The official "Ingham county jail Inmate guide"

If you've landed here from Google or the like, this may not be the post you want.  Please start reading Ingham County Jail Tales from the very beginning.

This post publishes for you the official guide for inmates at the Ingham County Jail. The words are what the ICJ publishes in a brochure handed to each inmate upon incarceration. (Well, actually, the Jail often fails to give a new inmate a printed copy of their Guide upon incarceration, but who's counting?)

For some reason, the ICJ treats their inmate guide as confidential. They won't give it out to friends and family, and it's not available on the Sheriff's Web site. You would think that an enlightened ICJ would want everyone -- inmate, friend, family, lawyer, probation officer, judge, public -- to all be on the same page. Much of the inspiration for this blog is to redress the ICJ's failure to provide complete information to the inmate, and to all who surround him or her.

Since the ICJ refuses to publish their Inmate Guide in paper or online, I'm providing it here. Note that in addition I've tried to provide other important information that the Guide fails to offer. If elsewhere on this blog I've gotten anything wrong. or omitted something you need to know, please tell me. If the ICJ has failed to provide information you seek, let the SHeriff's office know.

Each page is a separate image. Click on a page image to see it in a more readable size, or to print it.

Leaving the jail

You will eventually leave ICJ for one of these reasons:

• You've completed your sentence.  Or, at sentencing, the judge reduces your sentence to time already served in jail.
• You go to trial and you are found innocent, or charges against you are dropped.
• You've posted bail, or you are released on your own recognizance (ROR) awaiting trial or a hearing.
• You've been found guilty of a felony, and you will be transferred to prison.
• You've got a charge in another county, and you'll be transferred to that county.
• You died. (Fortunately, a very small percent of inmates leave jail dead.)
• The governor pardons you.  (This is even less likely than dying in jail; most gubernatorial pardons involve prison inmates serving hard time for a long time.)

If you leave to be transferred to another facility, your life probably won't be changing much. You may have to adapt to different rules and procedures. And of course you'll meet a new set of inmates.

If you've completed your sentence or otherwise are released, you will be cast free just yards from Cedar Street. They may let you out during the wee hours of the morning. In fact they love to do this; it seems to be a standard practice.   (A lot of inmates think that the ICJ gets state money for another full day if you leave at 12:01 a.m., but I'm told that's not true.) Still,  if you leave early, they don't have the cost of feeding you, and it frees your bed for the next incoming inmate

The guard will have you carry your mattress, pillow, and linens back to the storage area. If you've accumulated a lot of personal belongings, you'll schlep along with those, too. Let's hope you made a large order from the Commissary, so you'll have a large plastic bag to carry your belongings.

Whatever cash you came in with was converted into your inmate account. The jail will issue you a check for the balance left in your account, reflecting any deposits by your friends and family, and any expenditures, such as purchases from the Commissary.

Since you're likely to be set free during early morning hours, the check is probably useless at this time. What a concept: on entry they convert your cash into your account, and on exit they give you a check. (Hint to ICJ: why not issue a debit card with the remaining balance, like welfare does?) Mason State Bank is right across the street, combined with a Biggby's Coffee, so you could try their ATM.

Eventually a guard will direct you back to the "dress out" area. The trustees on duty will fetch your street clothes, still in the bag where you placed them the day you arrived at ICJ. You'll turn in your uniform and get back into your street clothes. It's a funny feeling at this point; you begin to feel a sense of liberty. If you entered the jail on a warm day but you're leaving in winter, ask the guard if he can get you a used coat to wear.

Next, at the wire cage, they'll make you sign some papers. They will also present you with a bill, which may be $1200 for 30 days in jail. State law allows the jail to charge you a daily fee to pay for your stay at the Mason Hilton.  Let's see... 1200 divided by 30 = $40 -- not bad for a Hilton.

Now you can use the free land line phone to call for a ride -- if you've got friend or family who might be willing to pick you up.  Unlike the phones you pay for in your dorm, this phone can call cell phones -- which is a neccessity for reaching a lot of people.

Then they'll buzz you out through the security door to the garage where you first entered. You will feel very odd sensations: the rush of freedom, and the dread of what's ahead.

Hopefully you've got a ride. If not, hopefully you turned off your cell phone when you checked in, and can call someone to pick you up. Or, a CATA bus route stops at the nearby Meijer -- which is a hike from the jail. Otherwise, start walking towards where you want to go -- if you have somewhere to go.

Good luck!

