Previous: First Amend This! An IDOC Newsletter, Dec. ’23
Welcome to the January issue of First Amend This!
This publication provides an insider look at issues affecting the Idaho Department of Correction community. If you wish to assist this effort, share the link, copy and paste, or print and send this issue to another.
Loved ones are encouraged to join the Idaho Inmate Family Support Group (IIFSG) on Facebook or contact the group’s admins at idahoinmate@gmail.com.
Looking to help improve Idaho’s criminal justice system? We ask that you contact Erica Marshall with the Idaho Justice Project. The Idaho Justice Project works to bring the voices of people impacted by the criminal justice system to the legislative table to work on solutions.
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EDITOR’S NOTE
In this issue:
Governor Little looks to build the secure forensic mental health facility that Idaho needed seven decades ago; CBS2 News overshadows a 31-person prison brawl with a dog and its trainer doing their business; how investments into prison education and vocational training programs are paying off; and if you’re going to vote for a prisodent, vote 82431.
Let’s First Amend This!
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NO ARREST OR CONVICTION NEEDED TO TREAT IDAHO’S MENTALLY ILL IN PRISON
In 1972, Idaho’s health and law enforcement officials presented the legislature with a plan to jointly operate a secure mental health unit for individuals deemed by the courts to be dangerously mentally ill.
But when the plan unraveled four years later, the courts began sending psychiatric patients to prison without an arrest or conviction.
Then regarded as a temporary solution, the practice continues today under the Idaho Security Medical Program.
Last year, while working with a $1.4 billion record-breaking surplus, Idaho’s Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee (JFAC) refused Governor Little’s request for $24 million to construct a secure forensic mental health facility that would put an end to the archaic practice.
ProPublica reporter Audrey Dutton reports that Governor Brad Little will once again request that JFAC fund the new facility.
According to Dutton, the Idaho Security Medical Program is at odds with the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, and the directors for the Department of Correction and Department of Health and Welfare aren’t comfortable with it either. Both have expressed concerns that the program provides patients with inadequate care and violates their civil rights.
Patients who are civilly committed by the courts to the program are treated at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution (IMSI) and the Pocatello Women’s Correctional Center, where they spend as many as 24 hours a day in conditions shown to exacerbate mental illness.
New Hampshire is the only other state with a similar program. It is now building a new 24-bed secure mental health facility. Once complete, Idaho will be the last remaining state to prescribe a prison setting for psychiatric patients.
As recently as November 7, members of JFAC toured the Southern Idaho Correction Institution, a minimum-security men and women’s facility that sits adjacent to IMSI.
Idaho Capital Sun reporter Clark Corbin wrote that IDOC Director Josh Tewalt encouraged “legislators during their visit to rethink prison and corrections in terms of coaching and rehabilitation instead of punishment.” Tewalt also shared how 1,000 people in IDOC facilities are currently housed above their security levels. “When considering corrections and prison budgets,” wrote Corbin, “Tewalt urged legislators to support adding the right beds.”
JFAC co-chair Rep. Wendy Horman, R-Idaho Falls, said after the visit, “The benefit of visiting the actual site is to see with our own eyes the effects of the decisions we have made. So, at the prison we are seeing the impacts that’s having on the lives of residents there and how it’s preparing them in a much better way to be introduced to our society.”
Horman and colleagues left the complex without visiting the unit at IMSI where patients of Idaho Security Medical Program are held.
Source: Audrey Dutton, “Idaho Keeps Some Psychiatric Patients in Prison, Ignoring Decades of Warnings About the Practice,” ProPublica. Audrey Dutton, “He’s in a Prison Cell With No Criminal Conviction. Idaho Put Him There for Mental Health Care,” Idaho Capital Sun. Clark Corbin, “Idaho Legislators Tour Prison, Micron and ITD Campuses as They Brace for Budget Requests,” Idaho Capital Sun.
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WEEK TWO, DAY ONE BREAKFAST (MAINLINE)
[Fruit and whole grain bread is substituted at facilities flagged for excessively brewing alcohol.]
______________________________
1 pc — Chuckwagon patty
1 cup — Farina
8 oz. — Milk 1%
3 oz. — Biscuit
0.75 oz. — Country breakfast gravy
2 pckt — Sugar
8 oz. — Vitamin beverage
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Source: IDOC Food Service Menu 7.1
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SIGNIFICANT EVENTS SOUTH OF BOISE IN DECEMBER
On December 10, Idaho State Correctional Center (ISCC) resident Milo Warnock, 45, died after being attacked by a fellow prisoner in what the Ada County coroner has ruled to be a homicide. According to Moscow-Pullman Daily News, Warnock was serving a two-to-ten year sentence for driving under the influence.
