Deaths at the Smithfield
Prison Ignored By the
Prison Society
By: Janice Carlisle
The Smithfield prison in Central
Pennsylvania has developed an evil reputation for abuse of
prisoners. Physical, psychological and other tactics are used to torment, torture and abuse prisoners.
That's especially the case for prisoners in the prison hole.
The Smithfield prison administration not only condones the abuses, but seems actually to instigate and encourage them. Most persons who seek employment in the imprisonment industry are viciously cruel, even psychotic. They are NOT good people. There have been a number of extremely suspicious deaths at the Smithfield prison. The deaths have, of course, been covered-up. The Pennsylvania Department of Imprisonment characterizes the deaths as "suicides." They may just as likely be murders. In any event, the deaths are directly linked to the staff's abusive conduct and to the administration's encouragement of the abuses. We have troubling information from Leonna Brandao, a conscious activist, and several of her correspondence about conditions at the prison and about the Pennsylvania Prison Society. The Pennsylvania Prison Society is a state chartered not-for-profit corporation. Its mission is (or at least its mission was to monitor Pennsylvania's horrific prison system and try to keep it humane. In order to accomplish that end, the Society employs a few dozen volunteers. At their own expense, the volunteers visit prisoners. Their duty is supposedly to find out what's going on and to help where they can. In theory, at least, it's a dandy idea. In reality, the Prison Society is failing to perform its mission! It doesn't protect or help prisoners. What's far worse, the Prison Society is in bed with the Department of Imprisonment. It actively participates in prison abuses. It actively covers-up prison abuses. It's getting paid off as a contractor for the Department of Imprisonment. The Pennsylvania Prison Society has become a shameless collaborator in prison abuses and mismanagement. Its nonprofit disguise has been scrapped. Half the Society's budget is tax money paid out to it by the prison system. These payoffs ensure that the Society doesn't cause any trouble for prison bosses. John Hargreaves, the so-called "Director of Volunteers" for the Prison Socitey has the job of keeping the volunteers in line. He censors, stifles and keeps them toeing the Prison Society's line. Many of the volunteers are just ordinary folks. They sincerely believe that they're in it to help prisoners and make the prisons more safe and decent. The volunteers haven't yet figured out that all of that is just a pretense. In reality, the Prison Society is the private fief of Hargreaves and his cronies. It's a game they play to make themselves feel as if their doing something "good." It's a pretense of decency where the members of the Society congratulate themselves and admire themselves. Prisoners aren't really helped or protected. Prisoners are simply used as fodder to feed the egos of the Society's social big-shots and phony do-gooders. As we've reported several times, John Hargreaves and his cronies have repeatedly retaliated against Society volunteers. Where a volunteer, usually a conscientious, self-sacrificing woman, actually tries to help prisoners, the Society punishes the volunteer by expelling her. Typically, Hargreaves, acting for the snobbishly, dishonest Pennsylvania Prison Society, tells the hard-working volunteer that her actions are "inimical to the best interests of the Prison Society." The term "inimical" (meaning "hostile") is misused in an effort to make the volunteer recognize the kind of social snobs she's dealing with. What Hargreaves seems to mean is that the volunteer might interfere with the Society's profits and/or its intimate friendship with prison bosses. There's no question that the Prison Society is completely aware of the deaths at the Smithfield prison. The only action the Society has taken is to protect its own profits. For the Pennsylvania Prison Society, where money conflicts with prisoners' suicides/murders, let the prisoners die!
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