ould go out and but air-conditioned tents for all prisoners, but certainly if they aretreated better, they will behave better, and this proves it.Another topic of debate with capital offenders issecurity, especially with those who got life in prison. Withthat kind of sentence, no one wants that person out on thestreet. This debatable topic is brought to the attention ofthose in Montana by Michael Erskine in the article "Dozens ofKillers in Medium Security." Eskine states "records show that52 of the 177 Montana...convicted of homicide offenses (Erskine1)". This means that around 30% of the inmates are serving fora capital crime. With that kind of figure, one would think thatthis prison would be maximum security for the safety ofsociety, especially those in Montana. But that is quite thecase as "a pair that escaped May 20 [1999](Erskine 1)" are nowa harm to society. There may have been more since this articlewas written only a month after that escape. This is "a mediumsecurity prison handling maximum security inmates,(Erskine 1)"Erskine says in his article. The people of Montana and society,in general are not being protected as they should. Though thisis only one prison, there are sure to be others with the samesituation, where there are too many capital offenders for theprison not to be maximum security prison. Perhaps one of the most important aspects of prison lifeis the rehabilitation part of being in prison. With capitalpunishment often being life in prison, capital offenders arethe most likely for rehabilitation. Chapter 2 of the textbookstates how the U.S Catholic Bishops feel about rehabilitation,saying "The most important purpose of prisons... isrehabilitation (textbook 36)." This shows that Christians feelthe re-orienting and reforming of a person is key to prisonersand very important in all prisons and in all cases. The beliefhere is that everyone must have a chance, and that everyone, nomatter who you are, going to make mistak...
