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  California prisons are plagued with gangs and gang violence, otherwise called Security Threat Groups (STG). Prisoners are normally separated by general population (GP) yards or sensitive needs yards (SNY).  Both of these designations have significant STG activity.  When a person is incarcerated and becomes an inmate, what is the reality of life?

     CDCR will have you believe that prison is a place with endless opportunities and is up to the incarcerated individual to apply themselves and take advantage of the resources and programs.  The prison system is structured in a way that limits the opportunity of individuals in a positive way.  If an inmate enters the prison system as a non-affiliated individual, especially if they enter at the third or fourth level, the likelihood of them being coerced into STG activity is high.  It would seem as though an inmate would be able to rely on prison staff to deal with the situation how - they would on Columbo, Matlock or SVU, but the reality is that correction staff will see this as weakness and exploit the situation for their benefit, like, turning the individual into a confidential informant (CI).

     Most incarcerated adults have no faith - that their life can or will consist of anything other than incarceration or parole.  Most incarcerated adults in CDCR have been in juvenile facilities or youth camps and psychologically, do not have the ability to know anything else.  A non-affiliated adult has minimum chance to navigate through the complex culture of prison that STG members have been involved in since they were juveniles.

     The opportunities provided to incarcerated individuals are provided to "handpicked inmates" who will not disrupt the status quo and agenda of CDCR, which is - to rehabilitate CDCR's image and promote the status of correctional staff.  The correction and rehabilitation of incarcerated individuals is only significant, to serve that purpose.  Corrections and rehabilitation are not the intention of CDCR programs.