Social Isolation and Imprisonment | How can we reduce the destructive impact of prisoner isolation?
The journey of isolation can have long-term damaging effects on prisoners, with Pigeonly prisoners can limit the isolation by staying connected to their loved ones, at a low cost.
THE PROBLEM
Isolation can destroy the human spirit. Prisons are created around this entire tactic, as the punishment for wrongdoings. For a human, detachment from life can cause extreme distress, arouse serious mental and physical health conditions, and counteract against long-term rehabilitation, particularly for those with lesser offenses. Extreme isolation can create a damaging ripple effect for the remainder of an incarcerated individual’s life.
One out of every 100 American adults is incarcerated, and according to a Bureau of Justice study, 75% of those individuals will be reincarcerated within five years. Recidivism, or reincarceration, has become a major issue in the United States prison system. The California Innocence Project recently reported that in order to reduce recidivism, communities need to consider factors such as the threat of homelessness, mental health services, substance abuse programs, adequate health care, education and employment assistance, and family support. Research has routinely found that inmates who stayed in contact with their families exhibit lower recidivism rates.
With high-costs, malaligned prison partnership incentives and the overall challenge of prison reform, is it possible to help our prisoners beat the odds of reincarceration and keep them connected to the outside world? In 2017, the U.S. Justice Dept reported an undertaking of sweeping reforms, including a concentration on family-friendly initiatives and the importance of helping inmates maintain family ties. That being said, it also is up to the providers of prison system function outsourcing, to be working on behalf of the prisoners as well.
A SOLUTION
Thanks to Frederick Hutson’s entrepreneurial ingenuity and focus, we now have Pigeonly, a platform that makes it easy for people to search, find and communicate with an incarcerated loved one. Keeping those ties, tied as tight as you possibly can with a big concrete wall in between you.
Frederick himself lived that journey of isolation, serving in eight different prison facilities across the U.S. for a full 51-month period, plus 6 months time in a halfway house. Unlike so many others, he was able to transform his experience into a business opportunity, that today is making millions of lives better. He saw his fair share of challenges stepping into a world of technology that he wasn’t familiar with, not to mention introducing a service that the world had not seen before. But this service solves a problem that was very much in need of repair, and success took hold.
Pigeonly provides users the option of one — or all — of their seven consumer facing products, which fit into three categories. The first is a voice over ip service, or phone calls. At a much lower cost, Pigeonly cuts the expense of phone calls by as much as 80%, and allows unlimited calls. The second category is financial services, which allows users to send money to the inmate’s commissary or trust account through prison vendor partnerships. And third, the postal mail service category; this allows prisoners to receive photos (printed up as a 4x6), letters, postcards, greeting cards or web articles in around 3 days time. Pigeonly also has created the Prison Wives app, which is a digital support community for the women who need empathic support in the outside world.
Social isolation is detrimental to reform. “It demonstrates the distressing, often irreversible effects of isolation and the importance of connectedness, even in the darker corners of society.” With Pigeonly, a prisoner has the opportunity to stay connected to that support that they so desperately need. Hopefully, with more entrepreneurs like this who are working towards the improvement of our punishment system, we can find the path to humanized reform and lead people to a greater future, beyond their errors — big or small.
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