A prison is a place of violence. Pretty quickly, as they begin their sentence inside, other inmates categorize each other as Predator or Prey. As a Hunter or the Hunted. Their role is determined by whether or not they have the strength to stand up against the other inmates. Will they run and hide in their cell, or will they stand and fight? Will they be abused, or will they be the abuser? Lion or antelope is the choice most have in a violent system.
Staff are often looked at the same way. Are you the Hunter or are you the Prey. Success for the prey is measured by just living another day. "Eight and the gate." But a lack of respect for the other predators makes you unaware, unprepared, and nothing more than a person to be used and manipulated.
Success for the Hunter is a successful hunt. An officer who is a Hunter is respected for their skills and their abilities. Remember, most of the time a lion lives alongside the antelope. The antelope keep a respectful distance but they are not living in constant fear of the lion. The lion has nothing to prove, he knows he is King. He knows he is an apex predator, and walks comfortably in his surroundings, not unaware, but comfortable with his skills.
PepperBall From crowd control to cell extractions, the PepperBall system is the safe, non-lethal option.
OMNI OMNI is cutting-edge software designed to track inmates and assets within your prison or jail.
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
A prison is a place of violence. Pretty quickly, as they begin their sentence inside, other inmates categorize each other as Predator or Prey. As a Hunter or the Hunted. Their role is determined by whether or not they have the strength to stand up against the other inmates. Will they run and hide in their cell, or will they stand and fight? Will they be abused, or will they be the abuser? Lion or antelope is the choice most have in a violent system.
Staff are often looked at the same way. Are you the Hunter or are you the Prey. Success for the prey is measured by just living another day. "Eight and the gate." But a lack of respect for the other predators makes you unaware, unprepared, and nothing more than a person to be used and manipulated.
Success for the Hunter is a successful hunt. An officer who is a Hunter is respected for their skills and their abilities. Remember, most of the time a lion lives alongside the antelope. The antelope keep a respectful distance but they are not living in constant fear of the lion. The lion has nothing to prove, he knows he is King. He knows he is an apex predator, and walks comfortably in his surroundings, not unaware, but comfortable with his skills.
PepperBall From crowd control to cell extractions, the PepperBall system is the safe, non-lethal option.
OMNI OMNI is cutting-edge software designed to track inmates and assets within your prison or jail.
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
Take care of each other and Be Safe behind those walls and fences!
Speaker 1:
Hello and welcome back to the Prison Officer Podcast. Today I'm talking about are you a hunter or are you prey? But before I get to our topic, I want to take just a minute to thank one of our sponsors. You know, during my 29 years of corrections, I've used or supervised pepper ball hundreds of times and now, as a master instructor for Pepperball, I teach others about the versatility and effectiveness of the Pepperball system. Pepperball is always the first option in my correctional toolbox because it gives me the ability to transition quickly from area saturation to direct impact, and the non-lethal PAVA projectiles organic irritants. You know they have impact ranges of zero to up to 150 feet. Pepperball's perfect for cell extractions or fights on the rec yard, where you have to reach out there. To learn more about Pepperball, go to wwwpepperballcom or click the link below. In today's show information guide, pepperball is the safer option. First, if you haven't done so yet, please take a moment to like my podcast or, better yet, hit the subscribe button so that you'll be notified when the next episode comes out. And whether or not you're listening to Spotify, apple or you're watching me on YouTube, hit that like button.
Speaker 1:
So what do I want to talk about today is are you a prey or are you a hunter? You know prison's a place of violence. That's pretty simple. That's pretty easy, pretty quickly. When new inmates are categorized into their roles as they begin their sentence and as they go inside, the other inmates quickly categorize them as predator or prey. You know their roles, determined by whether or not they have the strength to stand up to other inmates. Will they run, will they hide in their cell or will they stand and fight? Will they be abused or will they be the abuser? Will they be abused or will they be the abuser? Lion or antelope? It's the choice most have in a violent system. Inmates don't get to choose a lot about how they interact in that system, but that when it's done, they're pretty much broke down into either predator or prey. Now this got me thinking the other day, because I often get the chance to walk through and see many of our jails and prisons across the country when I'm teaching.
Speaker 1:
And recently I had the chance to witness the stark contrast between how two officers in a housing unit were doing their job. The first officer let's call him Charlie He'd been working there for many years. He was quite confident in the fact that he'd seen it all. And when I first met him he was sitting in the officer station facing a computer and looked to me about to nod off. When we approached, the staff member with me called his name and Charlie quite literally startled. He was just taken back that someone had walked through the open door of his office behind him. But uh, he stood up, slowly, you know. He shook my hand, uh, he kind of adjusted his crumpled uniform and then he stepped outside the office door to greet me and talk about the housing unit.