The Idaho Statesman reported last month that 31 people incarcerated at IMSI clashed on December 23rd in two parts of the facility. Chemical agents were deployed to break up the brawl and one person was taken to the hospital to be treated for non-life threatening injuries. An IDOC spokesperson told the Statesman that the agency wasn’t considering the brawl a significant event.
CBS2 News last month launched an investigation into why a participant of ISCC’s dog training program was allowed to remain outside alone with the dog that he is training for two hours on Christmas Eve. The CBS2 news team announced in a live television broadcast that it submitted a public records request for security footage of the two doing their business in a fully secured area. The story oddly overshadowed the IMSI brawl, to which the news team devoted a brief and indifferent mention before training its sites on the dog and its handler.
Sources: Staff, “Man killed in prison was Lewiston Graduate,” dnews.com. Kevin Fixler and Alex Brizee, “Fight at Idaho Maximum-Security Prison Near Boise Involves More Than 30 Prisoners,” Idaho Statesman. CBS2 News Staff, “Idaho Inmate Locked Out of Prison While Training a Dog,” Idahonews.com.
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U OF I PROFESSOR PLACES FIRST FOR POPTALK ON PRISON EDUCATION INITIATIVE
University of Idaho (UI) professor Omi Hodwitz recently presented a POPTalk (Power of Possibility) showing how UI’s Prison Education Initiative (PEI) is providing people in Idaho prisons with new worlds of opportunity.
Hodwitz’s speech was one of eight back-to-back three-to-five minute presentations delivered by UI faculty members to a crowded Vandal ballroom. She was awarded first place by an audience vote.
The PEI launched in 2021 as a postsecondary education program using U.S. Department of Education Second Chance Pell Grant funding. “In short, the PEI allows UI students and faculty to provide in-person assistance and study alongside students who are working to complete their own coursework,” writes Herman Roberts, a reporter for UI’s student paper, The Argonaut.
According to Hodzwitz, UI’s on-campus students and their incarcerated counterparts have collaborated to publish books and peer-reviewed articles. They have also presented research conducted together at international academic conferences.
The PEI currently serves the Pocatello Women’s Correctional Center and the Idaho Correctional Institution-Orofino (ICI-O). It also has plans to expand to at least one other Idaho prison.
Individuals who commit to advancing their education at the university level while incarcerated have been shown to reduce the rate at which they recidivate by nearly a half, or more with advanced education. A report released by the nonprofit, nonpartisan research institution RAND, shows that for every dollar invested into prison education, five are saved by reducing the rate at which people recidivate within three years of their release.
Source: Herman Roberts, “The Power of Possibility Found in Idaho Prisons and Elsewhere,” UIArgonaut.com.
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WEEK TWO, DAY ONE LUNCH (MAINLINE)
[Fruit and whole grain bread is substituted at facilities flagged for excessively brewing alcohol.]
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1.5 oz. — Peanut butter
0.5 oz. — Jelly
2 oz. — Wholegrain bread
1 — Fresh fruit/banana
1 — Weekend muffin
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Source: IDOC Food Service Menu 7.1
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IDAHO ED NEWS COVERS IDOC PROGRAMS
Freelance writer Katie McGuire last month published an article in Idaho ED News about the vocational training and education programs currently offered in two Idaho prisons.
Individual serving any length of sentence at the Idaho State Correctional Institution (ISCI) and ISCC are provided a range of opportunities including: General Equivalency Diploma studies, professional video editing, carpentry, masonry, cabinetry, HVAC, custodial training and more.
With the IDOC projecting that 98 percent of the people in its custody will one day be released, these opportunities play an active part in improving public safety,. The agency works with various accreditation programs to ensure that employers can verify the amount of training that residents complete.
It also offers free financial literacy courses to residents at ISCI, and over Zoom to others who qualify. Citing financial stress as a primary driver of crime, financial literacy instructor Jack Dujanovic now teaches his courses online to formerly incarcerated individuals, their spouses and the spouses of residents. (Click here for more info.)
McGuire writes that Ted Oparnico, the education program director for the IDOC, would like to continue expanding the range of programs the agency offers. But with the current rate of inflation surpassing annual increases in available grant funding, the IDOC requires more legislative involvement to do so.
