differ, even in such basic issues as the scope of the very term. This sometimes gives rise to difficulties in qualifying particular provisions to a particular branch of law and causes doubts which rules to apply to particular institutions. Relations between penitentiary law and executive penal law, procedural law, penitentiary science and penal and penitentiary policies are discussed. The second part of the article discusses selected problems of current penal policy related most of all to the use of imprisonment sentence. Between penitentiary law and penitentiary policy or, more broadly speaking, penal policy there are obvious relations. On one hand, this policy is shaped on the basis of the letter of law, on the other hand, based on collected experience, it forces changes in law which fails to respond to actual challenges. Sometimes penitentiary policy, and even mere penitentiary practice, influences provisions of penal law, including penitentiary law, directly. It also happens that law and penitentiary policy (or penal one) fail to meet as far as their goals and assumptions are concerned. It seems it is so in the case of imprisonment, which often looks different in penitentiary law provisions and in statistics resulting from employment of penal and penitentiary policy. The basic paradox consists in that, in spite of observed decrease in crime levels , penitentiary system becomes more and more inefficient. Poland has one of the highest prisonisation indices in Europe and constantly growing number of persons sentenced by the courts and waiting for imprisonment sentence to be executed .The waiting line for imprisonment is approaching the number of the imprisoned. This may be due to a several reasons. Firstly, since the beginning of 1990s there has been a steady increase in the shortest imprisonment sentences (of up to 6 months) which were often administered to those guilty of driving a vehicle under alcohol influence. Secondly, Polish prisons are places where a significant number of imprisonments due to probation violations are served – which shows the weakness in execution of alternatives to incarceration. Another problem is cancellation of suspended sentences. The criminal code provided for two ways a suspended sentence can be cancelled, facultative and obligatory. The latter raised serious doubts and was questioned by the Constitutional Tribunal in its decree of 17.07.2013 r., file no. SK 9/10 (as published in the Journal of Laws as item 905).
The many restrictions in force in a closed institution make prisons taxing and oppressive places for their inmates. Imprisonment is associated with a great deal of internal conflict and a deprivation of needs. This increases stress and psychological discomfort. This situation is often beyond the adaptation skills of convicts, prompting them to engage in a set of behavioural patterns known as prisonisation. In the process, prisoners accept norms and values that are specific to prison communities, including deviant attitudes and rituals that stand in opposition to the goals of rehabilitation and express rebellion against the institution of prison. People addicted to narcotics and psychotropic drugs have an additional motivation, viz. the possibility of obtaining drugs, to live the “double life” of prison. Research shows that incorporating specialized addiction treatment into prison programs is conducive to rehabilitation. This raises the question as to whether this therapy could effectively control prisonisation as well. The author’s own survey of prisoners who were treated shows that their hierarchy of values were significantly different six months later. This change can be regarded as developmental and indicative of successful rehabilitation. This could serve as evidence that positive therapeutic results encourage prison inmates to find constructive ways of dealing with imprisonment, reducing stress, reflecting on their conduct and understanding that their time in prison is a consequence of their actions. In this context, addiction therapy in prison may well be an effective means of preventing prisonisation.
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