Overcrowding -- and early release

The population of ICJ fluctuates constantly. Newly-arrested inmates add to the population as newly-released ones subtract from it. Some inmates have been sentenced to weekend jail -- a humane attempt to keep people in their jobs. They check in on Friday night and are released Sunday night -- which adds up to 3 days off your sentence as ICJ counts. Some inmates get released on bail only to return later when sentenced.

The limit on the number of inmates seems to be a combination of state law, court decisions, and policy. When the ICJ population exceeds 675 or so, the place is considered overcrowded. When this happens, the jail begins early release of inmates. Those who are within a few days of their scheduled out-date may be released. Jail workers (aka trustees) are at the top of the pecking order for early release.

You'll hear lots of rumors as to whether the jail is overcrowded. Don't believe them. One rumor comes from the kitchen crew, citing how many meals were served that day. This isn't reliable, as the staff get meals, and the ebb and flow of new and released inmates may count more people than will sleep in the jail that night.

One aspect of overcrowding is permanent: the ICJ regularly puts some inmates on the floor, sleeping in the common area or "day room" that's supposed to be more like a living room. This allows ICJ to bed, for instance, 10 people in a dorm intended for 8. The floor isn't so bad, but you will want to snatch the mop when it comes so you can clean around your mattress.

In any event, the ICJ operates a balancing act: because of financial incentives, they want to keep the inmate count at capacity.  But because of circumstances they can't control -- who knows how many people will be arrested tonight -- the jail will sometime go over their limits. When that happens, they have something like 3 days to reduce the inmate count. And when that happens, it may be to your benefit.

Speaking of early release, the jail may let you out just after midnight, or in the wee hours of the morning.  You may have some trouble getting a ride home -- assuming you have a home to go to. See the post on Leaving the jail.

You be the judge: should this guard be fired?

Did you ever see "The Silence of the Lambs"? Did you think it was just not believable that an inmate could hide a sharp object, then use it to viciously stab a guard? Sadly, that scenario is going to play out someday at the Ingham County Jail.

As we've learned, about 1/4 of the guards at the Ingham County Jail are assholes, and they don't give a damn whether your meds are properly dispensed. One of the these is particularly lazy about meds, and her actions put her fellow guards, and herself, in danger.

Now for the Hannibal Lecter story and its parallel to this particular guard. This guard enables exactly the scenario from that movie. A certain inmate has diabetes. This means he needs to prick his finger with a blade to draw some blood, test his blood sugar, and use a hypodermic needle to inject insulin -- twice a day. 

Let's assume this guy is gay, which in this case happens to be true. There is nothing wrong with that, except that in this case he was in jail awaiting sentencing on sex-related crime. Hell, for that matter, we're all jail inmates, which means that any of us may have questionable social behaviors. You don't want to be exposed to any inmate's blood, and you don't want a fellow inmate to have a needle in his hands without supervision.

So, if there's a diabetic in your dorm, every morning most guards will bring a medical kit about the size of a lunch pail, set it down for the inmate, and watch as he pricks his finger, bleeds, and then reads his blood sugar. Then the inmate takes a hypodermic needle and injects his required dose of insulin. The guard may do this outside the dorm -- probably using the meds cart he has with him as a table -- or inside your dorm, on the table where you will soon eat.

Understand that the jail, with good reason, is paranoid about any pieces of metal -- especially sharp metal, or metal that could be sharpened. If your lawyer gives you a manilla envelope with a brass clasp, the guard will nervously rip the clasp away before you take the envelope back to your cell. Any time you return from outside jail -- work duty, a court date, a hospital stay -- you are strip searched to make sure you don't have a weapon, including sharp objects.

But this one guard apparently never saw "Silence of the Lambs." She's lazy. When she comes through to give this dude his insulin, she drops off the needle kit for the inmate, and leaves the dorm so she can service other dorms! She may not return for 30 minutes.

This means our fellow inmate has every opportunity to hide a hypodermic needle. The needle kit includes a secure disposal receptacle for used needles; there's no way for the guard to know later if the inmate really has deposited his used needle properly.

The guys in my dorm talked this over. It was a low-security group, and no one, not even our diabetic dude, seemed disposed to violence against a guard. But ICJ has one amazingly stupid guard who repeatedly gave easy access to a potential weapon -- day after day. I don't know about you, but I think a guard who leaves sharp, possibly lethal objects in the hands of an inmate, and then moves on to other work, should be disciplined or fired. My guess is that once her fellow guards realize this, they'll feel the same way.