Speaker 1:
Now, charlie's knowledge of the housing unit was great. He understood how it worked. He knew how many inmates. He knew when they went to chow. He knew when they went to the yard. He knew all the rules, what was allowed on the unit. He was spot on when it came to the rules.
Speaker 1:
But the part that caught my attention was the way the inmates walked by him like he wasn't there while he was talking to me. Charlie even moved back out of the way as a couple of the inmates brushed by too closely. According to Charlie, he'd worked in this unit a long time, yet it was apparent the inmates regarded him as only a piece of furniture just to walk around, something that was in their way. Charlie wasn't looked at as the officer in charge of the unit. He was just there. Now, before you think, you know who I'm talking about, I have changed the name absolutely and you won't know who I'm talking about. And I'm not trying to make it sound like Charlie is a bad person, but the way he carried himself in that housing unit, the inmates didn't respect him. He was just something in the way.
Speaker 1:
And then, as I was standing there, another officer walked up. Let's call him Jonathan. Immediately I could sense a difference with Jonathan. To start with, he didn't wait to be introduced. He saw me and he stuck out his hand and he introduced himself to me. Jonathan told me he'd been working this unit for just under a year and he had just come back to the office to secure some contraband that he had found during a cell search. After a quick chat he invited me to tour the housing unit and Charlie at that point turned around, sat down his back facing the doorway and once again was looking at the computer. But I was happy to go see the housing unit, go out with Jonathan and see. You know what was going on.
Speaker 1:
So as we walked into the housing unit. It was apparent immediately that the inmates saw Jonathan in a different light From the moment we walked in that housing unit. Every inmate from around the housing unit had their eyes on him. You can see the inmates thinking where's he going next? I'm even sure a couple of the inmates that went back into their cells were ensuring that the contraband was well hidden in their cell on the chance that Jonathan might come through there.
Speaker 1:
Next. As we walked, jonathan gave me a different tour. He didn't recount the housing unit rules stapled on the corkboard. No, jonathan knew what was really going on in this housing unit. He mentioned and showed me areas where he had found contraband recently. He told me about the main players in the unit who were the gamblers? Who sold drugs. Who was the new local tattoo artist, because apparently the last one had closed shop. Apparently his inking of a gang member's child didn't turn out so well, so he wasn't tattooing anymore.
Speaker 1:
And as we walked by a game of dominoes, jonathan spoke to several of the inmates and it was just casual conversation. He said something like hey Smith, what's up? Had nod of his head. The inmate responded with something like you know inmates do same old, same old. Jonathan asked him, said you're going to watch the game tonight? One of the guys at the table said of course, you know that's my team. I got to watch it.
Speaker 1:
So what I noticed from those guys was a certain amount of respect to the inmates. Didn't just walk past or brush Jonathan Like he was a piece of furniture. They knew he was alert to everything around him. He even knew their names. He knew their favorite sports team. He knew and studied a lot about them. As a matter of fact, they understood a lot about Jonathan. They knew Jonathan was just there to do the job, but he did it while still showing a certain amount of respect to them. They knew that Jonathan was not the type of staff member that they were going to try and manipulate. That just emanated from him that that was not him. They knew this housing unit was a safe place to be. This was not a place where you wanted to break the rules when Jonathan was on shift, and if you did, you had a pretty good chance of getting caught.
Speaker 1:
I think Jonathan for the tour after a little bit and watched as he turned and went right back into the housing unit. Um, I could tell he was on the hunt for something. He probably saw something that I didn't catch. You know, something caught his eye during our walk and now he would go looking for the next shank or plastic bottle full of hooch. Jonathan was a hunter and he was on the hunt. As I turned to leave, I noticed Charlie was playing solitaire on the computer. As I turned to leave, I noticed Charlie was playing solitaire on the computer. I purposefully said have a nice day, probably a little loud, and it startled him again. And as I left I thought about how much he looked like prey. He wouldn't be surprised. He probably is not even going to know if an attack ever comes. He's so focused on the computer he's just trying to get through his day and he doesn't pay any attention to what's going on in the housing unit.
Speaker 1:
When you're prey, success is measured by just living another day, right? Uh, in corrections we call that eight in the gate. I made it through eight more. But a lack of respect for the other predators makes you unaware, it makes you unprepared and it makes you nothing more than a person to be used and manipulated. Prison is not the place to live unaware. Prison is not a good place to be seen as prey, but when you're a predator, you know success is well, it's a successful hunt, you know. But when I call an officer a predator it's not like calling an inmate a predator. An officer doesn't prey on inmates. An officer who is a predator is respected for their skills and their abilities. Remember, most of the time a lion lives alongside the antelope. The antelope will keep a respectful distance, but they're not living in constant fear of the lion. The lion doesn't have anything to prove. He knows he's king. He doesn't have to go out and show people he's king. He knows that he is an apex predator and as he walks in his surroundings you can see he's comfortable, not unaware, but comfortable in his skills. You can see the same thing with a good correctional officer, a correctional officer who is a hunter.
