Released (When will the sentence end?)
By: Jennifer Rogers
Tags: Criminal Justice Reform, Justice, Prison, Prison Reform, Womens Rights

Have you ever found yourself wondering what life after prison looks like? This can be a very tough road to navigate. Particularly for Women coming home with children and no real direction on where to begin. This blog will give you a short insight into the life of a prisoner. Jennifer Rogers, a former federal inmate, will talk about life on the inside and after release. Jennifer has went on to be the top 1% of women in sales. Earning six figures a year, and recently founding the National Association of Women’s Prison Reform. Despite what the statics show or what society thinks. We do Reform and the sentence can end.

Life on the inside of a prison is nothing like what you see on the TV shows of todays world. There is always an underlying truth, however the emotional abuse and sometimes physical abuse that takes place behind the prison walls can leave inmates worse off than when they entered. The prison system does absolutely nothing to rehabilitate the inmates that enter into its cold, dingy, lonely environment.

From the moment that you enter in you are stripped away of any remaining dignity that you had left. You become a number. A number and a last name. The women officers look at you like you are scum of the earth and many of the male officers look at you as a piece of meat. Meat that given the right circumstances will be taken advantage of. Not to say that all officers are bad. There are some really goods one. Unfortunately, they are overshadowed by the ones that could care less whether you survive or not.

Did you know that there are zero programs inside of most women’s prisons to help them recover, reform, and become successful? So how do we do it? Where do we go from here? How do we go from being counted 3 times a day, told when to eat, told how to dress, being moved like a herd of cattle to thriving individuals after release?

With there being zero programs designed to prepare inmates for release this can be very tricky. Inmates spend countless days and nights counting down the days of when they will finally go home. While inmates eagerly look forward to their release date, they have not been prepared for this moment at all. They are handed a bus ticket and told to report to a halfway house by a certain time. The doors open and the inmates are free. This can be an alarming venture for some inmates as they are traveling thousands of miles in unfamiliar territory with absolutely zero support.

Inmates arrive to their destination with very few belongings, if any at all. They check in to yet another government facility and the clock begins ticking immediately for them. Studies show that there is a very short window of time for an individual to find a home and a job in order to not violate their release and return to prison. Due to the lack of programs, housing assistance, and job opportunities for convicted felons, this is not an easy task. Many inmates are denied housing, resulting in homelessness, and cannot find a job that will to allow them to afford any means of living. Much less a sustainable lifestyle.

So what are we doing to correct this growing problem? There are some programs that exist for men, but very few for women. This is alarming and concerning given that 70% of women in prison are the primary care takers of at least one child under the age of 18. How do we expect these women to get out and become reformed members of society? They cannot find a place to live or a job that pays enough for them support themselves much less their children. Who is standing in the gap for them? Who is willing to go into the trenches and assist these women?

The sad truth is very few people are willing to get involved. At least until now. NAWPR was founded for women by a former incarcerated woman. I know what it is like to come home with big plans, and big dreams. Only to faced with the reality of life after release with no resources to become the woman that I knew I was capable of becoming. So, I created a way for myself. I, unlike many women was fortunate enough to have family that I lived with while I got on my feet.

I was in a Federal Half Way House. From the moment of my arrival, all I knew is that I had to find a job. But how? How could I possibly find a job with no access to a phone other than a pay phone? How could I make a way for myself when every direction was a dead end road? What did I do?

I made a way when there was none. I created my own street. I used an illegal cell phone (they weren’t allowed), and risked my freedom to create a way. I called an ad that was in the job postings of the newspaper. I sailed throuh a phone interview and convinced the half way house director to allow me to go to an onsight interview in person. I was fortunate. I did not look or sound like I had just gotten out of prison. I was determined. I was going to make it.

What made me different in this scenario than any other woman or man coming home from prison? How did I get so lucky? I was determined. I was not going to allow my past to define me for another second. 10 years later I still stand by this truth. What about the other inmates that are just as determined? Where do they end up?How do they survive? More importantly, how do they thrive? Stay tuned for part 2 of my ongoing series of life after release. #NAWPR (National Association of Women’s Prison Reform) #WEDOREFORM