21. July 2005

USA

bericht über einen knast für menschen über 55.

Peaceful prison

Inmates over 55 can finish serving their time planting flowers or vegetables, reading or making crafts at the Central New Mexico Correctional Facility's geriatric unitLOS LUNAS - Joe Romero shakes as he rises from his motorized wheelchair, shuffles stoop-shouldered to a small patch of garden and scoots away a jumble of leafy vines to reveal a beefy watermelon as big as his head and as green as his prison jumpsuit.

"That's going to be my baby," he says, his eyes shooting here and there to make sure none of the other inmates in the state's only prison geriatric unit have spotted his horticultural prize.There is little honor among thieves, even among the 38 oldest and frailest ones who are incarcerated in the Central New Mexico Correctional Facility's geriatric unit in Los Lunas until their long sentences or their long lives end.

"It's a problem among ourselves. No one wants to admit to stealing tomatoes and such," Romero, 68, says. "But it happens."Romero suffers from Parkinson's disease and, by his estimation, takes $1,300 worth of medication a day paid for by the state. His advanced age and failing health are the reasons he is housed in this mid-level security unit off the main Los Lunas prison and across from its medical and mental health facilities.

Here, in what is not so lovingly referred to as Jurassic Park, inmates 55 and older are free to roam within its confines, living out their sunset days in a modicum of peace away from the younger, angrier inmates who would prey on them in the regular prison.The aging of baby boomer criminals and the eradication of the "good-time" sentencing laws in 1999 have brought about a gradual change in the way New Mexico deals with its senior citizen inmates.

In New Mexico, 431 inmates are 55 or older. That's nearly 7 percent of all male and female prison inmates, according to 2004 state Department of Corrections statistics.

Women, only a small fraction of elderly prisoners, have no separate facility. Men have Jurassic Park."There are benefits for grouping ages together like this, both for their safety and our ease in handling their medical needs," said James Van Loan, unit manager. "All studies show that with age comes an aging out of the criminal process. They just get tired of prison. They just want a place to serve their time and get out."

A breakdown of costs per inmate in the geriatric unit was unavailable. Department of Corrections spokeswoman Tia Bland said the average cost per day for an inmate in the entire Los Lunas system is $96.23, or $35,125 per year.Medical and psychiatric care for inmates in Los Lunas costs an average $11.80 per inmate per day, not much less than the estimated $12 it costs to similarly cover an inmate in the geriatric unit, Bland said.

"We believe the unit is very cost-effective just in the sense that the unit is right next door to our medical facility," she said.The Los Lunas facilities hold an average of 1,305 inmates, including those in the geriatric unit.Since the unit opened two years ago, it has remained at or near its 39-bed capacity.Preparations are under way to add a fourth barrack with 14 more beds and a separate trailer to hold religious and education services.

Because it sits on the outer rim of the Los Lunas prison near an empty expanse of ragged desert inmates call "No Man's Land," the unit can continue to expand as needed.Save for the razor wire spiraling along the tall chain-link fence, one might mistake Jurassic Park for a low-rent retirement home.Even on razor wire, a hummingbird feeder hangs."It's the best place I know of," says Romero, halfway into a four-year sentence for the sexual molestation of a Las Cruces child.

Many inmates here are sexual predators, among them David Holley, a Roman Catholic priest sentenced in 1993 to 55 to 275 years in prison for molesting eight boys he met during his work at an Alamogordo church.At 77, Holley is the oldest inmate in the geriatric unit. Given his age and sentence, he will likely never walk out again.Eight geriatric inmates passed away here last year - a fifth of the unit's total population, Van Loan said.

Seventy-five percent more will likely die here if they aren't paroled first, he said."There are only two ways out of here - and death is one of them," he said.Nationally, the number of inmates dying from natural causes rose to 2,700 in 2002 from 799 in 1982, according to the U.S. Justice Department."It's not mandatory, but a majority of the inmates who come here are already ill," he said. "Most of them have led pretty unhealthy lives for quite a long time."