Speaker 1:
You know, back when I was a housing unit officer, I was a hunter. I rarely sat down. There was so much to do, so much to figure out, so much to find. When I started at Leavenworth there were 200 plus inmates in my housing unit and one of them was always up to something. They were either making shanks, making hooch, selling drugs. It was a goldmine for finding contraband. Absolutely, of course, the main prize for us was shanks. If you could find shanks, you were looked up on as being a good correctional officer. So I carried equipment with me. I carried a little block of a little wedge of wood and, uh, I carried a key chip that was ground down on one side like a flat screwdriver, um, and a search mirror. I always had a search mirror with me. This was my hunting gear. This is when I went to work. This was the gear I went hunting with, you know, and as soon as, as soon as count cleared, most of the inmates were headed to chow or the yard. But that's when I started hunting, that's when I started looking.
Speaker 1:
You know, bulletin boards, um, and other stuff attached to the walls was one of my favorite. That's why I carried that little wedge and that's where I usually checked first. So I'd take that little small wedge of wood and I would shove it up behind the bulletin board, which would stretch it out from the wall, and then you could take that little mirror and look up from the bottom and you could see if something had been placed up there behind that bulletin board. And this was a favorite place for inmates to to hide shanks. And the reason is because, guess what they carried a little piece of wood. So when the shit kicks and they need a shank quickly, they would take that wedge. They'd wedge a bulletin board or whatever the you know was on the wall where a shank was at, they'd wedge it, and then they could reach up there and grab a shank wherever in the prison they were at. So, uh, I kind of used the same skills that they used in order to catch, uh, the shanks in order to find those.
Speaker 1:
You know, sometimes you'd find more than one. One quarter in housing unit A, I remember there were three of us who were friends, who worked a1, a2 and a3 and one quarter. We had a bet who could find the most shanks in a quarter, and I found 88 shanks that quarter and came in second place. Mark found over 100 and he came in first place. So, um, there was a lot to be found, but you couldn't find it sitting at the computer playing solitaire.
Speaker 1:
We were up all the time every day, hunting not just shanks, drugs. We found drugs. My rookie year I I found an eight ball of black tar heroin and I got an award for it. You know, um, we would find black tar heroin a lot back then. You could find marijuana. Not as much, um, but we would find that sometimes hooch was a big deal. We could find hooch where they uh, uh, either brewing it or bottle in it, one of the two. That's usually when you caught it. But we were out hunting for this stuff.
Speaker 1:
Uh, it wasn't enough just to sit in the office and wait for me to find something. We went out and looked for it. You know, many officers don't think they have to be either, and I know there's officers sitting here right now while I'm talking and in their mind they've been there, they've done it, they've seen it. There's nothing more for them to do. Done it, they've seen it. Uh, there's nothing more for them to do. And that's just not true.
Speaker 1:
As correctional officers, every day matters. Every shank that you take off the yard is one less weapon that those inmates have when it comes time to have a fight or a disturbance. Um, every, every bottle of hooch you take out there is is is one less inmate who's going to get drunk and violent. So it does matter what we find and what we do and that you're out there hunting and that you're not just sitting around being an antelope being prey. You know, um, unfortunately, my career has taught me that those people who do so little that do the eight in the gate. They don't care about their housing unit, they're not trying to find nothing, they just want it to go by so that they can go home. Most of the time that's when the hooch and the shanks and the drugs are being passed and made, and it's usually somebody else on another shift that has to pay for their complacency.
Speaker 1:
So, um, don't be that person, don't be that antelope, don't be prey. You have to make a choice. You're either going to walk in that prison as a hunter on the top of the food chain, or you can be prey and just be part of the food chain, but you're going to get manipulated, you're going to get hurt, bad things are going to go on in your unit because you're not looking for them. So I guess the next question is how do you? How do you act like a hunter? So here's, here's, a few things that I have.
Speaker 1:
The first one is observation, and I don't see staff doing enough of this anymore. It was something that was drilled into me when I started. I used to have mentors, officers, who would come up and say, hey, stand up here. And we'd go stand on the top tier or the top of a building and we would watch inmates to see where they went. You need to learn to observe the movements of inmates. Find a place any place, and now we have cameras. You have more cameras. Now you can do some of this from a camera, but I do think there's some positivity in being there seeing it in person. I don't think you can feel everything and see the minutiae of what they're doing if you're doing it over camera, but if that's the best you can get, then watch the camera, observe those inmates. See who they talk to, see where they walk, see which cells they go in, which cells they come out of, see which cells are guarded, see which parts of the housing unit some inmates don't go in. See what part of the housing units inmates go in, like they're buying something sandwiches, drugs, whatever.