Sources: Katie McGuire, “Idaho Prisoners Given Opportunity Through Education,” Idahoednews.org.
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WEEK TWO, DAY ONE DINNER (MAINLINE)
[Fruit and whole grain bread is substituted at facilities flagged for excessively brewing alcohol.]
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0.5 oz — Meatloaf
0.5 cup — Parsley Potatoes
0.75 cup — Vegetables
1 pc. — Cake
2 oz — Wholegrain Bread
10 gm — Margarine
8 oz — Vitamin Beverage
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Source: IDOC Food Service Menu 7.1
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ABOUT THAT BIGASS BRAWL, THOUGH…
At what size does a prison brawl cross the threshold of significance?
I resided at IMSI from March 2019 to October 2023, and not once did a 31-person brawl extend from my unit onto the rec yard.
I drafted and presented the following proposal on behalf of IMSI residents in July. I share it again here because I believe it adds context to the challenges that IMSI staff and residents have been facing together for years. IMSI management had yet to respond to it by October 4th, the day I was transferred to a neighboring facility.
Date: 7.31.23
To: IMSI Leadership
From: A-Block Representatives
Re: Parole-Required Programming, Religious Services, Education and Incentives
WE, the residents of the Idaho Maximum Security Institution (IMSI), propose a meeting between IMSI leadership and representatives selected from the general population, to discuss the ongoing absence of parole-required programming, religious services and behavioral incentives; and to mutually outline and commit to the steps that must be taken to see them return.
We understand that this facility struggled to maintain safe and orderly operations throughout the course of COVID-19, due in large to understaffing and a lack of available resources.
But we have also documented understaffing being used to excuse the absence of religious services, programming and ad-seg reform since before COVID-19 came into existence.
Having observed a surplus of new staff working our units, we have collectively concluded that understaffing is no longer the issue it was once presented to be.
We understand the part that violence has played in preventing us from receiving the same meaningful opportunities and programming options as those currently offered to residents of other facilities.
Because we also understand how meaningful opportunities and programming options are proven to improve our rate of success upon reentry, we have come to agree that all IMSI residents–including those who remain here despite being classified at lower security levels–deserve safe and equitable access to programming, spiritual services and visits with loved one
READ: Our resident population has taken the necessary steps to ensure a higher level of safety for all staff, residents, volunteers and visitors.
We, the residents of IMSI, diverse in our interests, ethnicities and religions, implore IMSI leadership to match our initiative by meeting with our representatives to explore in what ways we can commit to reaching solutions together.
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ISCI CELEBRATES FESTIVUS WEEKEND WITH FEATS OF SKILL AND STRENGTH
ISCI residents faced off December 23 in the first series of double-elimination tournaments to be held since COVID-19.
The carnage began on the basketball court in the gym at 8:20 a.m., when the first two of seventeen six-person teams began firing rubber inflated munitions in a prison dodgeball purge.
Teams of doubles also competed in tournaments of handball and pool–but without the primitive survivalist fear and unfounded aggression that makes a true athlete.
First and second place teams were awarded grab bags of goodies, and the ISCI Audio-Visual Group was there to film the day’s events. “We’re just collecting samples of some of the cool things we got going on [at ISCI],” said one cameraman who requested to remain unidentified.
Select footage is expected to be televised at other facilities.
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ICI-O’S DOG PROGRAM RECEIVES SENSATIONAL COVERAGE
Given up on, abandoned, neglected, mistreated–too often this is the story of the inmates who train dogs under the pressure of prison gangs in northern Idaho…
It’s becoming increasingly difficult for the media to divert their eyes from the Paroling Animals With Skills (PAWS) program at ICI-O.
John Webb with KHQ.com last month described the program in such a way that you might believe its purpose is to solicit shock and empathy from the community.
Richard Alaniz is the executive director for Faithful Fields, a partner to the PAWS program. He says the goal of the program is to help anyone who might otherwise struggle to afford a service dog or an emotional support animal–the cost of which can range anywhere from $10,000 to $50,000.
To help support PAWS and similar programs, reach out to Faithful Fields or your local animal shelters.
Source: John Webb, “Prison Animal Program Benefits Dogs, Inmates, the Broader North Idaho Community,” KHQ.com
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KIDS IN BONNEVILLE COUNTY SHOP WITH COPS FOR CHRISTMAS
Last month the IDOC joined the Bonneville County Sheriff’s Office, the Idaho Falls Police Department, the Idaho State Police and the Idaho Department of Fish and Game to take 38 Bonneville County kids shopping for Christmas presents.
