Program and Service Needs of Federally Incarcerated Métis ...

Family Interviews
Each of the offenders who were interviewed were asked to provide the name of one or
more family members with whom they have maintained contact with, and that they felt
comfortable with us contacting. A total of 67 family members were identified.
A structured interview was developed for family members of the Métis offenders who
were interviewed. Interview questions examined four key areas: background;
relationship to offender; needs of offender; and, family needs. The structured interviews
included both closed and open-ended questions.
The family members were contacted by telephone and asked if they were willing to be
interviewed for the project. If they were willing to participate, they were given the
opportunity to conduct the interview in person or over the phone. Twenty family
members were interviewed. In some cases two individuals were interviewed from the
same family. All interviews were conducted face-to face by one researcher contracted
by MFCJS.
Sixteen family members were female (80%). Ten were Métis, seven were First Nations,
and three were non-Aboriginal. Nine of the family members were mothers, five were
siblings, two were fathers, two were spouses/common-law partners and two were
"other" family members. Family members typically lived in urban areas (60%). Small
proportions were currently living in Métis (20%), rural (15%), and other (5%)
communities at the time of the interviews.
Staff
A list of institutional staff was obtained from the contact at each facility. Staff were then
randomly selected from each list. The proportion of staff in the final sample
corresponded with the proportion of offenders that were interviewed at each institution.
As a result, the largest proportion of the staff sample was selected from the medium
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