Prison Visits
One of the most important things for a prisoner is to receive visits from family and friends. It is widely recognized as being beneficial as it is known to reduce recidivism, keep moral high, and helps to maintain family and community ties. The benefits extend to all, to include the prison staff, the community, the prisoners’ family, and the prisoner. Visitation is vital for the prisoner to help maintain his or her humanity. Unfortunately, in the Federal Bureau of Prisons, prisoners are often housed far from home where it can make visitation very prohibitive or nearly impossible for many of the prisoners’ families to make the trip. The BOP’s policy says that an inmate should be housed within 500 miles of their release address, but in practice it is all too common for prisoners to be housed much farther than that and in many cases they may be housed clear across the country thousands of miles away from home. There are many reasons for this which I will not get into here, but the fact remains that there are many people for different reasons that don’t have the privilege of getting a visit.
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Several years ago I happened to be one of those unfortunate people who did not receive many visitations. That is until I heard about Prisoner Visitation and Support (PVS). I found out that it was a service provided to inmates who were in my exact predicament. I got the address and wrote to their main office in Philadelphia. Then one unexpected day I was called to the visiting room. As I said, visiting is an important thing and it is treated with respect by all prisoners, both for the event and for the person or persons that most likely had to travel some distance and jump through hoops to come see us. We want to look our best so we wear our best pressed uniforms, nicest shoes, and maybe even put some cologne on. Its almost like getting ready for church or a night out on the town. For those who are expecting the visit many will go to the barbershop the night before to get a fresh haircut. On this day, since the visit was unexpected, I didn’t get a haircut but I did put gel in my hair, put on my good uniform, and polished my shoes.
As I was walking to the visiting room I felt a little jittery. I was a bit nervous and didn’t know what to expect and I didn’t know if I would be “judged”. Arriving at the visiting room and going through the procedure of getting inside I was then directed to a chair where I was greeted most warmly by a gentleman who introduced himself as “Dan”. Dan is a tall man, short well groomed hair, a graying beard, glasses, and dressed casually. We shook hands and I told him my name. All of my anxiety had melted away. I could instantly tell that the man that stood before me was warm, kind, sincere, and genuine. We sat down and started to talk. There were no intrusive questions or judgment. Just two guys having a friendly conversation.
Dan has been visiting me for several years now and I look forward to every visit. What Dan does for me I could never repay, what Dan brings with him is a little bit of the outside world. For the time we sit together all the walls and razor wire melt away. Just two friends drinking soft drinks and talking about life, family, current events, and the future. For those precious few hours I am no longer in prison because the outside free world was brought to me. Its interesting to see how profoundly different we are treated by PVS volunteers as opposed to our regular interaction with prison staff. Generally staff creates an environment of “us v. them” and no matter how subtle there is always that tension, always that sense of division. They are the “law enforcement” and we the “criminals” like a perpetual childhood game of cops and robbers. On the other hand, the PVS volunteers treat us as who we are, human.
Through the years I’ve had the pleasure of meeting several of the other volunteers from PVS, all equally warm and friendly. It’s an honor to have met all of them. If you know of a Federal or Military prisoner who are not receiving visits and you think they may benefit from them please contact PVS at https://www.prisonervisitation.org/.
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