Life doesn’t have to end behind bars, says ex-inmate, among those urging more addictions help in Ontario jails | 24CA News
Alicia Gordon spends most of her days serving to girls concerned within the felony justice system get again on their ft, attempting to provide them hope.
She understands how tough it may be, as a result of only a few years in the past, Gordon was at her lowest level.
Addiction had taken all the things away from her — her dwelling, her profession, her kids and her freedom — leaving Gordon behind bars in a northern Ontario jail.
But it was at the moment, collaborating in a specialised addictions therapy program whereas serving a sentence on the Algoma Remand and Treatment Centre (ARTC) in Sault Ste. Marie, that she was given the instruments and the idea she might get well.
“There is always hope. I was as far gone as anyone could get, and I still have managed to crawl my way back to some form of stabilization,” Gordon mentioned.
They made me notice that my life did not have to finish behind bars.– Alicia Gordon, who served a sentence at Algoma Remand and Treatment Centre
“They made me realize that my life didn’t have to end behind bars, that there was another way.”
But with simply eight therapy beds in all the province for incarcerated girls, Gordon mentioned, there are fairly merely not sufficient assets to assist individuals residing with habit.
Gordon and different advocates say Ontario must act on its guarantees to offer extra therapy in jails — particularly because the addictions disaster continues and the province strikes ahead on plans to construct new correctional services.
Large proportion of inmates scuffling with habit
Gordon was first held in custody on remand in 2019, earlier than pleading responsible to numerous costs within the spring of 2020 — simply because the COVID-19 pandemic was declared.
“They had shut down all programming and it was very isolating,” Gordon mentioned.
“You’re just thrown into a box. There’s no hope in that. There is no way to try to start setting things up so you’re successful once you’re released.”
Gordon mentioned many of the different girls she met behind bars have been additionally scuffling with a substance habit.
“From my own experience, the majority of individuals are in custody because of addiction issues in some way. Even people that I had met who were serving for assault and murder usually were on some kind of substance when that crime was committed.”
WATCH | Alicia Gordon tells her story of habit and restoration:
Alicia Gordon spent years scuffling with an habit to crack cocaine, resulting in felony costs. Now, she’s devoted her life to serving to others in Thunder Bay, and is sharing her story to encourage hope.
Ontario’s Ministry of the Solicitor General didn’t present any statistics concerning the variety of provincial inmates — serving a sentence of two years much less a day — who’ve been identified with substance use problems.
Judith Gadbois-St-Cyr, a spokesperson with Correctional Service Canada, mentioned their analysis estimates about 61 per cent of inmates have earlier or present alcohol and substance use problems at admission to jail, and the quantity is nearer to 85 per cent for Indigenous women and men.
In 2017, the then chief commissioner of the Ontario Human Rights Commission, Renu Mandhane, toured the provincial jail in Kenora and located that each inmate struggled with psychological well being or addictions problems.
Academic analysis has additionally demonstrated the connection between addictions and the provincial corrections system.
Between 2006 and 2013, one in 10 individuals who died from a drug-related overdose have been launched from an Ontario jail inside one 12 months, in accordance to a peer-reviewed article printed in 2016 within the multidisciplinary journal PLOS One.
More therapy wanted for individuals in incarceration
While serving her sentences, Gordon hung out at three provincial jails in northern Ontario. None of them provided her addictions therapy like what she obtained whereas within the specialised program on the ARTC.
“I needed the tools to find a way to battle my addiction,” she mentioned.
To get in this system, Gordon mentioned, she needed to wait till she was free from any misconduct for 90 days. Once in, therapy was scheduled 4 or 5 days per week, with programming happening all through the day.
Gordon mentioned the facilitator confirmed her that life past habit was attainable, helped her apply for therapy and helps as soon as her sentence ended, and impressed her to work within the addictions subject — which she does now on the Elizabeth Fry Society of Northwestern Ontario.
“She was beyond generous, had tonnes of compassion, and she supported me outside of the program as well.”
Debbie Reed needs one thing like that might have been obtainable for her son Johnny, who died of a drug overdose in March 2020. Now, she is a founding member of Thunder Bay’s Gone Too Soon bereavement group for folks whose kids died from drug overdose.
She mentioned Johnny turned to crime to assist his habit, however when he ended up in a provincial correctional facility, there was nothing for him.
“Johnny sat in jail for a horrible 23 hours a day with a cellmate [who told me], ‘We just sat in there and thought of better ways to do this crap,'” Reed mentioned.
For anybody sentenced to a provincial jail, Reed mentioned, a part of the sentence must be therapy if the crime is habit associated.
She believes that if that have been the case for her son, who died from an overdose simply weeks after his launch, he would nonetheless be alive.
“When Johnny got thrown into jail, if he had been thrown straight into a treatment centre, we would not be talking about a Johnny deceased — we would be talking about a Johnny recovered.”
Uneven therapy throughout Ontario
According to a spokesperson with Ontario’s solicitor basic, “substance use programs are offered at most provincial facilities,” As effectively, the spokesperson’s electronic mail mentioned, inmates who’ve points with substance use on the time of admission are offered health-care helps like protocols to handle withdrawal and opioid substitution therapies.
The province can be working to extend programming and rent extra addictions counsellors as a part of its Corrections Mental Health and Addictions Strategy, and is constructing new areas in present and new provincial jails to offer programming, the spokesperson mentioned.
But no specifics have been offered. For instance, the federal government is spending $1.2 billion to construct a brand new 345-bed correctional facility in Thunder Bay, however the spokesperson didn’t reply a query about specialised or intensive addictions therapy.
Part of the issue is the care and programming that people obtain differ relying on the establishment they’re despatched to, mentioned Dr. Lori Regenstreif, a professor within the division of household medication at Hamilton’s McMaster University who works in addictions and first correctional well being.
“It doesn’t seem to matter how big the city is, or how long people stay or what the charges are — it’s just uneven,” she mentioned, including the corrections system is a vital setting for intensive therapy, if it is accessible to individuals.
“The imprisonment experience actually becomes a recovery experience, and I think that’s key,” Regenstreif mentioned.
“If you’re just sticking people behind bars and telling them that you just sit there and do your timeout for eight months or whatever, then you’re not doing anything — not just for them, but for the rest of society.”
Dale Guenther, a McMaster University professor and a household doctor working in Ontario’s jail system, mentioned virtually each go to he has with a affected person in jail is said to psychological well being or habit points — typically prescribing drugs to ease the signs of withdrawal and assist with stabilization.
“Once a person is in the institution, we have an unbelievable opportunity to shower them in all the things we know can help and can work … we’re not doing that at this point,” Guenther mentioned.
But the shortage of assets inside provincial jails is solely a mirrored image of society, he mentioned.
“If we had great addiction and mental health treatment in the community, then we probably wouldn’t have nearly as many people in our institutions in the first place.”
Guenther added that it is not merely a matter of offering extra companies; in addition they must be evidence-based, inexpensive and simply accessible — which is not taking place now.
