U.S. GAOL RIOTS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 173, 23 July 1936, Page 19

U.S. GAOL RIOTS.

"BEASTLY FOOD." BLAME BY SOCIAL WORKER. " ! CORRUPT BOARDS AXSO CITED. i (By a Special Correspondent.) KAXSAS CITY, MO., June 20. A thousand good, cooks are needed to put down tie riots in American prisons. Take that from James Parsons, natitonal superintendent of the Society for the Friendless, who has, in 28 years of social work, interviewed 30,000 convicts, and should know what they think about. James Parsons cites " beastly food " as the 2vo. 1 cause of prison outbreaks and disorders, but he names others that he feels are almost equally important:— Failure to segregate the desperate, depraved and cunning prisoners from the more or less " accidental" and harmJess inmates. Lack of intelligence in prison administration, where politics dictate appointments of prison officials, or where low pay and long hours prevent getting high type men as guards.

Unjustifiably long sentences, imposed by judges to appease public furore, and indefensibly ehort sentences for those criminals who have smart lawyers or ' influence."

Corrupt pardon or parole boards. However, when you are sitting across ile table from James Parsons —all six feet two of him—you are, in some strange manner, more intrigued by what ke is than by his carefully-phrased comments on American crime and the American criminal.

Here is a man who lias heard 30,000 convicts pour out their life stories to him, but who has neither the lire of the reformer nor the tear of the sentimentalist in his ere. These deepset grey-blue eyes reassure you that James Parsons is not one of those who, 'G"-Alan Hoover said, ''Built beautiful stories about the sweet, dear convicts." Finds Convicts a Decent Lot. Parsons, still hustling with energy and bubbling with enthusiasm a t ~i3, is no pessimist.- He admits, quite ■heartily, that he has found convicts a pretty decent lot, but does not contradict Hoover's claim that there are plenty of tough convicts who do get out prison too early and too easily.

'"The trouble with Hoover," he says, "is that he generalises. And you cannot generalise. There is no such thing as a criminal class or a criminal type. There are downright cussed men who have Uo intention or desire to be anything hut bad. But there are other thousands in our prisons who are more or less 'accidental' criminals. They met temptations that were greater than you or I have ever faced, and were not strong enough to resist them. There are men and women who are mentally and morally feeble, who would get on well enough if they had the barest necessities of life, but who cannot earn even that much honestly. There are men and "«'omen who cannot resist liquor or dope, ■and who do crazy thing 3 under theil influence. There are stubborn men who simply refuse to abide by laws they consider unjust. There are shrewd men

and there are desperate men. There are men who love or hato too fiercely. "You can't treat them all alike. Each deserves to be punished and to bo given his chance to reform on the basis of his own ability to adjust himself to society and its laws." Should Be Free of Politics. Does he think parole. systems are too lenient? "It all depends on what kind of men you have on your parole board. They should be intelligent men. They should be fair. Most of all, they should be completely removed from the least shadow of politics. If any man can get out of prison a day earlier because of his political influence, then the board is rotten, society is being sold out, and every other man in that prison is being embittered. "It would be interesting to find out liow many prison riots and prison breaks have resulted from just such political favouritism in granting paroles." Public agitation over the parole question may be both good and bad, he adds. Good because it will tend to restrict corruption, bad because it may restrict paroles where they are justified. "The danger is/' he says, "that parole boards' may deny paroles to men who deserve them simply to avoid public uproar. "Some people seem to be under the misapprehension that parole is merely a method of shortening the time a convict serves in prison. As a fact, Government figures show that under the parole system men are serving longer terms in prison for the same offences. Probably one reason is that legislatures provide and judges pronounce longer sentences when they know parole is possible. "We have to recognise that the parole system is the best method yet devised to readjust men and get them started on the right path after they get out of prison, Every prisoner ought to be on parole for a while before lie is finally released.

"Any real parole system requires that the parolee must work steadily and account for everything he spends. It requires him to report regularly to a parole officer, who also gets reports from his employer and his family. He may not drink. Ha may not leave the State without permission. Even a minor offence against the law is a basis for revoking the parole and sending him back to serve the last day and hour of his sentence in prison. "The real crook doesn't want parole. He doesn't want any strings tied to him.

"Qf course, when some chap is arrested for a serious crime and it is discovered that he has been paroled, sometimes two or three Times, it looks bad. It may prove that some parole board, honestly or dishonestly, made a mistake. It may prove that we need better parole boards. But it doesn't prove that the parole system is not sound." —(X.A.N. A.)