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Date Posted: 16:46:44 10/09/11 Sun
Author: Sad facts. Help each other.
Subject: Corrections. Where criminal justice never sleeps.

Stopping Correctional Worker Suicide
By Caterina Spinaris Tudor , Ph.D.
Published: 03/08/2010

The corrections field is plagued with the scourge of staff suicide. Recent statistics from New Jersey show that corrections officers commit suicide at over double the rates of police officers and the general population. From 2003 through 2007, for males ages 25-64, per 100,000 the suicide rate for C.O.s was 34.8, for police 15.1, and for the general population 14.0. (NJ Police Suicide Task Force Rpt.pdf).

These are startling numbers. What might they be due to? Corrections workers have to deal with whatever we all face�financial, family and personal issues. On top of that they are regularly exposed to the darkest of the dark of the human condition�violence, horrific crimes, mental illness, suffering, investigations and jaded coworkers. Life is very cheap behind the walls, perhaps making one�s own death a more acceptable option to some. Here are some grim examples of recent correctional workers� suicides, including a gruesome murder-suicide.

On 8/4/09, Essex County, NJ, Corrections Officer Kelley McKenith wounded her boyfriend and then shot and killed her 4-month-old baby before taking her own life.

After leaving the Union County Jail, NJ, at lunch hour on 9/2/09, Frank Congiusta, a 16-year veteran Corrections Officer fatally shot himself with a handgun inside his vehicle parked just down the street from the jail.

Of course the same pattern exists in other states. On 1/25/10 a 6-year North Carolina Correctional Officer on perimeter patrol at the Pasquotank Correctional Institution, a high security prison for adult men at Elizabeth City, used her service revolver to kill herself on the job.

Correctional worker suicide is not limited to the U.S. In the Gauteng region of South Africa in 2009 alone FOURTEEN (14) Corrections Officers died by suicide!

What can we do to stem this suicide epidemic among corrections personnel?

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Re: Corrections. Where criminal justice never sleeps. -- Vet CO, 07:11:27 12/11/11 Sun