美国国家公共电台 NPR A New Approach To Incarceration In The U.S.: Responsibility

 

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST:

Here's a depressing statistic¹. In Massachusetts, over half of all young adult men released from jails and prisons go back within three years. The state's largest county wants to disrupt that cycle. A few months ago, it adopted a new approach, teaching responsibility. As Cristina Quinn of member station WGBH reports, the more responsibility inmates² learn, the greater freedom they can earn.

CRISTINA QUINN, BYLINE³: On the top floor of the Middlesex House of Correction and Jail in Billerica, Mass., there is a barbershop, a library, even a meditation⁴ room.

This is the PACT⁵ unit. It stands for People Achieving Change Together. It's designed specifically for 18- to 24-year-olds who want to make sure this is the last time they are here, like 22-year-old Eric Darden.

ERIC DARDEN: I want to just kind of break the cycle and try to strive to be better, instead of coming back.

QUINN: He's finishing up a two-year sentence for armed robbery and assault and battery. Besides having a cell all to himself he says the atmosphere in the PACT unit is distinctly different from the rest of the jail. In his last cell block, he'd always been on guard. But here...

DARDEN: You don't have to worry about looking over your back. You have a situation. You can talk about it instead of, like, someone trying to hype it up.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Sixteen. I have, like, a list, and I just don't want to...

QUINN: In the PACT unit, the unspoken rules of jail politics fall by the wayside. Inmates and corrections officers have a more relaxed relationship. But the idea of putting all these young guys in one block was something Assistant Deputy Superintendent⁶ Scot Chaput initially⁷ didn't want to do.

SCOT CHAPUT: I thought they were totally crazy. Most of our discipline is with that age group, right? The fighting, just refusing to do things.

QUINN: That crazy idea is something Middlesex County sheriff Peter Koutoujian wanted to try. He's tired of seeing the same people cycle in and out of his jail.

PETER KOUTOUJIAN: Everything about this unit is designed in a way to prepare them for re-entry by giving them some of the skill sets that they didn't have and some of the introspection that they never had.

QUINN: They do that by attending mandatory⁸ anger management meetings, sessions with therapists and consistently reporting to work or class. All of them had to apply to be here. This approach is motivated by scientific research. Studies show brain development continues into the mid-20s meaning programs like these can make a big difference in rehabilitation⁹.

KOUTOUJIAN: For these young men, who are in a very significant part of their lives where change can be profound. You need to make sure that you're replicating¹⁰ what life will be on the outside, otherwise they'll never be able to re-engage.

QUINN: That means more phone privileges and face-to-face visits with family, if they stick to the program. The sheriff's office partnered with the Vera Institute of Justice, a research and reform group. They looked to Germany's prison system, a leader in prioritizing rehabilitation and re-socialization. It's a departure for US prisons.

ALEX FRANK: It's different. It's uncomfortable. It might feel like a risk.

QUINN: The Vera Institute's Alex Frank is one of the key players in helping¹¹ prisoners take that risk.

FRANK: At this juncture¹² in the US, I think it's a leap that more and more systems are willing to take.

QUINN: In Bristol County, Mass., Sheriff Thomas Hodgson is known for his stricter approach. He thinks we're not addressing the main problem, preventing at-risk youth from getting into trouble in the first place.

THOMAS HODGSON: I think it's great that this experimental unit is being tried. But I believe if we want to stop this cycle of recidivism¹³ and increased dysfunction and people coming to jail, it takes a lot more time to change people who are so far down the road.

QUINN: Connecticut launched the nation's first young adult unit over a year ago. There have been no reports of any fights since it opened. So they're launching two more, including one at a women's prison. Seven other jurisdictions¹⁴ across the country also want in and are now on the Vera Institute's waiting list. For NPR News, I'm Cristina Quinn in Billerica, Mass.

1 statistic   

n.统计量；adj.统计的，统计学的

参考例句：

• Official statistics show real wages declining by 24%.官方统计数字表明实际工资下降了24%。
• There are no reliable statistics for the number of deaths in the battle.关于阵亡人数没有可靠的统计数字。

2 inmates   

n.囚犯( inmate的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• One of the inmates has escaped. 被收容的人中有一个逃跑了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The inmates were moved to an undisclosed location. 监狱里的囚犯被转移到一个秘密处所。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

4 meditation   

n.熟虑，（尤指宗教的）默想，沉思，（pl.）冥想录

参考例句：

• This peaceful garden lends itself to meditation.这个恬静的花园适于冥想。
• I'm sorry to interrupt your meditation.很抱歉，我打断了你的沉思。

5 pact   

n.合同，条约，公约，协定

参考例句：

• The two opposition parties made an electoral pact.那两个反对党订了一个有关选举的协定。
• The trade pact between those two countries came to an end.那两国的通商协定宣告结束。

6 superintendent   

n.监督人，主管，总监；(英国)警务长

参考例句：

• He was soon promoted to the post of superintendent of Foreign Trade.他很快就被擢升为对外贸易总监。
• He decided to call the superintendent of the building.他决定给楼房管理员打电话。

7 initially   

adv.最初，开始

参考例句：

• The ban was initially opposed by the US.这一禁令首先遭到美国的反对。
• Feathers initially developed from insect scales.羽毛最初由昆虫的翅瓣演化而来。

8 mandatory   

adj.命令的；强制的；义务的；n.受托者

参考例句：

• It's mandatory to pay taxes.缴税是义务性的。
• There is no mandatory paid annual leave in the U.S.美国没有强制带薪年假。

9 rehabilitation   

n.康复，悔过自新，修复，复兴，复职，复位

参考例句：

• He's booked himself into a rehabilitation clinic.他自己联系了一家康复诊所。
• No one can really make me rehabilitation of injuries.已经没有人可以真正令我的伤康复了。

10 replicating   

复制( replicate的现在分词 )； 重复； 再造； 再生

参考例句：

• Applications create these partitions for storing and replicating data. 应用程序创建这些分区用来储存和复制数据。
• The closest real things to these creatures were bits of self-replicating RNA. 最贴近这些造物的实物是能做一点微不足道的自复制的核糖核酸。

11 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

12 juncture   

n.时刻，关键时刻，紧要关头

参考例句：

• The project is situated at the juncture of the new and old urban districts.该项目位于新老城区交界处。
• It is very difficult at this juncture to predict the company's future.此时很难预料公司的前景。

13 recidivism   

n.累犯，再犯

参考例句：

• Many areas and work units have experienced no recidivism at all for as long as ten or more years.不少地区和单位出现了连续几年、十几年没有发生重新犯罪的好典型。
• It needs to supplement the personality factor to confirm the ordinary recidivism.在普通累犯成立的条件中,应增加罪犯的人格因素。

14 jurisdictions   

司法权( jurisdiction的名词复数 )； 裁判权； 管辖区域； 管辖范围

参考例句：

• Butler entreated him to remember the act abolishing the heritable jurisdictions. 巴特勒提醒他注意废除世袭审判权的国会法令。
• James I personally adjudicated between the two jurisdictions. 詹姆士一世亲自裁定双方纠纷。