Cops & Courts

It’s early. About 5 in the morning and I’m heading south on Highway 5 toward Corcoran, a farming town of about 24,000 people. However, that population count is misleading. About half of the people living in Corcoran are locked up in two of the state’s largest prisons just south of downtown.

Nancy Mullane takes a tour of the Protective Housing Unit at Corcoran Sate Prison; Dispatches from the Inside: Expectations, regulations and the realities of parole; and local Journey cover-band Evolution.

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As a prisoner, I am often reminded that the CDCR requires me to follow its rules. That’s understandable, rules and regulations ensure that operations run safely and smoothly. When an inmate can’t or won’t follow the rules, negative consequences are triggered to urge him or her to do so in the future. But what happens when the CDCR doesn’t follow its own rules? Where are the negative consequences to them? Apparently there are none. But there are negative consequences to inmates, and to the community, when the Department of Corrections can’t follow its own rules. Let me explain.