Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 26, 1995 TAG: 9502240034
SECTION: HORIZON PAGE: G4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NASHVILLE LENGTH: Long
Bold letters on a pink background make him hard to miss: "Help me overcome my irrational behavior," the sign reads.
But Battle, who is wearing the sign for 10 days as punishment for threatening another inmate at the Metro Davidson County Detention Facility, is more sincere than sheepish.
"What this sign does is bring up my awareness," Battle says. "It makes me not want to make the same mistake again."
Battle's biggest mistake was getting hooked on drugs. He is serving a one-year sentence for possession of cocaine at the Metro facility, a private prison operated by Corrections Corporation of America.
Unlike the hundreds of thousands of inmates who are prisoners to substance abuse, Battle is getting real help. He is enrolled in LifeLine, an intensive, long-term program aimed at helping him overcome his drug addiction while accepting discipline and responsibility.
The program lasts for at least six months, and offers 254 inmates around-the-clock treatment in a special unit that LifeLine Director Bob Kennington calls a "therapeutic family community."
The LifeLine program is unlike anything offered by the Tennessee Department of Corrections. In state prisons in Tennessee and elsewhere, Kennington says, most drug treatment programs might consist of an hourlong meeting once or twice a week.
"There's about as much difference as daylight and dark" between CCA's program and substance abuse counseling in state prisons, Kennington says.
CCA operates LifeLine even though the program is not required by its contract with Nashville and Davidson County; a fact that may silence critics who say rehabilitative services could suffer in private prisons as companies look for ways to save money.
The program is just 20 months old. But it has become so successful that CCA plans to duplicate it in other prisons, using the concept as a marketing tool as it seeks to expand its business to new locations - including the proposed prison in Wythe County.
In a nearly nonstop series of group therapy sessions, public confessions, and one-on-one counseling from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m., LifeLine participants are forced to come to grips not just with their drug or alcohol problems, but with their personality flaws.
"Maybe for the first time, they get to open up about things that have been inside of them all their lives, things that they have been able to block out by using drugs and alcohol," Kennington said.
"My philosophy is it's not how far you fall, but how high you bounce back up that matters."
Inside the two cellblocks that are devoted to the LifeLine program, the environment appears to be a cross between an elementary school and a medium-security prison.
Gray carpet covers the floors, and the walls are decorated with colorful posters with slogans like "Tough times never last, but tough people do," and "We cannot become what we need to become by remaining what we are."
In the corners are "quiet chairs," where disorderly participants are banished for 30-minute intervals.
The large room is lined by two levels of cells, which face into a day area where the group therapy sessions are held. On this particular day, what is most noticeable is the library-like silence - a striking contrast with the constant level of chatter and shouting in most prison settings.
When Kennington walks in, the 127 inmates who have been seated in folding chairs rise to their feet as one, and silently link their arms together as if prompted by an unspoken cue.
"Good afternoon, family," Kennington says.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Kennington!" the men shout in unison, creating a deafening noise that bounces off the cellblock's concrete walls like a ricochet cannon shot.
The group then recites the LifeLine creed. "We, the residents of LifeLine Therapeutic Community, having experienced a consuming hunger for a better way of life, unite as one with our brothers, knowing that it is through each other that we may gain the courage to accept the painful mistakes of our past, and the wisdom to learn from those mistakes."
The recitation continues for several minutes. If commitment to change can be measured by volume alone, it seems doubtful that anyone in the room will ever go back to smoking or drinking.
About half the men in LifeLine are there because they volunteered, having completed an application and screening process while in the Metro prison's main population. The other half were sent by local judges, who have recognized the program as a valuable sentencing tool.
LifeLine has three phases: a 28-day orientation that requires each participant to attend classes and write his life story; a primary treatment phase that features the heart of the group therapy teaching over 14 weeks; and a senior phase that prepares potential graduates to re-enter society while serving as mentors to new participants.
The rules and regulations at LifeLine are so numerous and so stringent that it takes 60 hours of classes in the orientation phase to cover them all.
Offenders might have to wear a sign like Battle's, or the one that Wallace Overstreet bore - "All I let you see is my happy face, a mask, but the real me is an immature child."
Other forms of punishment include scrubbing shower stalls with a toothbrush, sitting in one of the "quiet chairs," and singing and dancing in front of the program's entire population.
Throughout it all, participants are encouraged to open up, sharing their own painful life experiences, and learning from others who have lost the same struggles. The inmates sometimes sit face to face in "relating chairs," so close together that their knees nearly touch, and discuss their problems for hours.
"This is not a spectator sport," Kennington said. "You have to participate and get yourself involved in the process."
It is by no coincidence that Kennington himself is a recovering drug addict, having spent four years in a Texas prison on a heroin charge. Many of his lessons are by example, and from the heart.
"It's important for them to see that if I can do it, they can do it," he said.
It is too soon to say for sure how well LifeLine works, but early recidivism statistics offer an encouraging picture. A comparison of the program's graduates to inmates paroled from the regular prison population found that only 8 percent of LifeLine participants were arrested again, as compared with 22 percent of the other offenders.
Kennington is also encouraged by LifeLine graduates who attend their own meetings after being paroled - 31 of them at a session he recently visited. "That's 31 guys who could be out there robbing you or breaking into your house," he said.
Criminologists may debate the pros and cons of drug treatment programs, but Ernest Anderson is perhaps the best expert.
"I'm a career criminal," said Anderson, a LifeLine participant doing 12 years for robbery, drug charges and probation violations.
"I've been to almost every prison in the state of Tennessee," he said, "and this is by far the best living conditions and the best rehabilitation situation that I've been in."
"I should be in a penitentiary. But by the grace of God, I'm here."
by CNB