7 ms·

> If you refused to work, you were put in the box and 5 days were added to your sentence. Don't you need a judge to determine that?

by 77pt77 9y ago

bbctol 9y ago
Prisons have a certain amount of gaintime (small reductions in sentencing) that's there to be withheld at the prison's discretion, specifically in order to motivate work and good behavior.
kodt 9y ago
They aren't actually adding anything to your sentence, but are just taking away 'gain time' that has been earned for good behavior. You can accrue gain time and eventually earn early release. However, they can also take this away for bad behavior. Obviously some sentences are not eligible to earn gain time.
pixl97 9y ago
That depends on what 'added' means. The sentence you receive from a judge is probably not anywhere close to what you will actually sit in jail for. Probation, parole, double time, triple time, good behavior, trustee status, all affect the outcome. For example, you are sentenced to 3 years of jail for a non-violent drug offense. How long do you serve in jail? Very commonly 366 days, though it may be as much as a year and a half. That is if you don't get into any other trouble in jail. After that point you will be released on probation. What the previous poster is likely stating is that if you willingly agree to be a slave for the state you get all the benefits of early release. The defectors that do not want to be slave labor are not given said benefits. An ironic application of the prisoners delma. If none of the prisoners would be willing to be a slave, the state could not hold them all, or 'extend' their sentences because of overcrowding.
- cubano 9y ago
  > For example, you are sentenced to 3 years of jail for a non-violent drug offense. How long do you serve in jail? You don't get 3 years in jail, you get 3 years in prison. The only jail time you do waiting to be sentenced to prison is the time you wait to go to court. You get no gain time for time spent in jail for your prison sentence, so its often called dead time or day-for-day or something. >An ironic application of the prisoners delma. If none of the prisoners would be willing to be a slave, the state could not hold them all, or 'extend' their sentences because of overcrowding. This is an interesting observation, but here is how thats dealt with; anyone whom discusses a general purpose strike against working is charged with a serious felony "inciting to riot" and is given an "outside charge" and is probably spending years more in prison. That's how they do that.
  - throwaway040435 9y ago
    You don't get 3 years in jail, you get 3 years in prison. The only jail time you do waiting to be sentenced to prison is the time you wait to go to court. Do you think it's appropriate to call out someone for using "jail" instead of "prison", when the meaning is clear, and you made the same mistake just 5 minutes prior? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14497654 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14497654 and in your original post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14496609 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14496609
    - sbov 9y ago
      It wasn't clear for all of us. It would be nice of the OP to change "jail" to "prison" if that's what they meant.
      - pixl97 9y ago
        The definition between a jail and a prison is very much depends on what state you are in. For example in Texas, you've sat in jail for 6 month and receive a 1 year sentence, you will not be sent to prison, you will remain in the jail for the next 6 months. You can remain in 'jail' for years sometimes before being sent to a prison facility, even after sentencing.
      - anigbrowl 9y ago
        In the USA, sentences of less than 1 year are misdemeanors and can be served in a jail. Sentences of longer than 1 year are felonies and are served in prison. Jails are operated under authority of the county in which they are located, prisons under the authority of state or federal government. This is obviously a summary rather than an exhaustive definition.
    - cubano 9y ago
      No I most definitely did not make a mistake. Yes CCDC aka Clark County Detention Center (aka Las Vegas County Jail) is a jail in downtown Las Vegas where I did my kitchen slave labor recently on a 90-day sentence for basically jaywalking. If I were to be sentenced for more then a year, I would have been sent to a prison somewhere in the boonies of Nevada away from Vegas. The OP discussed a "3-year jail sentence", and I simply explained that would not be possible as jail and prison are significantly different institutions with very different implications. I don't think I am wrong to continually express the difference between the two.
logfromblammo 9y ago
It might be that your actual sentence is 10 years, but the state may expect to send you to prison for the first 5 and have you live on probation or parole restrictions for the last 5. So the judge might tell you to serve 8 years in prison. That gives the state some years of leeway to both add time to your prison sentence for being difficult and to knock some off for being cooperative. No matter which way you slice it, the sentence is still 10 years, and the state can decide how much of that is spent in prison, and how much outside as a less-than-entirely-free person. If you can manage to serve your entire sentence in prison without actually committing additional crimes, you might be able to walk out the front gates and never have a single day of probation, but I put the likelihood of that ever happening at just above infinitesimal. People in prison would mostly rather be outside and on parole/probation. You only need a judge's help to keep someone in prison past the actual length of their sentence. IANAL and IHNBAP, so I may be up to 100% wrong about this.
hackermailman 9y ago
It's called 'good time', which you earn as credits for early release. If you refuse to work you get written up and subtracted good time which means time added to expected release date. These disciplinary writeups affect parole potential as well. The kitchen is also considered one of the better jobs, a bad job would be Hoe Squad, which means a chain gang led out into 35C heat to work the fields while guys on horseback yell at you to work faster. The best skill you can have in most prisons is plumbing/home renovation knowledge, as it's common for one of the guards or warden to have you fix their houses in exchange for a restaurant meal on the way back to the prison. If you work well you will be contracted out F/T to the local town and the guards/warden pocket 90% of your salary.
- samstave 9y ago
  >The best skill you can have in most prisons is plumbing/home renovation knowledge, as it's common for one of the guards or warden to have you fix their houses in exchange for a restaurant meal on the way back to the prison. If you work well you will be contracted out F/T to the local town and the guards/warden pocket 90% of your salary. Is there any documented evidence of this happening? EDIT: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/prison-labor-in-america/406177/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/prison-... http://www.motherjones.com/crime-justice/2015/06/private-prisons-profit/ http://www.motherjones.com/crime-justice/2015/06/private-pri... http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/06/cca-private-prisons-corrections-corporation-inmates-investigation-bauer/ http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/06/cca-private-pris...
  - fnordfnordfnord 9y ago
    I worked for TDCJ for a couple years, there were plenty of strange and sometimes salacious scandals. They often failed to make the news. That being said, no CO that I knew wanted inmates to know where they live. I only know of one case of a prison officer taking an inmate to their own home, and that was rumored to have been for sex. That doesn't mean a thing didn't happen though. CO's and other prison folks are very insular, and don't usually discuss things outside their tribe (well, not current affairs anyway). There is limited on-unit housing for officers, and inmates are responsible for maintenance of those. It is not unheard of for inmate work-crew supervisors (officers) to buy their workers a hamburger or take-out meal; this is usually during or after a shift of unusual duration or a situation that deserves a little recognition. There are special cases. My grandfather, a county sheriff, was granted custody of a TDCJ inmate by the director. The inmate worked as a porter in the county jail, and occasionally was my babysitter for short periods of time. This was in the '70's.
cubano 9y ago
CCDC gives approx 10 days a month gain time to all sentenced inmates regardless of if you work or not. Actually working for the jail only provides you the opportunity to LOSE gain time, not get more. If you refuse to work, you get up to 15 days in solitary confinement (the box, or I simply call it "jail" because its actually jail inside of jail) and lose 5 days of gain time, thus adding 5 days to your sentence. However, it does not end there...one of the CO's that worked security in the kitchen often threatened to contact your sentencing judge and ask for extra time for screwing up in the kitchen.

