ISSUES AND PRACTICES.pdf - The Counseling Team International

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them, which he did. I then took the officers to a conference room and asked how they weredoing. They talked for 30 minutes and then said they were OK.Then I hooked up with another unit team member, and together we took up a collection in thefacility to buy flowers. We took them to the wife's house. We offered our condolences and saidwe were available to help. We went back to the house again the next day, and we went to thefuneral parlor and the funeral. We kept in touch after the funeral.The only request the wife made was to have her husband buried in his uniform. The unit teamleader made the necessary arrangements with the department administrators.If it hadn't been for the peer team, we would not have gone to the wife's home, and I wouldn'thave talked with the two other officers because they were not working on my shift.Does the Two-Tier Approach Have Advantages?According to Ed Owens, the Institutional Division's deputy director for support services, the twotiersystem makes it possible to have a response based on the severity of the incident andemployees' needs. If an incident has not created severe stress, the unit team can handle it withjust peer support. If an incident has had a severe impact, the regional team can address it with aprofessionally led debriefing.In addition, Owens says, having a separate unit team within each facility enables wardens--"whogo through a metamorphosis when they have been promoted and end up feeling they areindependent"--to feel, "I have my team--these are my folk."For further information, contact:Elaine SmithVictim Service CoordinatorInstitutional DivisionTexas Department of Criminal JusticeP.O. Box 99Huntsville, TX 77342-0099(936) 437-8588New York State's Department of Correctional ServicesPost-Incident Stress Debriefing ProgramBrief Program OverviewAfter a critical incident, the assistant commissioner of the New York State Department ofCorrectional Services selects from a pool of staff who are certified debriefers five or sixindividuals whom he sends to the facility to conduct debriefings. The team refers involvedemployees, as needed, to the State's employee assistance program for followup professionalcounseling.
In 1998, the New York State Department of Correctional Services had 22,315 correctionalofficers and 9,156 civilians employed in 70 facilities. In the early 1990s, a small group ofcorrectional officers, on their own time and at their own expense, had undergone training toconduct critical incident debriefings as part of the voluntary firefighting work they did off thejob. The group had urged the department to establish an in-house critical incident debriefingprocess.As a result, in 1993 the assistant commissioner organized these trained employees into a Post-Incident Stress Debriefing Program (PISD). However, the program remained dormant until a riotat the Mohawk Correctional Facility, in effect, served as a pilot test of the approach-and theimpetus to formalize it. According to a correctional officer at the prison, "As terrible as Mohawkwas, it got the [PISD] program instituted statewide."After the Mohawk experience, the PISD model was used again successfully in another facilityafter an inmate raped a female staff member and in still another facility after an inmate stabbedan officer 10 times.Mohawk: A test of the systemThe Mohawk Correctional Facility is a 1,305-bed medium security institution with 19 buildingson 75 acres. At the time of the riot, it had 440 security staff (not all on duty). There were 350inmates in the yard at the time of the incident. Once the yard was secured, staff identified 150 ofthese inmates as actual participants in the incident. Eleven staff were seriously injured; eightothers were less seriously hurt.The riotOn Thursday, July 17, 1997, a young inmate in disciplinary housing hanged himself using asheet tied around a cover on the smoke detector in his cell. The inmate left a suicide note to bemailed to his mother. Other inmates spread the rumor that officers murdered the young man andset it up to look like a suicide. At the same time, a severe thunderstorm disabled Mohawk's entirephone system, including the inmate telephones. Inmates concluded that administrators haddeliberately turned off the phones to prevent them from discussing the "murder" with outsiders.The facility's executive staff went to the housing units to assure them that the inmate's death wasa suicide.On July 19, a large group of inmates, infuriated by their misconception of an "inmate murder,"assaulted a number of officers. After the inmates had been confined to one yard, they used a barto pry up the containment fence in an attempt to crawl into the rest of the facility. Chemicalagents were used to stop the inmates, and they were contained within the yard. AfterCorrectional Emergency Response Teams from other facilities arrived, the inmates wereremoved from the yard in groups of 10.Logistics
Page 1 and 2: ISSUES AND PRACTICESAuthor: Peter F
Page 3 and 4: The various program options present
Page 5 and 6: Program overviewCollaboration with
Page 7 and 8: An unproven interventionPotential b
Page 9 and 10: Executive SummaryAddressing Correct
Page 11 and 12: One officer said, "The public hasn'
Page 13 and 14: Correctional officer union official
Page 15 and 16: Doing the job carefully in records
Page 17 and 18: 2. "Commissioner Locks Down Prison
Page 19 and 20: Chapter 2The Extent and Sources of
Page 21 and 22: In many prisons and jails, there ar
Page 23 and 24: promising not to create trouble or
Page 25 and 26: 6. Martinez, A.R., "Corrections Off
Page 27 and 28: How to Cope with Job Burnout, New Y
Page 29 and 30: e. Kamerman, J., "Corrections Offic
Page 31 and 32: Family Service Society serves only
Page 33 and 34: Society also provides inservice tra
Page 35 and 36: Family Service Society refers emplo
Page 37 and 38: Staff more likely to be viewed by o
Page 39 and 40: Unit team responsibilitiesTypically
Page 41: officers were involved. We took tur
Page 45 and 46: An officer and a lieutenant, both o
Page 47 and 48: Bruce W. BakerAssistant Commissione
Page 49 and 50: Technical assistance and training t
Page 51 and 52: Chapter 4Program Staffing, Training
Page 53 and 54: Most new clinicians fill in their g
Page 55 and 56: wanted the best. In addition, the p
Page 57 and 58: Each New York State Department of C
Page 59 and 60: DOCs and sheriff's departments can
Page 61 and 62: Counseling Team] that it's OK to sa
Page 63 and 64: Outreach to line officers is essent
Page 65 and 66: The program permits team members to
Page 67 and 68: Exhibit 5-1 Union MemorandumAccordi
Page 69 and 70: The Counseling Team and Rhode Islan
Page 71 and 72: grant ended in December 1998, Sheri
Page 73 and 74: Snacks, lunch, and child care were
Page 75 and 76: As with wardens, seeing is believin
Page 77 and 78: 1. For further information about th
Page 79 and 80: department. However, the rules of c
Page 81 and 82: John Near, the South Carolina DOC's
Page 83 and 84: While there is no evidence that deb
Page 85 and 86: Organizational changes departments
Page 87 and 88: * Appelbaum, P.S., and T.G. Gutheil
Page 89 and 90: Telephone hotline, providing 24-hou
Page 91 and 92: Chapter 7Evaluation, Funding, and T
Page 93 and 94:
the regional teams and facility adm
Page 95 and 96:
A psychologist hired under the gran
Page 97 and 98:
Assuming four of the five unit memb
Page 99 and 100:
consultation.
Page 101 and 102:
the survey that will follow." The r
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