Governor Rauner wrote an opinion piece in the Oct. 14th edition of the Chicago Sun Times newspaper entitled “In the name of justice, I’m shutting down F House.” The Governor’s piece was a scathing critique of the Criminal Justice System in Illinois saying, “Once offenders enter our criminal justice system, they experience a process that is out of date, costly, inhumane and ineffective.” He also stated that, “It doesn’t work for taxpayers, it doesn’t work for our employees, and it doesn’t work for offenders.”
The Prisoner’s Exchange applauds the Governor for having the political fortitude and integrity to give the public an honest account of the state of justice in Illinois. The Governor also has plans to open two adult facilities in Kewanee and Murphysboro. Both were previously juvenile facilities, but former Governor Ryan closed them during his term in office. Those facilities will now focus on re-entry by providing programs that will offer job training and life skills classes.
Governor Rauner is proving himself to be serious about reforming the criminal justice system in IDOC. Hopefully Democrats will take heed and, instead of taking for granted the blind loyalty of the minority vote, they will give the governor the support he needs to achieve his mission of reducing the Illinois prison population by 25% over the next 10 years. Closing F House has received headlines, in my opinion, because historically it was the frontline of battle for control in IDOC. Over the last two decades, F House had become an asylum. Most recently, F House was used for segregation, orientation, parole violators, court writs, and prison overflow. IDOC had doubled the occupancy limits by stacking two beds in cells designed for one. The prison also adopted the practice of housing mentally ill prisoners there and offering little to no treatment. As a result, the mentally ill men would yell, throw urine and feces and harm themselves along with other prisoners.
Much respect to the Governor for closing down the IDOC Blacksite. There will be more to come on this issue in part 2 of this series.
Leave a Reply