Aaaaaanyhoo... the reason I brought up the friends we caught up with last weekend is because upon hearing our plans, she mentioned that they've started watching Orange is the New Black and asked if the visitation scenes portrayed on the show are realistic at all. In a nutshell, yes they are.
Here's how it goes, on a good day, with no hitches:
- You check the website to see what visiting hours are.
- You arrive in the lobby and pick up a numbered visitor form to fill out. It includes information such as the name (and of course number) of who you're there to see, your name and home address, make and model of the vehicle you're driving, home address, and any minors with you for whom you are responsible.
- A guard sitting in a glassed off cubicle of sorts calls out numbers (which correspond to the numbered forms). Once your number is called, you enter the cubicle, sign in, remove your shoes, and go through a metal detector.
- Upon passing the metal detector test, you enter a little anteroom of sorts. Once a handful of other visitors have been processed, the guard comes in. Then a huge door of bars (yes, prison bars) slides closed between the anteroom and the guard cubicle/lobby area. Not to be overly dramatic, but it's an awful lot like this. You really haven't lived until you've experienced this with your kids.
- You enter the actual visiting area, check in with another guard at a desk, who tells you where to sit.
- You sit and wait for your inmate to come in. Usually it's fairly quick. Sometimes it's not. We watched a family sit and wait for nearly an hour today.
Now I'll write about what can actually happen. In some ways, it's the same. Differences will be in a different colored text.
- You check the website to see what visiting hours are. With any luck, the website will have been updated, but you never really know. If you happen to arrive during a 'count,' or there's fog, or anything out of the ordinary has happened; all bets can be off. We've historically been lucky in this regard, thankfully.
- You arrive in the lobby and pick up a numbered visitor form to fill out. It includes information such as the name (and of course number) of who you're there to see, your name and home address, make and model of the vehicle you're driving, home address, and any minors with you for whom you are responsible. Should the country be in the midst of an ebola scare, you'll have to fill out a sheet of paper saying you haven't been in western Africa in the past 21 days; and if you have, you must certify you're not suffering from runny turds. While waiting for your number to be called, you'll watch others be called in and then come out because they didn't meet some visitor standard or another. There are no words to adequately convey the ridiculous sadness of watching this go down.
- A guard sitting in a glassed off cubicle of sorts calls out numbers (which correspond to the numbered forms). Once your number is called, you enter the cubicle, sign in, remove your shoes, and go through a metal detector. If you don't meet all the criteria for the visitor dress code, you get sent out to change; and the guard tells you to fill out another form (a.k.a. move to the back of the line). Yesterday, boy child was wearing sweat pants and girl child was wearing yoga pants. DENIED. Thankfully we had our suitcases in the car, so we went out to change. Unfortunately, yoga pants was all I'd packed for girl child; because that's all she ever wears. Thankfully, I had packed my black 'skinny jeans,' which can double as not skinny jeans on a nine year old (because believe you me, there wasn't any chance of skinny jeans getting past this week's guard.) Girl child has been in with yoga pants before, and boy child has been in with sweat pants before; but that nonsense wasn't going to fly with this week's guard. And, in case you're wondering, these standards most certainly vary; depending on who the guard is, what kind of mood he/she is in, his/her general impressions of you, barometric pressure. Seriously, it is totally random. If after you've changed clothes and filled out your forms for a second time a new inmate should arrive with the local sheriff to report, previously mentioned guard will SPRINT out of his little glass area to meet the sheriff before he brings the inmate into the lobby, because inmate can't walk through the lobby while visitors are sitting there. Inmate will go back into his cage in the back of the van and guard will tell all visitors that they have to leave the building. Visitors will wait outside while inmate is escorted in, complete with cuffs and lots of chains. You really haven't lived until you've experienced this with your kids.
- Upon passing the metal detector test, you enter a little anteroom of sorts. Once a handful of other visitors have been processed, the guard comes in. Then a huge door of bars (yes, prison bars) slides closed between the anteroom and the guard cubicle/lobby area. Not to be overly dramatic, but it's an awful lot like this. You really haven't lived until you've experienced this with your kids.
- You enter the actual visiting area, check in with another guard at a desk, who tells you where to sit.
- You sit and wait for your inmate to come in. Usually it's fairly quick. Sometimes it's not. We watched a family sit and wait for nearly an hour today.
So... that's more than you ever wanted to know about the entry process for visiting an incarcerated family member. Which also presents another future post topic: how/when/why we decided that we would take our children to visit Uncle M in la casa grande.
The title of this post is the summary. There are policies and procedures, and there is most definitely a power struggle going on.
The title of this post is the summary. There are policies and procedures, and there is most definitely a power struggle going on.
1 comment:
Pretty.
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