Grey Owls Committee – Hope For Change

Zines and other statements from the Grey Owls Committee / Hope For Change organization in Pennsylvania DOC

Elderly Pennsylvania Lifers’ Plea for Redemption and Compassion

By Anthony Brown

Mary lifers in the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections (PA DOC) have developed health problems over the years due to inadequate health care and poor nutrition. Elderly Pennsylvania (PA) lifers often find it difficult to remember conversations they have shared with fellow inmates In general, lifers in PA would like to come face-to face with the ones they’ve hurt or members of his/her family, and the community to express how sorry they are for the crime or crimes they have committed, as well as to continue efforts to plead for redemption / compassion. Unfortunately, the health issues of elderly lifers in PA are robbing them of the opportunities to express the regret and compassion they have toward those they’ve hurt.

Dementia, poor eyesight, and respiratory ailments are just some of the health problems elderly PA lifers are experiencing. A healthy PA lifer would build bridges to victim advocates if given a 2nd chance and this is why elderly PA lifers should be considered for Redemption / Compassionate Release. Making pleas for redemption / compassion are nothing more than a healing process between victims and lifers. It is proven that this process works. PA,
unlike other states, does not have any type of Redemption Project.

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, over 130,000 of U.S. prisoners are elderly, a 400% increase between 1993 and 2013. Across the nation and in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s Correctional System, eldarly prisoners experience a tortuous journey toward the end of their ives without any sort of redemption or compassionate release. While twenty-five percent of the PA DOC inmates are 50 years of age or older, 50% of the elderly PA liters are 50 and over – 53% of the female lifers and 43% of the male. The actual numbers of elderly PA lifers are: 103 females and 2,139 males. On April 30, 2015, there were 162 lifers in PA age 70 years and older, 25 of those were 80 years or older.

In analyzing the cost of a life sentence, age is a major factor. The total cost to confine all PA inmates in fiscal year 2017 was $2.356 billion or $47,599 per inmate. In fiscal 2016, the total medication cost for those over age 50 was almost $21 million, the same amount spent on the entire under 50 inmate population.

Using the previous calculation of $47,509 to house a PA inmate in general population and factoring the increased cost for medical care and medication for the senior age group, ie those over 50 years of age, the annual cost doubles or triples. A conservative estimate of the total cost to the taxpayers to house a PA genior lifer during fiscal year 2017 was $95,196.

The national average for Life Without Parole Sentences is 39 years of imprisonment. If an inmate entered prison at the age of 25 and passed away at 64 and the average cost to post-sentencing rehabilitation programs and educational accomplishments, then releasing half of senior lifers would save $4.6 billion.

There are many other opportunity costs that could be applied to this analysis of the cost of a life sentence in PA. The goal of all elderly PA lifers is to educate and to raise the issue of the $3.6 million cost per lifer for the length of their incarceration to the taxpayers of PA. The main question for the taxpayers is very simple – Do you want to continue spending $2.3 billion annually to fund the PA DOC, particularly when the limited financial resources are needed elsewhere? Elderly PA lifers and lifers in general in the PA DOC would like to educate everyone, to let them know that the system is broken and in great need of Criminal Justice Reform. If this practice continues, the state and this country would be nothing more than a penal colony of the 15th Century.

Anthony Brown is serving a life sentence in Pennsylvania. He can be reached at:

Anthony Brown LG 8593
SCI Forest
PO BOX 33028
St. Petersburg, FL 33733

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