Unintended Consequences of Regulatory Restraints to Control Sexual Abuse of Female Prisoners in Correctional Facilities

Abstract

Community activists and state legislators have expressed great concern over the sexual abuse of female prisoners by corrections officers (CO)s. The purpose of the current empirical case study was to explore COs’ experience with gender-mandated job roles in a correctional facility. Eleven retired COs were interviewed to determine if the job change prohibiting 15 male COs from working inside female prisoner housing units had an effect on employee morale. Data was collected using face-to-face interviews with semi structured open-ended questions. Five themes emerged in our findings: (1) process change, (2) interpersonal relationships, (3) employee development, (4) management optimization, and (5) strategies for improvement. The results revealed prohibiting male corrections officers from working inside female prisoner housing units decreased employee morale