Not that I’m advocating guns in prison, I’m just curious why it doesn’t happen. I saw a tv show about a prison in a south american country, and guns were everywhere inside the prison. I forget the country as I saw this years ago, but looking on google apparently places like Brazil or Venezuela have issues with inmates getting guns.
They can smuggle cell phones, drugs and cigarettes into prison fairly easily. A network of visitors, corrupt guards, people passing things over the fence, etc. gets contraband into prison.
I know prisons are full of knives which are made from material found in the prisons, but there are many guns that are about as compact as a large cell phone. A 32 or 25 with hollow point bullets would be more damaging than a shank. If they can smuggle in cigarettes or cell phones, what is to stop them from smuggling in extremely small firearms?
So I guess my question is, how do prisons keep the guns out so well? Even zip guns seem like they’d be fairly easy to get into a prison, at the very least a box of ammo wouldn’t be hard to get in I’d assume.
In some prison lockdowns, the guards may find large numbers of makeshift knives. But I get the impression guns and bullets are rare.
Is it that inmates don’t need guns because they are in close proximity?
Is it because the penalty is so high that even the inmates refuse to use them?
Is it because corrupt guards are needed to smuggle, and they refuse to bring guns in?
Whatever prisons are doing to keep guns out seems to be working. But it seems like inmates would have a strong incentive to bring guns in. If a gang fight broke out, 10 inmates with handguns would have the advantage over 10 with shanks.
Except for a prison break it is difficult to see the use of a gun whilst locked up.
Any discharge — and no use using it as a threat unless you are willing to follow through if needs be — and it’s not like they don’t know where to find you.
They try. Google “prisoner hides gun in his ass” and prepare to spend some time reading. They get caught, generally speaking, before the gun is of any use to them.
Guns have only two good uses in prison, as I see it.
Used in a break-out.
Use to murder another inmate who may be difficult to reach via the usual shankings and such. The guy doing the shooting is scrod, legally. So, we’re looking at a lifer or other with nothing to lose and who is motivated by gang loyalty or payment to family on the outside.
Corrupt prison guards might be willing to look the other way for drugs and other contraband, but even the most corrupt wants to go home after his shift is done. Guns in the hands of hardened criminals make that much less likely to happen, as in prison riot unlikely. Not even the worst guard will give an inmate that kind of leeway.
What Airman said. Most of the contraband smuggled in is carried by prison employees. Smokes, drugs, and phones aren’t directly useful as weapons against employees. Guns on the other hand…
Lifers make up only about 4% of the guys in my system. They get extra attention, but most of them want to build a comfy nest within the prison, not live out their time in segregation.
And stabbings and beatings carry lesser charges than gun use, as a rule. And are less likely to result in new charges (not unlikely, LESS likely). They’re harder to prove who did what, for one thing. Guns, less so.
This is a very funny sentence.