INTOLERANCE: Life outside rough for felons

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April 23, 2008

By Jason M. White The Herald Bulletin Wed Apr 23, 2008, 11:28 PM EDT

Felons are often the subject of discrimination after getting out of jail, regardless of their race, said Jeffery Cottrell, program director of the Urban League of Madison County.

Ex-convicts have trouble finding work. And they are constantly surrounded with a negative stigma, he said.

For example, