Prison Break Casts Spotlight on Staff-Inmate Relationships

Training to work in maximum-security prisons includes stern warnings that add up to one message: Don’t get too close to the inmates.

Never treat the relationship as anything other than professional. Never reveal personal details an inmate could use to compromise you. And never forget you are dealing with hardened, often cunning, criminals.

Investigators say prison tailor shop instructor Mitchell ignored those admonitions with frightening results, actually helping a pair of killers make their power-tool breakout.

Immersed in a world of inmates who can be excellent manipulators, some prison workers wind up doing things out of compassion, greed, or fear over inmates’ threats to harm them or expose them for breaking a rule.

“You spend more waking hours with them than your family, you get to know them, you see them age over the years,” said Catarina Spinaris, executive director of Desert Waters Correctional Outreach, a training organization. “You have to be very cognizant of the need to maintain distance.”

This article appeared in print on page 5 of the June 16th, 2015 edition of Hamodia.