Conjujal Visit Essay

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Many places have different views on the act of visitation for the incarcerated. While many foreign countries and a number of states see visitation, specifically conjugal visits, as a right of the inmate, in (article number 1)“ The Cost of Conjugal Visitation Outweighs The Benefits” other places such as the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction sees conjugal visit as a lost privilege, a liability to the facility, and a risk to society. For jails such as the ODRC, the disadvantages entirely outweigh the advantages. Contrary to the beliefs of foreign countries and some states, the ODRC sees conjugal visits as an increased risk of safety for the visitor. This is due in part that there is known evidence that “male perpetrators of family violence remain predisposed to committing further violence during conjugal visits.” Such a visit, being that it is private and unsupervised, wouldn’t be the ideal safest place for a visitor who may have or has the possibility of suffering at the hands of a violent inmate. This is why supervised visitation is promoted and practiced; visits can remain stable and controlled. The ODRC also stands by the fact that enabling inmates to have conjugal visits puts the sexual partner of the offender at risk for sexually transmitted diseases due to the incredibly high rate of STDs throughout the inmate population. When we consider conjugal visits, for facilities that do not support the idea, there is a deeper moral consideration taking place and that is the fact that there is the risk of the inmate, whether it be male or female, producing a child. This could bring forth a child that may not have both parents for years, or ever, and not to mention the emotional damage that a young child may have coming to such a bleak facility and seeing a parent locked behind bars. Another underlying factor is that incarcerated parents are unable to

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