The annual Shop with a Cop event is now over 30 years strong. Nate Sunderland with East Idaho News reports that in its time it has served well over 1,200 children who, in addition to shopping, enjoy activities like riding in police cars and getting to meet with Santa.
Santa, too, enjoys the event. He arrived this year in a snowcat. In previous years he arrived by helicopter, tank, race cars, classic cars and even a hot air balloon.
This year’s donations were arranged through the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Center.
Source: Nate Sunderland, “Hundreds of Kids Helped After 30 Years of Shop with a Cop” EastIdahoNews.com.
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RENICK ON THE RADIO
With over six years of episodes available for streaming, Mark Renick hosts Victory Over Sin on Boise’s KBXL 94.1FM, Saturdays at 12:30 pm. The program, funded by a Southwest Idaho advocacy arm of https://www.svdpid.org, shares what it’s like to live incarcerated in Idaho and then come out of incarceration and live on parole.
12.2.23. Darrell Taylor from Ten Mile Christian Church is a returning guest of the show. He has worked with people involved in Idaho’s correctional system for decades and helped to pioneer the holiday program Cookies for Corrections
12.9.23. Jesse Asoau is the cofounder of the Life by Death movement. Formerly incarcerated himself, he now finds creative ways to encourage others to test their limits. LifebyDeathMovement.com.
12.16.23. Christopher Wood and Dakota Johnson with the Renaissance Ranch share the formula behind what they say are some of the highest long-term recovery statistics in the United States.
Contact Mr. Renick at 208-477-1006 or visit https://www.svdpid.org for more information on reentry resources in Southwestern Idaho.
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RECENTLY ACKNOWLEDGED
ICI-O — Ofc. Darrel Gray with a 20-year Certificate of Service.
EBCRC — Residents for raising $871 in donations for the Hays House, a safe shelter for youth who are runaways, homeless, or victims of abuse or neglect.
District 5 — P and P administrative assistant Gina Hart for five years of service.
Sources: Idaho Department of Correction on Facebook
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RESIDENT AUDITING 101
The Resident Auditing Committee has been busy applying itself academically and expects to return in February.
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RESOURCES FOR INCARCERATED PERSONS
[Referred by ISCI DAD Club facilitator Ms. Christensen.]
The Children of Incarcerated Parents Library (CIPL) makes pamphlets on parenting from incarceration available for download without charge at the National Resource Center on Children and Families of the Incarcerated (NRCCFI) website: nrccfi.camden.rutgers.edu.
Unfortunately, the NRCCFI lacks the funding to provide free copies by mail. Please ask your clinician, case manager, prison library or loved ones for assistance obtaining copies.
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INMATE SERVICES AT WORK
[This message has been forwarded from a resident of the Idaho State Correctional Institution.]
12.27.23
Dear Ms. Yamaguchi,
My name is Patrick Irving. I am a contributor to Prison Journalism Project, a member of PEN America‘s forthcoming Incarcerated Writers Bureau and the author of First Amend This!, an Idaho Department of Correction newsletter. I am writing with great respect to the mental health advocacy work of your press client and Mariel Hemingway Foundation co-founder, Mariel Hemingway. It is my hope that you can find time to share with her two intriguing articles that focus on what may be both the highest-risk and most frequently overlooked population in Idaho:
1) Audrey Dutton, “Idaho Keeps Some Psychiatric Patients in Prison, Ignoring Decades of Warning About the Practice,” ProPublica.
2) Patrick Irving, “Needing To Share While Sharing the Need (for Trauma-Informed Care in Prisons),” First Amend This! Dec. ’23.
I also wish to share with you that this year I aim to organize and operate a creative-problem solving, civic outreach service group from the Idaho State Correctional Institution. My goal with this group is to assist the missions of organizations and agencies like the National Alliance of Mental Illness, the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration, the Idaho Department of Correction and even, if possible, the Mariel Hemingway Foundation.
You are welcome to keep us in mind as you go about your course of work.
Many thanks,
Patrick Irving 82431
ISCI Unit 14B-4B
Boise, ID 83707
bookofirving82431.com
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SUGGESTION BOX
I suggest placing the Prisoners Literature Project (PLP) on the list of approved book vendors, along with the rest of the prison book projects listed in the Prisoner Activist Resource Center (PARC) National Resource Directory. Both the Kuna mailroom and PLP report that materials sent by PLP currently aren’t accepted.
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Shout out to Phil Gyford with ooh.directory!