Speaker 1:
You need to understand the places where inmates gather. It's just like hunting. You're not going to go stand in the bottom of a gravel quarry waiting to see a white-tailed deer. You're going to go out in the edge of the woods. You have to know where they gather and how they act day after day, and that's where you're going to find the shanks, the hooch, the drugs, whatever.
Speaker 1:
Another thing I'd say is you have to be knowledgeable. Study the rules and policies. You should be the expert on this. You should know what is allowed. You should know what is not allowed. You should study the inmates, learn their habits, their weaknesses, learn their fears. Inmates have fears, absolutely. They do Learn what drives them, just like anybody else in this world, and inmates are people. If you find out what drives them, you can figure out why they do everything they're doing Drugs, money. What are they trying to accomplish? Power. You could figure that out. It makes it easy for you to follow them. Figure it out.
Speaker 1:
Um, ownership, my gosh, I can't say this loud enough. Take ownership of your areas. Those inmates don't own those housing units. They don't own those housing units. They don't own those pods. You do. And if you're not running it like you own it, then you're failing. That's all there is to it.
Speaker 1:
I don't have anything nicer to say about that. If inmates think that they're running your pods and your housing units, then you're failing. You need to be out there so much that they're watching you. They want to know what you're up to, just like Jonathan there the minute he walked in that housing unit. Every inmate was watching. Is he going to come my way? Is he going to search my stuff? That's what they should be thinking when you walk in a housing unit. They shouldn't look up at you like a piece of furniture to walk around when you're in their way. If you're not running your housing unit like that, you're failing. If you haven't read it yet Extreme Ownership, jocko Wilnick. It's a good step in learning some of that. If you see something that needs to be done, own it, make it happen, make sure it gets done. Don't accept excuses from inmates, from other staff or yourself.
Speaker 1:
And finally and I talked about this a little bit respect. You know respect goes both ways. I see officers who expect respect but are not willing to take the time to give it. And when I say respect an inmate, you don't have to respect the life they have or the life they had. You don't have to respect the crime they did, but you have to show them the respect as a human being. You have to give them what they've got coming. And you have to. Respect is also expecting something from them, not only respect. You expect a certain level of behavior from those inmates, or should. And if you do expect it from them, 90% of the time they'll rise to it. So you know.
Speaker 1:
Another thing that I see about respect is when you do find something, when you're out there hunting and you find something, this isn't the time to belittle this inmate. This isn't the time to um you know, tear their cell up or shame them. Go do your job, and your job is to find this stuff. Your job is to find shanks and hooch right. Your job is not to shame this inmate or humiliate them. They know what they did wrong. They have a job to do in prison. They're going to be criminals. You have a job to do in prison. You're supposed to prevent crime. It's not personal. And if it is personal, then get out of your feelings, because this is about doing your job. This isn't about whether or not you like that inmate. You don't have to like this inmate, but you don't have to treat them poorly because this time you won. Next time they've gotten away with stuff and you didn't see it. This time you won.
Speaker 1:
So don't be a bragger, don't humiliate people, don't belittle them, especially in front of everybody else. Remember and this is one I always go back to, if you remember the movie Roadhouse, right? What did they say? I want you to be nice until it's time not to be nice. And that's absolutely true. When you walk in that housing unit, you can be respectful, you can be nice. If they give you a reason not to be nice, then make that step, but you don't have to walk around in there all the time being a butt. So I don't know.
Speaker 1:
I saw those two in that housing unit. It really it brought back a lot of stuff for me that I saw over the years and the different officers I worked with over the years, because I worked with some officers who were great hunters, great predators, and then, absolutely, I worked with officers who were nothing but prey and they would get manipulated, they'd get hurt, you know, because they don't understand the arena that they're working in. So you need to understand and you need to tell, ask yourself are you going to be a hunter or are you going to be prey? Are you going to be a lion or are you going to be an antelope? And it's up to you, it's up to you how you carry yourself. So, um, I think that's it.
Speaker 1:
Before we go, I'd I'd like to take a minute to thank one of our other sponsors, you know, uh, omni has been with us quite a while now, and Omni real-time locating system is a company that well, I've been working with closely. Um, I love being part of this innovative team. Their PREA compliant real-time monitoring technology is the very best way to track and record the locations and interactions of all inmates and assets throughout every square inch of your correctional facility. Imagine if you could get an alarm the second an escape happens. Or what if you could get and send a medical response the second an inmate's heart rate drops below a defined level that you choose. To learn more about Omni, go to wwwomnirtlscom or click the link below in today's show information guide. Omni's real-time locating system is a powerful tool designed specifically for the modern correctional professional. If you haven't done so, please take a moment and like my podcast or, better yet, hit the subscribe button so that you'll be notified when the next episode comes out. Thanks for listening and let's be safe out there. Have a great day.
