“I Came to Prison to Do My Time — Not to Get Raped”: Coping Within the Institutional Setting

ABSTRACT

The War on Drugs has yielded a significant growth in the United States prison population, particularly for women. A substantial percentage of women involved in the criminal justice system have a substance use disorder, have committed their crimes for drug money, or were convicted of a drug-related felony. Many drug-involved women enter prison with histories of sexual/physical assault and may be subjected to further victimization within the institution. Although staff sexual misconduct within women's prisons has been established, there has been little attention to its effects on the mental health of incarcerated women or the ways in which women cope with such abuse within the confines of prison. We constructed case narratives from secondary data collected as part of an investigation and later used in a class action lawsuit, thus allowing the women to portray their experiences and choice of coping strategies in their own ‘voices.’ We found that women often made active and calculated decisions to comply with the officers' demands for sex, usually without engaging in a grievance process. Although this ‘compliant’ behavior may be interpreted as passive, and perhaps consensual to the officers seeking sex, it reflects careful planning toward the greatest degree of safety—discharge from prison.

Notes

Note. M = Monica (Case 1); R = Rhonda (Case 2): J = June (Case 3).

Among these reasons is protection of the women who may share information and continue to be subjected to incarceration. Therefore, we could not in good conscience complete a Human Subjects Investigation Committee application knowing that we could not protect the women who participated in such a study.

Names have been changed to protect anonymity.