> If you refused to work, you were put in the box and 5 days were added to your sentence. Don't you need a judge to determine that?

by 77pt77 9y ago

> If you refused to work, you were put in the box and 5 days were added to your sentence. Don't you need a judge to determine that?

bbctol 9y ago

Prisons have a certain amount of gaintime (small reductions in sentencing) that's there to be withheld at the prison's discretion, specifically in order to motivate work and good behavior.

kodt 9y ago

They aren't actually adding anything to your sentence, but are just taking away 'gain time' that has been earned for good behavior. You can accrue gain time and eventually earn early release. However, they can also take this away for bad behavior. Obviously some sentences are not eligible to earn gain time.

pixl97 9y ago

That depends on what 'added' means. The sentence you receive from a judge is probably not anywhere close to what you will actually sit in jail for. Probation, parole, double time, triple time, good behavior, trustee status, all affect the outcome. For example, you are sentenced to 3 years of jail for a non-violent drug offense. How long do you serve in jail? Very commonly 366 days, though it may be as much as a year and a half. That is if you don't get into any other trouble in jail. After that point you will be released on probation. What the previous poster is likely stating is that if you willingly agree to be a slave for the state you get all the benefits of early release. The defectors that do not want to be slave labor are not given said benefits. An ironic application of the prisoners delma. If none of the prisoners would be willing to be a slave, the state could not hold them all, or 'extend' their sentences because of overcrowding.