Hepatitis C, a debilitating viral infection often spread through intravenous drug use and sharing dirty needles, is common.Other inmates suffer from cirrhosis of the liver, emphysema, arthritis. Five inmates require wheelchairs. Seven use oxygen tanks.

None of the inmates are bedridden. None are senile.None have attempted to escape.

"I would say a majority of them really believe they have it good here," Van Loan said.Six or seven inmates are convicted killers. The most notorious is Merrill Chamberlain, a former Sandia National Laboratories scientist serving a life sentence for the 1987 shooting death of Albuquerque police Officer John Carrillo.

Chamberlain, 66, is among the inmates who leave the unit Monday and Wednesday nights to make ceramic mugs or build wooden airplanes in the nearby prison hobby shop.It's more than arts and crafts, said Steve Schmidt, the prison's vocational teacher. It's therapy. It's salvation in a handmade bowl.

"These guys have never accomplished much in their lives and maybe that's why they've wound up where they are," Schmidt said. "Here they can say, `I can do something. I can make something. I am worth something again.' "Other inmates spend much of their day relaxing on beds to watch "Live with Regis and Kelly" or reading about Jesus in barracks that smell of Bengay and shower slippers.

But the favorite pastime here is gardening. In small pieces of land the size of burial plots, prisoners plant tomatoes, basil, butternut squash, rows of corn, cilantro, onions, chile and pinto beans."Every gardener has their own likes," explains Romero, whose speciality besides watermelon is chile hybrids made extra fiery hot by cross-pollinating them with jalape?o plants.

Isidro Delgado, a 70-year-old convicted child rapist, prefers growing flowers. Corn is 64-year-old convicted killer Ron Brown's favorite.Kenneth Hudman, who tends three separate plots, is the envy of others with his bounteous tangle of pinto beans.

"It's something to do besides sitting around," the 62-year-old child molester says modestly. "You can grow pintos just about anywhere. You could probably throw some on this concrete and they would grow."The prison provides manure, Miracle Gro and plenty of water. The nearby University of New Mexico Valencia campus in Los Lunas donates vegetable seedlings.

Other seeds come from inmates' family members."Before spring gets here the men start clamoring about the need to get seeds," Van Loan said. "They're saying, `Can my sister send me this? Can my mom bring in that?' I tell them sure, but I need to inspect it all first."By early April, inmate barracks are filled with soil-filled plastic foam cups bearing tiny green sprouts, he said.

These days, the corn is as high as a small elephant's eye. Two beds of zinnias at the entrance of the facility explode in bright blooms of pink, red, yellow and white. There is nary a weed or wilted leaf anywhere, and even in the unforgiving heat of a Los Lunas day plants are as lush and green as a tropical rain forest.

The incarcerated gardeners are resourceful, using plastic foam takeout containers to shelter struggling seedlings. They spear the ground with rows of plastic spoon-forks, or sporks, to keep the feral cats from lounging in the verdant coolness.

Come harvest time, the inmates will feast on fresh produce, some prepared in tiny microwave-equipped kitchens at the back of each barrack.Van Loan makes no apologies for the relative comfort his inmates enjoy. In these gardens, Van Loan said he hopes more than seeds are growing.It is better, he said, to give inmates who may one day be on the outside again the tools to handle that freedom better than they had before.

"The Corrections Department's purpose in its prisons is not to punish. It never has been," he said. "Our jobs is to keep inmates out of trouble and keep them safe during the time they are serving the sentence that the court imposes."

Until then, flowers bloom.

*BY THE NUMBERS*

Number of state prison inmates over 55: 431

Percentage of state prison inmates over 55: 7 percent

Number of beds at Los Lunas geriatric unit: 39

Oldest inmate at Los Lunas: David Holley, 77, a priest convicted of molesting eight boys he met during his work at an Alamogordo church.

Source: N.M. Department of Corrections, 2004 statistics

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