More love for prisoners than for students?

Stone Walls do not a Prison make, 

Nor Iron bars a Cage;

school? prison? other?

Photo by J. Harrington

Unless the Minnesota legislature loves prisoners more than students, or believes that school resource officers have better judgement than prison guards, I don’t understand why they’re considering changing last year’s legislation prohibiting certain holds in schools, that have been and are still banned in prisons.

The language protecting prisoners is found in HF 63   2nd Engrossment - 92nd Legislature, 2021 1st Special Session (2021 - 2021):

243.52 DISCIPLINE; PREVENTION OF ESCAPE; DUTY TO REPORT.
Subdivision 1.

Discipline and prevention of escape

If any inmate of person confined or incarcerated in any adult correctional facility either under the control of the commissioner of corrections or licensed by the commissioner of corrections under section 241.021 assaults any correctional officer or any other person or inmate, the assaulted person may use force 
in defense of the assault, except as limited in this section. If any inmate confined or incarcerated person attempts to damage the buildings or appurtenances, resists the lawful authority of any correctional officer, refuses to obey the correctional officer's reasonable demands, or attempts to escape, the correctional officer may enforce obedience and discipline or prevent escape by the use of force. If any inmate confined or incarcerated person resisting lawful authority is wounded or killed by the use of force by the correctional officer or assistants, that conduct is authorized under this section.

Subd. 2.

Use of force.

(a) Use of force must not be applied maliciously or sadistically 
for the purpose of causing harm to a confined or incarcerated person.

(b) Unless the use of deadly force is justified in this section, a correctional officer working in an adult correctional facility either under the control of the commissioner of corrections or licensed by the commissioner under section 241.021 may not use any of the following restraints:

(1) a choke hold;

(2) a prone restraint;

(3) tying all of a person's limbs together behind the person's back to render the person immobile; or

(4) securing a person in any way that results in transporting the person face down in a vehicle, except as directed by a medical professional.

The legislative session that started yesterday has, as a priority, responding to the kinds of issues raised in this article: Prone restraint is banned in Minnesota prisons, yet controversy continues about a ban in schools. Perhaps the issue could be resolved by taking the language relative to prisons and adding school resource officers and including commissioner of education in addition to corrections. For the life of me I don’t understand the furor. Maybe an even better solution would be to prohibit licensed police from serving as school resource officers and using the money saved to add teachers and mental health professionals?

School-to-Prison Pants

By Clemonce Heard

After Laurie Thomas

They had to be Dickies®, not Dockers®.

They had to include a cellphone pocket

on the right leg, & feign a faint hanging

off our tails in spite of a belt’s strangling

support. They had to scream prison, jail,

scream water’s rising, scream help-p-p-p

from the lowest floor. But unlike water

they couldn’t rise, couldn’t obey a warden

lest they risk being jive. They had to be

spread wider than bars. They couldn’t be

starched or pressed, but steamed via dryer.

They had to be creaseless, but crisp, khaki

as a waterline staining crest-white Nikes®;

Forces. Lord forbid they be high waters.

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