Established 2023
Disability Services in Eastern State Penitentary
Monday, November 11, 2024
Helena Giner
Disability Services in Eastern State Penitentary
Prisoners with disabilities recieve services offered by Eastern State. Sourced from the article "Disabled Public Offenders" in the Eastern Echo
Individuals with disabilities face disproportionate incarceration in our American penal system. Historically, prisons were pipelines for those with disabilities who were unable to find jobs, live independently, or deemed “unfit” for their communities[1]. Although disability programs have increased in quality and scope over recent years, people with disabilities continue to make up a sizable proportion of the penal population. As of 2016, nearly 40% of state and federal prisoners have reported having at least one disability and a quarter indicated participating in special education programs[2].
The condition of penal life for those with disabilities is dismal. Disabled prisoners face a high likelihood of abuse, physical, and sexual violence in the penal system. Unless stringent safety measures are applied by prison staff, there is a high chance for violent targeting. Furthermore, people with disabilities require support/services such as physical, occupational, and behavioral therapy, adaptive equipment, and sensory adaptations. Although this support is protected under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1999 (ADA)[3], reports show that prisoners with disabilities are frequently denied medical programs, therapy, and accommodations[4].
The question of conditions for prisoners with disabilities at the Eastern State Penitentiary during its history is largely a mystery. Few statistics are published regarding how many prisoners had disabilities and their treatment in the prison. Further complicating the matter, the definition of disability has been modified over time, suggesting that statistics may be inaccurate. Because disabilities often pose challenges which may be barriers to written expression, few prisoners with disclosed disabilities are recorded to have authored written works which could have voiced their situation. However, evidence of support programs were mentioned sparsely in the Eastern Echo, a prison newspaper in circulation between the 1950s to 1968. Drawing on writing of these support programs, I analyze three different articles about disability services found in the Eastern Echo to investigate the type of disability services found in Eastern State Penitentiary and the possible extent of their implementation.
INDIVIDUAL THERAPY...REBUTTAL
by Sterling B. James
Inmate Sterling B. James argues against the legitimacy of individual therapy services offered by Eastern State Penitentiary. The therapy provided by Eastern State was described as unscientific and equated to “hypnotism” by James, who stated that he surveyed the “John Q. Population” (the average person in Eastern state) to come to this conclusion.
James finds further fault in the acquisition of therapy. Inmates were required to self-enroll in therapy, which James believed few men who needed therapy would. Additionally, James argued that poverty and lack of education were the main causes of crime. Treating these aspects, James asserted, would be more of a useful factor than therapy.
Although the therapy in James' article was not only aimed at supporting those with disabilities, therapy is a service that many people with disabilities utilize. The description of its distribution by James indicated that it was inaccessible. Therapy was self acquired, meaning that prisoners had to take action to sign themselves up for therapy.
Prisoners would:
1. Have to recognize that they needed mental therapy
2. Sign themselves up for this therapy
This would be difficult for people with serious mental health conditions or cognitive disabilities. Furthermore, mental healthcare was not normalized in the 1950s as it is in the 2020s, meaning that many prisoners could have felt higher levels of self-internalized stigma as a personal barrier to therapy.
James’ argument regarding the importance of educational and vocational services reflected an overarching argument of the time. The Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1954 was passed two years prior with the same importance placed on rehabilitation to provide vocational training to disabled inmates. However, mention of the services appeared ten years later, described as “new” in later Eastern Echo articles.
Disabled Public Offenders
The editors of the Eastern Echo promote a vocational program providing rehabilitation to disabled prisoners to “restore them to economic feasibility.’ This program offered services such as physical and psychotherapy, artificial limbs, braces, and hearing aids, while providing educational counseling, college training, business courses, barbering, truck driving, and other vocational training to qualified disabled inmates. The program was “free if the applicant cannot afford to pay” indicating that it cost money to some.
Qualifications were determined by proving 1) a mental or physical disability which results in functional limitations 2) substantial handicap for employment 3) reasonable expectation that services would help an individual find employment.
The article acknowledged that there are “hard realities involved in this issue.” It stated that there is 1) a backlog of eligible people not reached by the program 2) debt situations which make it difficult for some state agencies to find funding, giving rise to burgeoning caseloads, insufficient funds, and staff shortages. However, the article proposed solutions to work around difficulties, for example, partaking in repeat diagnoses to prove eligibility and deferring the examination of eligibility until after the applicant has received services.