More broadly, ICJ needs to think through their procedures for diabetic inmates. Do you really want some random guy bleeding on your breakfast table or over your meds?

Court dates and probation

You may be in jail awaiting trial, or a hearing because you're accused of a probation violation. Here's a few things you should know.

First off, several of my fellow inmates worried themselves sick about whether they'd make their court date. This is understandable: when you're in jail, most of your time is sitting waiting for the next milestone. This includes days, weeks, or months of nothing but waiting. So some inmates work themselves into a lather, afraid the jail won't deliver them to the court at the appointed hour.

Don't worry. The ICJ is very efficient at delivering you to your court appointment.

If your court appointment happens to be at the 55th District Court, the courtroom is in a building attached to the jail. The guards will shackle you -- whether you are a violent offender or not -- and take you down a long connector hallway to the court. They'll place you in a holding cell while you await your court appearance.  If you're in another court, you'll be taken there, escorted, in an ICJ van.

If it happens to be cold outside, you will freeze in the hallway and in the holding cell. One court guard, who is otherwise very friendly -- even compassionate -- has a bug about inmates staring out the window of the holding cell. If any of your fellows awaiting court stands by the door window, the guard will turn on a fan bringing in outside air.

The guard will remove your shackles while you're in the holding cell, then shackle you again when it's time for you to head into court.  If you're a non-violent offender, you may wonder why O.J. Simpson made it through murder and armed robbery trials without cuffs, but you stand before the judge unable to even raise your right hand.

When your time comes, you'll be taken into court. There will probably be a trial or hearing in progress, so once again you await your turn. Then you and your attorney -- either paid or court-appointed -- will face the judge.

After your trial or hearing, you'll go back to the holding cell with other inmates.  You may wait hours to leave the holding cell.  They'll feed you a bologna sandwich lunch if you stay across meal time.  

Depending on the verdict or sentence, you may be set free.  You'll go back to your cell, get your belongings, and be processed out.  See the "leaving jail" post in this blog for further information.

If the judge doesn't set you free, you'll head back to your cell.  If you're sentenced to time in jail, you'll eventually be moved to a sentenced dorm.  The main difference: no television.  If you're sentenced to prison, within a few days you'll be escorted to a van and hauled to another slammer.

...

Probation is a topic that could fill an entire blog of its own.  They say that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.  I won't claim that your PO is corrupt, but it's clear that she or he -- most of them are women, for some reason -- exults in her power, and will gladly exercising that power over every aspect of your life, not just the crime you committed.  She'll have you arrested and hauled to jail on any hint of a possible probation violation.  Unless you make bail, you'll rot in jail until your hearing date comes up. 

I met many inmates, some of whom have been through the criminal justice system multiple times, who said they'd gladly spend 30 or 60 days in jail instead of enduring 2 years of probation.  Speaking from experience, I can suggest that if you've already lost your job, doing time may be a much better deal than probation.

Bailing out

If you are awaiting trial the judge will usually set bail.  The amount of bail could be as low as a couple hundred dollars, or it could be $50,000 or more.

If it's a small amount, or if you are wealthy, you may simply post the entire cash amount of your bail.  Assuming you show up for trial, you'll get your money back in full.

If you can't afford to post cash bail, you can work with a bail bondsman.  A bondsman is in the business of making bets -- that you won't skip town while out on bail.  Typically the bondsman charges a fee of 10% of the amount of your bail.  Note that you don't get this money back.  It's a fee for their service of guaranteeing 10 times that amount to the court.

For some reason, one agency, Leo's, seems to dominate the market among bail bondsmen.  Apparently Leo aggressively seeks your business.  Some say that Leo may negotiate a fee of less than 10%.  Others say Leo will let you use your home as collateral.  In any event, it seems that Leo may be your man.  

If you're lucky, the court may release you on your own recognizance -- ROR -- which simply means your name is sufficient guarantee to satisfy the court.

Note that judges may set the bond ridiculously high as a way of keeping you in jail.  I went from a $300 bail to $30,000 after a probation violation.  The judge knew well that I was not suddenly 100 times more likely to skip town or cause harm to society -- the two reasons why bail exists.  She was using a high bail to punish me.  Hmmm, didn't the founding fathers write something into the Constitution about excessive bail?  

Working for the Ingham County Jail -- cut your time in jail in half ce in half

There's lots of work to do at the jail.  They have to feed 700 or so inmates plus jail staff; take care of the inside and outside of the jail and the 55th District Court; clean the cages at the adjacent Animal Shelter; wash all of the police vehicles; clean cells at Lansing's city jail; serve the Drain Commission;  take care of the fairgrounds -- and more.  Over 100 inmates are jail workers.

