"Landlocked prisoners taught deep-water diving
By Kemp PowersFri Dec 1, 9:24 PM ET
A landlocked California men's prison aims to keep inmates from returning to jail by putting them in deep water -- training them for undersea construction and dam repair.
The California Institution for Men in Chino sits on a stretch of former farmland some 40 miles east of Los Angeles and just about as far away from the Pacific Ocean.
But it houses a prison-based marine technology training program where inmates serving sentences of 14 months to 4 years learn skills authorities hope will help them find jobs when they return to society.
At a training open to reporters on Friday more than a dozen inmate divers demonstrated their techniques in two 22-foot (7-meter), 30,000-gallon (113,560-liter) dive tanks. One diver donned a 135-pound (60-kg) suit for heavy underwater construction, and sunk to the bottom as one of the other inmates monitored his equipment up above.
No more than 12 percent of the more than 1,600 inmates who have participated in the program have returned to prison -- far below the average recidivism rate of 50 percent in California prisons, officials said.
The program, which aims to train about 100 inmates a year, is open to any prisoner in the general population no matter their crime, said one of the program's officials Charles Patillo. The center was closed in 2003 until August this year due to budget cuts.
Eric Pawling, 44, an inmate incarcerated for petty theft, said well-publicized animosity between prisoners of different races in the prison system had no place in the diving program.
"We leave the racial stuff on the yard because we all have to depend on each other when we're underwater," Pawling said.
Instructor Fred Johnson, who has taught both military and civilian divers during a 45-year career, said there was one major difference between the inmate divers and his other students.
"Compared to civilian divers, they're much more dedicated," said Johnson. "
By Kemp PowersFri Dec 1, 9:24 PM ET
A landlocked California men's prison aims to keep inmates from returning to jail by putting them in deep water -- training them for undersea construction and dam repair.
The California Institution for Men in Chino sits on a stretch of former farmland some 40 miles east of Los Angeles and just about as far away from the Pacific Ocean.
But it houses a prison-based marine technology training program where inmates serving sentences of 14 months to 4 years learn skills authorities hope will help them find jobs when they return to society.
At a training open to reporters on Friday more than a dozen inmate divers demonstrated their techniques in two 22-foot (7-meter), 30,000-gallon (113,560-liter) dive tanks. One diver donned a 135-pound (60-kg) suit for heavy underwater construction, and sunk to the bottom as one of the other inmates monitored his equipment up above.
No more than 12 percent of the more than 1,600 inmates who have participated in the program have returned to prison -- far below the average recidivism rate of 50 percent in California prisons, officials said.
The program, which aims to train about 100 inmates a year, is open to any prisoner in the general population no matter their crime, said one of the program's officials Charles Patillo. The center was closed in 2003 until August this year due to budget cuts.
Eric Pawling, 44, an inmate incarcerated for petty theft, said well-publicized animosity between prisoners of different races in the prison system had no place in the diving program.
"We leave the racial stuff on the yard because we all have to depend on each other when we're underwater," Pawling said.
Instructor Fred Johnson, who has taught both military and civilian divers during a 45-year career, said there was one major difference between the inmate divers and his other students.
"Compared to civilian divers, they're much more dedicated," said Johnson. "
