Sunday, March 29, 2009
BY CHRIS STURGIS
Special to the Times

 

HIGHTSTOWN--Prisons should prepare convicts to be productive, law-abiding citizens upon release, but too often they function as warehouses for low-level offenders, said the Rev. Robert T. Schulze, director of the Prison Ministry of the Diocese of Trenton.

Schulze spoke at yesterday's annual Prison Ministry Forum at St. Anthony of Padua Church in Hightstown, where about 50 people, including prison chaplains, citizens who volunteer in prisons and former inmates came together to discuss how they can help.

Schultze said in his 35 years of work with inmates, he has seen a trend toward longer sentences for nonviolent offenses, while services to help former prisoners adjust to life on the outside have waned.

The guest speaker was Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-Mercer), the New Jersey Assembly's majority leader, who hosted a series of hearings last fall on the vicious cycle of re-arrest and re-incarceration.

"We have an awesome task ahead of us," she said. "The involvement of faith-based communities is so crucial, because of your legitimacy, because of what you stand for, and because of what you believe in," she said.

A group of former inmates addressed the audience, identifying themselves only by first name.

Speaking quietly and shyly, John said he made a successful transition following 17 years in the state prison system. He said he succeeded because of the chaplain and volunteers who worked with him while he was behind bars.

"If it weren't for people like you, I would have come out with a hardened heart," he said. "You preserve a soft place in the human heart in a system that often convinces us to do otherwise."

Another former inmate, Dennis, said he struggled in the halfway house to which he was released after his 25-year sentence came to close. He described himself as a career thief who knew nothing about holding a job. He only knew how to talk to others in a loud, assertive way suited to the coarse, all-male environment of prison.

John and Stacey Kindt also spoke of their incarceration for their highly publicized plan to take John's children from a previous marriage. Her conviction was later overturned by the state Supreme Court.

John Kindt said despite the public perception of inmates, he met some extremely kind people, including one who gave him the sweatshirt off of his back because he was freezing one night in a county jail.  "It was all he had," Kindt said.

Stacey Kindt has since founded Redeem-Her, an organization that gives women housing and assistance when they finish their prison sentences.
She said the ex-inmates often arrive with no driver's license, no work skills and no clothing suitable for a job interview. They receive an ex-offender ID, but it is of little value for identification because it is stamped with the words "This is not a legal document."

More information about her organization can be found at Redeem-Her.org.

One audience member, John Carlucci of St. Mary's Church in Colts Neck, said he has been visiting prisoners at Trenton State Prison since the day a prison chaplain invited him 12 years ago.  He said he now considers the inmates his friends, and his service has "put flesh on my faith," he said.

"The system believes that if you punish someone long enough, they will not want to go back to prison and will do only honest work, but the system does nothing to make them ready for honest work," he said.