The familiar term for an inmate worker is "trustee" but it seems ICJ just calls them "jail workers."

If during your incarceration you want to become a jail worker, you need to fill out a kite asking to be considered for worker status.  The incentive to become a worker is huge: you will live in a much nicer dorm, and you will get one extra day off your sentence for each day served, cutting your remaining time in half.

If you're picked to be a worker, you'll move to Post 10.  You'll find this dorm much nicer than the dungeon you came from.  It's brightly lit and has friendly linoleum instead of bare concrete.  The dorm is set up barracks style, with 20 or so people in each room.

You will be given a locker and told to lock it religiously. You will be given two uniforms.  Each night you can have clothes laundered; this allows you to wear fresh clothes -- desirable if you're working the outside world.

Some workers work the night shift -- laundry for instance -- and they have their own dorm area.  The rest start their work day at 6:00 a.m.  The head guard on duty will call out each worker type needed over the intercom:

• Inside maintenance
• Outside maintenance
• Animal Control
• Drain Commission
• Garage
• Etc.

You will have  been assigned a job category.  It's your job to wake up when they call out "Animal Control" or whatever category is starting work.  Make your bed, and get your ass to work.  (The worker post, Post 10, demands that your bed be made military style.)  If you're lucky you'll be assigned to the Garage.  This is by far the easiest job.  Your job is to wash the fleet of sheriff police cars.  Your work day is from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.  Often you'll be done at lunch time.  Some days you won't even be called to work.  Other workers will mock you for not working a real job.  (On the other hand, you may be loaned out for more onerous work -- like helping Outside Maintenance shovel snow.)

You will find that most of your fellow worker-inmates want to work. You will also find that some of the young inmates are total slackers.  This is something you will have to cope with: young slackers who'd rather goof off instead of actually working.

When you move to Post 10 you'll also discover that they feed you better.  They give a sandwich in addition to the cooked meal, and, for crews that have worked especially hard that day, they will call your crew and give each member an entire extra hot meal.  Obviously someone figured out that if you've got people doing hard physical labor, you have to give them calories to sustain them.

You'll also be given two orange uniforms instead of one.  You have nightly laundry service -- both uniforms and whites. Obviously they want their trustees to look clean when working in public.

All in all, working for the jail is a good deal.  However, there is a huge sword hanging over your head:  screw up, and you may lose all you'd gained.  While I was in jail, a fellow inmate on worker status was assigned to the Lansing jail.  He spied a woman -- an attractive one in a business suit, he said -- deposit a cigarette on the outside receptacle.  He picked up the cigarette -- still smoking -- and puffed on it.

Unfortunately a guard inside saw this, and reported him.  ICJ revoked his worker status and sent him back to the general population.  A few puffs on a cigarette cost this dude 100 days of freedom.

Women in jail

Since I'm not a woman my knowledge of the situation for women in ICJ is limited.  There are women in jail, but they are a fraction of the population.

Sometimes you hear female voices from their dorms, if someone's rowdy or there's an argument.  (Just imagine a movie with this theme.)

Some male dorms may have a vantage point where you can see women -- a window view not totally obscured, or a common door with a keyhole view.  (The locks in jail are huge -- and the keys are huge, thus the keyholes are as well.)  If you have such a view, and the women know it, some of them may flash their tits for you.

The Commissary carries prooducts for females: bras and panties, tampons, etc.

Windows

The windows in the dorms are mostly opaque.  If the windows are open during warm weather, you may catch a glimpse of blue sky, but for the most part, you can't see outside.

Take note: 99% of the time, you can't see outside.  You can't see a tree, whether fall, winter, spring, or summer.  Therefore every glance of outdoors you encounter is a gift to enjoy.  

In areas outside your dorm, such as hallways and Medical, the windows are clear glass.  Any trip outside your cell provides the precious gift of seeing a bit of the outside world.  If you're sent to Medical and they park you in a holding cell with windows, take advantage of this, and keep your eyes glued to the outside, instead of watching TV all the time.

If it's cold outside, the windows in your dorm will be closed -- the guard carries a hand crank to open or close the windows.  It gets pretty close in the dorm with the windows shut, so someone will ask to crack open a window. Here's a tip: if you are sleeping on the floor during winter, be sure to have the guard close the window at night. Otherwise you will freeze.

