Lee’s Blog 13

According to Britton, a corrections office is a big man that is very stern. He also portrays the image of having a great deal of power. The portrayal in the media conjures up the idea of a Rambo-type person in a corrections officer uniform. From my personal experiences, I would say nothing could be farther from the truth. I know two men who are corrections officers in the Arizona Department of Corrections. The one man is tall, buff, and bald headed. He does portray the image of power, though he is a sweetheart of a guy. He has said in past conversations that they were taught that corrections officers, no matter how nice they really are, must convey an image of power to the inmates. They were taught that, if an inmate detects the least little bit of non-control on the part of the officer, there will often be trouble. This man has worked out with weights a lot in his life to look stronger to the inmates. He also told us that female corrections officers in a male prison that is more than minimum security tend to be devoured by the inmates because they know they are bigger than the officer.

The other man I knew years ago was, at that time, a corrections officer on Death Row at the Florence prison. He was the total opposite of the man I just described. This man was very much over weight. He probably could not run very fast if he needed to. It did not seem to matter to him, though, because he said the prisoners on Death Row were usually so secured that they could not do anything. His main job when an execution occurred was to clean out the death chamber afterwards.

I have watched television shows and movies in the past that had female police officers and corrections officers in them. The women often seemed to be depicted either as sex objects or as women that really looked more like men. I don’t believe either of these depictions is valid for the most part. My thoughts on female corrections officers are that they do have to be strong. I would guess that, if they have long hair, it probably has to be up in a bun so that inmates cannot grab their hair as easily. One thing I have noticed when I have seen Sheriff Joe’s female officers on television is that their uniforms usually tend to be almost skin tight. I would think this would lead to unwanted, unnecessary heckling from the inmates. As concerns whether male correction officers can do the job better than a female officer, I don’t believe so.