Corrections_Today_March_April_2019

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the Sexual Abuse Act or the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA). When I read the book a second time, I read it from this perspective. This perspec- tive is important because it is about how individuals are impacted through the actions of just one person. Now, I have always believed most corrections professionals are good, law-abiding people who work very hard to make the country safer and provide those for whom they care an opportunity of self- betterment. But because abuse is not about institutions but about individu- als, I believe the book is an important one to read. The horrific stories portrayed by the women in this book highlighted 13 women at various stages of the criminal justice system who had been psychologically and physically abused in and out of prison. While their stories are important and should not be dismissed, their stories speak toward a much larger issue: when do we 13 women at various stages of the criminal justice system who had been psychologically and physically abused in and out of prison. The horrific stories portrayed by the women in this book highlighted

understand the dynamics of commu- nity and family and how they influence a need to be loved and understood? This need often ended with the women portrayed making poor decisions and choosing the wrong associates and partners. The book also demonstrated the need for community interven- tion before these women became so involved, typically with drugs, that their choices led to criminal behavior, some of it as horrific as the prison experienc- es they shared in their narratives. While most disheartened by the stories of correctional officers and others in their abuse of these women, I was more struck by the lack of family and lack of community in which these women were raised. A colleague of mine has been attempting to bring light to the is- sue of family and community for many years saying all the criminal justice reforms in the world will be of little use until we address the issues of family, education and poverty. We continue to try to make the criminal justice system better, which is good, but we do little to try to impact the etiology. In November 2017, according to World Prison Brief, there were ap- proximately 212,000 female offend- ers housed in prisons in the United States. This does not include the approximate 1,061,000 women on probation and parole identified in a 2017 report by the Prison Policy Initiative. So, when one looks at the total population of almost 1,300,000 women under correctional supervi- sion, an argument could be asked: did the editors seek out the worst

“Inside This Place, Not of It: Narratives from Women’s Prisons” Compiled and edited by Robin Levy and Ayelet Waldman, Verso, Brooklyn, NY, (2017), 301 pp. Reviewed by Art Beeler, Senior

Lecturing Fellow at Duke Law and Adjunct Professor at North Carolina Central University.

When doing a book review for ACA or another publisher, I try to read the book twice, once for general content and the second time for nuances. This review of “Inside This Place, Not of It: Narratives from Women’s Prisons” was one of the more difficult reviews I have written because of my bias as a correctional administrator. When I read the book for the first time for content, I was upset, saying, “Here we go again, a book edited by those who know little of the world of prisons.” I took that view until I remembered the five wom- en at an institution I supervised who were mentally ill and sexually abused by a correctional officer long before

52 — March/April 2019 Corrections Today