Fights

Let's face it: if you're in jail, you're not hanging out with the best people our society coughs up. Some of these guys have short tempers.  When they're playing the card game Hearts, someone may get really pissed off at his partner, and a fight -- or the threat of a fight -- flashes before you.

If a fight occurs, sometimes it takes place in the common area, and sometimes they take it inside a dorm room.

After the fight, if you show visible wounds, a guard will ask you what happened.  It seems to be unwritten code that if you say you fell into a door, the question is dropped, no matter how ridiculous that story is.

Time off for good behavior is a powerful incentive against fights.  You could lose your accumulated time off -- and when you're in jail, you count every minute until your release.  Therefore many times the potential combatants mouth off about 

Alcoholics Anonymous, CATS, church, and other inmate improvement programs

The ICJ offers a variety of programs intended to help inmates improve their lives.  You should sign up for as many of these as you think will in fact help you.  You might hope the program helps you deal with your issues, but just getting out of your dorm and having serious discussions with your fellow inmates can be worth a lot. 

Sadly, the ICJ does a poor job of providing you with information about the various programs. There's scant information in the official inmate guide.  

If alcohol is a problem for you, you may want to attend AA meetings while in jail.  Fill out a kite for this request.  It may take a while to get in.  You'll meet once a week, with inmates from throughout the jail and a meeting chairperson  from the outside who's volunteered to do this task.  One rumor is that one of the volunteer chairs is in his seventies, has decades of sobriety, and lives hundreds of miles away, but makes the trip once a week because it's his form of service back to the community.

You'll find that the tone of the meeting is somehow different than most AA meetings on the outside.  The stories are more intense, the situations more dire.  (And things can be pretty dire for folks at AA meetings outside.

You may also be encouraged to sign up for a program called CATS.  In fact, your judge may order you to attend CATS.  The kite form has a category labeled CATS, so circle that on your kite and explain you want to attend.  The program usually is oversubscribed, so once again you may have to wait a while.  When they finally let you into this group therapy program, you'll get one day's credit for each weekly meeting you attend.

By the way, your judge and your guard and others may use the word CATS, but many don't know what it means.  The official jail guide doesn't define this acronym. For the record, it's "Correctional Assessment and Treatment Services.  "

Various churches offer services or meetings at the jail.  If you're at all religious, sign up to attend. The officiants tend to be right wing proselytizers, but that's OK if you want to participate in a religious event.  The jail has a chapel where you're meet; it's got a huge cross where the altar might be, so it's obviously bent towards Christians.  Again, even if this isn't your brand of religion, if you are religious, I advise you to sign up.

The jail offers other programs to improve your life.  For instance, there's a program for you to complete your high school education via GED.  Go for it.  To quote a corny line, "While you serve time, make the time serve you."

Books, newspapers, and magazines

There are probably a few books floating around in your dorm.  Authors like John Grisham and James Patterson are popular.  You'll hunger to read even if those aren't your genre.

You can also get books from friends and family.  All they have to do is drop them off at the visitor's desk.  They should write your name on the first page of the book.  The Chaplain will review each book to ensure that it doesn't cover forbidden topics -- like breaking out of jail.  This will take a day or two.

Be specific when you ask a friend to drop off a book or tow.  Either give the specific title, or make it very clear what genre you seek.  Page-turners like detective tales may appeal more than, say, self-help books while you're in jail.

Speaking of self-help, the ICJ does nothing to give to basic texts, such as the Bible, the Koran, the Talmud, or the Big Book from Alcoholics Anonymous.  If nothing else, the Commissary should sell these books.  Better yet, the ICJ should have copies available for loan.  I filled out multiple kites trying to get someone to loan me  a Big Book.  They went unanswered.

The rules say an inmate may only possess three books at a time, but I saw no sign that this rule is enforced.  In theory you're supposed to mail extra books home or donate them to the library.

It's very handy if someone in your dorm subscribes to a newspaper.  The Lansing State Journal, as pathetic as it may be, provides useful information.  You can read how a given judge is sentencing for cases similar to yours, giving you an idea of your own fate.  Inmates also like to read about prominent cases of fellow inmates.  And the crossword is a nice way to while away time.

If you really want to confuse your fellow inmates, then subscribe to The New York Times.  Your fellows won't know what the hell it is; they'll think you're from New York.  It's got a lot to read, so it offers another time sink.

You can buy magazines at the Commissary.  The selection is slim.  Somehow a copy of Glamour magazine made its way to our dorm. The guys weren't interested in most of the articles but the profile of Penelope Cruz was popular.