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Summary Of Life Behind Bars In America By Michael G. Santos

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A. Life in prison is not the path any average person wanders down, or perhaps even plan for. Also, it is safe to assume that any person who has been to prison would let the outsiders know that is not fun, nor is it a life anyone devotes to living. In Michael G. Santos’s book, Inside: Life Behind Bars in America, Santos explains what living behind bars in America is like. Unlike most of the population in prison for violent offenses, Santos was in prison for the opposite reasons: a major drug bust. Santos was also sentenced to federal prison, instead of a state/local prison, for forty-five years which stemmed from a high-profile cocaine bust that occurred in Miami, Florida. Thanks to the war on drugs, Santos ended up sending a total of a little …show more content…

Michael G. Santos did not write this book to just past time in prison, but also wrote this book to teach people what life is like in prison. Living in prison, Santos describes as invasive and dehumanizing. Santos also describes living in prison like being a machine, where the prisoner is the robotic machine, and the correctional offciers, who Santos says doesn’t do very much correcting, is the person in charge of keeping the robot in routine and constantly on schedule. Not only does Santos describe what life is like in prison, but Santos also describes what goes on in prison. Santos states that some female correctional officer serve as prostitutes to inmates, such as Lion, the leader of prison gang who used female correctional officers as toys for his pleasure. Though this book describes what life is like, Santos also uses this book to help outsiders understand the prison system and how prisoners cope. For Santo’s coping came easy. To cope with prison, Santo’s got his masters, physically worked out, and wrote books by hand, but used his wife to get them published while he remained in …show more content…

Implications for this book include Santos’s desire to help fix the prison system and the mass incarceration issue the U.S is facing. Santos is also helping other that are being prosecuted by the failing system. Upon being released and piecing his life back together, Santos started his own foundation called the Michael G Santos foundation. Through this foundation, Santos is helping bring awareness to the socials issues that result from mass incarceration while also helping former prisoner transition and integrate successfully back into the work force. Through Santos’s hard work and commitment, Santos successfully helped Maine’s department of corrections enhance their prison system by the virtue of his own programs that he has developed post

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