Vocational Rehabilitation
by Mary E. Switzer
Published in tandem with “Disabled Public Offenders,” “Vocational Rehabilitation” was a direct message from Mary E. Switzer, the chief author of the Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1954, to disabled prisoners about the aforementioned vocational program. This program was said to be implemented in November in Pennsylvania as of 1964, ten years after the bill’s passing.
Switzer outlined national efforts to implement the Act, as well as success stories in Pennsylvania. Switzer stressed the importance of self-motivation, stating that “the ultimate decision to work must be made by the individual himself.” She wrote that to become involved in the program, prisoners should “see the parole officer.”
The Vocational Rehabilitation program was a fundamentally progressive program. However, similar barriers observed by James can be applied to an understanding of the distribution of the Vocational Rehabilitation Act.
Prisoners had to take steps to join the program. Obligated to see the parole officer to express their interest in joining their program, the decision ultimately made by the “prisoner himself.” However, this could have alienated the prisoners who might not be able to conceptualize the importance of vocational training, those who faced difficulties with self-advocacy, or those who were nonverbal. Furthermore, this placed people with disabilities at the mercy of their parole officer, who may have not relayed their requests due to other penal distractions, personal discrimination, or apathy. Incessant self-advocacy could have been necessary to acquire these services, an important skill, but one that poses accessibility issues.
The program was only available to people who were deemed “able to benefit.” Who evaluated prisoners could also play a role in their ability to join the program. An evaluator with racial or gender bias might give prisoners an unfair evaluation, barring them from receiving services.
Furthermore, the standard of being “able to benefit” from services is ableist in itself. This alienates those with severe disabilities who may never be able to hold a job, removing access to therapies which could benefit them. The proportion of these individuals in the Eastern State Penitentiary is unknown, however, it can be assumed that they did exist in the penal system, since there is evidence of incarceration for people with severe disabilities for offenses such as sleeping on the street. It is unknown whether these individuals received services in the Eastern State, however, they would have been excluded from the physical/psychological therapy provided by vocational rehabilitation on the basis of their disability’s severity. If this was the only therapy available, they could have been at a severe disadvantage. However, the extent of disabilities services is unmentioned throughout the articles in the Eastern Echo.
The writing in the articles poses questions regarding who the target audience was. “Disabled Public Offenders” was written factually, assessing pros and cons while explaining to prisoners that there might be barriers to entry into the program. “Vocational Rehabilitation” was written as a letter, mainly to convince prisoners to take initiative into joining the program.
Taken as a whole, this poses a complicated message to incarcerated people with disabilities. Some may have been discouraged by “Disabled Public Offenders” concession of difficulties, whereas some may have been intimidated by the responsibility placed upon them in “Vocational Rehabilitation.” Some may have only read “Disabled Public Offenders” and missed the instruction for involvement mentioned once in “Vocational Rehabilitation.”
Some may have not been able to read the articles. Whether these programs were advertised beyond the scope of newspapers is unknown. Since prisoners were obligated to pursue the services themselves, it seems that word regarding services could also have been acquired through self-sufficiency. If blind individuals, individuals with developmental disabilities, or those who were illiterate were notified was questionable, but it is nearly impossible that they could have been notified through a newspaper article in the Eastern Echo.
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The Eastern Echo provided indirect insight into the lives of prisoners with disabilities in Eastern State Penitentiary through the discussion of service programs. Therapy and vocational training were incredibly progressive programs to be given to inmates. However, the description in the Eastern Echo, services were something requiring self-advocacy and self-awareness. Whether this was accessible to inmates and whether the programs were successful is largely unknown. Yet, the contents of the Eastern Echo suggest a prison environment that is accessible to some individuals with disabilities. But the emphasis on self sufficiency, self-advocacy, and proof of the ability to "benefit" from these programs indicates that it was not accessible to all.
Works Cited
[1]Ben-Moshe, L., Chapman, C., & Carey, A. C. (2014). Disability incarcerated: Imprisonment and disability in the United States and Canada. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.
[2]Laberis, B. (2020). How does the US prison system handle people with disabilities? Retrieved from https://www.accessibility.com/blog/how-does-the-us-prison-system-handle-people-with-disabilities
[3](N.d.). Retrieved from https://www.disabilityrightspa.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/ADA-2E-Inmste-Rights-ADA.pdf
[4]Vallas, R. (2024). Disabled behind bars. Retrieved from https://www.americanprogress.org/article/disabled-behind-bars/