cubano 9y ago
> For example, you are sentenced to 3 years of jail for a non-violent drug offense. How long do you serve in jail? You don't get 3 years in jail, you get 3 years in prison. The only jail time you do waiting to be sentenced to prison is the time you wait to go to court. You get no gain time for time spent in jail for your prison sentence, so its often called dead time or day-for-day or something. >An ironic application of the prisoners delma. If none of the prisoners would be willing to be a slave, the state could not hold them all, or 'extend' their sentences because of overcrowding. This is an interesting observation, but here is how thats dealt with; anyone whom discusses a general purpose strike against working is charged with a serious felony "inciting to riot" and is given an "outside charge" and is probably spending years more in prison. That's how they do that.
- throwaway040435 9y ago
  You don't get 3 years in jail, you get 3 years in prison. The only jail time you do waiting to be sentenced to prison is the time you wait to go to court. Do you think it's appropriate to call out someone for using "jail" instead of "prison", when the meaning is clear, and you made the same mistake just 5 minutes prior? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14497654 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14497654 and in your original post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14496609 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14496609
  - sbov 9y ago
    It wasn't clear for all of us. It would be nice of the OP to change "jail" to "prison" if that's what they meant.
    - pixl97 9y ago
      The definition between a jail and a prison is very much depends on what state you are in. For example in Texas, you've sat in jail for 6 month and receive a 1 year sentence, you will not be sent to prison, you will remain in the jail for the next 6 months. You can remain in 'jail' for years sometimes before being sent to a prison facility, even after sentencing.
    - anigbrowl 9y ago
      In the USA, sentences of less than 1 year are misdemeanors and can be served in a jail. Sentences of longer than 1 year are felonies and are served in prison. Jails are operated under authority of the county in which they are located, prisons under the authority of state or federal government. This is obviously a summary rather than an exhaustive definition.
  - cubano 9y ago
    No I most definitely did not make a mistake. Yes CCDC aka Clark County Detention Center (aka Las Vegas County Jail) is a jail in downtown Las Vegas where I did my kitchen slave labor recently on a 90-day sentence for basically jaywalking. If I were to be sentenced for more then a year, I would have been sent to a prison somewhere in the boonies of Nevada away from Vegas. The OP discussed a "3-year jail sentence", and I simply explained that would not be possible as jail and prison are significantly different institutions with very different implications. I don't think I am wrong to continually express the difference between the two.

logfromblammo 9y ago

It might be that your actual sentence is 10 years, but the state may expect to send you to prison for the first 5 and have you live on probation or parole restrictions for the last 5. So the judge might tell you to serve 8 years in prison. That gives the state some years of leeway to both add time to your prison sentence for being difficult and to knock some off for being cooperative. No matter which way you slice it, the sentence is still 10 years, and the state can decide how much of that is spent in prison, and how much outside as a less-than-entirely-free person. If you can manage to serve your entire sentence in prison without actually committing additional crimes, you might be able to walk out the front gates and never have a single day of probation, but I put the likelihood of that ever happening at just above infinitesimal. People in prison would mostly rather be outside and on parole/probation. You only need a judge's help to keep someone in prison past the actual length of their sentence. IANAL and IHNBAP, so I may be up to 100% wrong about this.

hackermailman 9y ago

It's called 'good time', which you earn as credits for early release. If you refuse to work you get written up and subtracted good time which means time added to expected release date. These disciplinary writeups affect parole potential as well. The kitchen is also considered one of the better jobs, a bad job would be Hoe Squad, which means a chain gang led out into 35C heat to work the fields while guys on horseback yell at you to work faster. The best skill you can have in most prisons is plumbing/home renovation knowledge, as it's common for one of the guards or warden to have you fix their houses in exchange for a restaurant meal on the way back to the prison. If you work well you will be contracted out F/T to the local town and the guards/warden pocket 90% of your salary.

samstave 9y ago
>The best skill you can have in most prisons is plumbing/home renovation knowledge, as it's common for one of the guards or warden to have you fix their houses in exchange for a restaurant meal on the way back to the prison. If you work well you will be contracted out F/T to the local town and the guards/warden pocket 90% of your salary. Is there any documented evidence of this happening? EDIT: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/prison-labor-in-america/406177/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/prison-... http://www.motherjones.com/crime-justice/2015/06/private-prisons-profit/ http://www.motherjones.com/crime-justice/2015/06/private-pri... http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/06/cca-private-prisons-corrections-corporation-inmates-investigation-bauer/ http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/06/cca-private-pris...
- fnordfnordfnord 9y ago
  I worked for TDCJ for a couple years, there were plenty of strange and sometimes salacious scandals. They often failed to make the news. That being said, no CO that I knew wanted inmates to know where they live. I only know of one case of a prison officer taking an inmate to their own home, and that was rumored to have been for sex. That doesn't mean a thing didn't happen though. CO's and other prison folks are very insular, and don't usually discuss things outside their tribe (well, not current affairs anyway). There is limited on-unit housing for officers, and inmates are responsible for maintenance of those. It is not unheard of for inmate work-crew supervisors (officers) to buy their workers a hamburger or take-out meal; this is usually during or after a shift of unusual duration or a situation that deserves a little recognition. There are special cases. My grandfather, a county sheriff, was granted custody of a TDCJ inmate by the director. The inmate worked as a porter in the county jail, and occasionally was my babysitter for short periods of time. This was in the '70's.

cubano 9y ago

CCDC gives approx 10 days a month gain time to all sentenced inmates regardless of if you work or not. Actually working for the jail only provides you the opportunity to LOSE gain time, not get more. If you refuse to work, you get up to 15 days in solitary confinement (the box, or I simply call it "jail" because its actually jail inside of jail) and lose 5 days of gain time, thus adding 5 days to your sentence. However, it does not end there...one of the CO's that worked security in the kitchen often threatened to contact your sentencing judge and ask for extra time for screwing up in the kitchen.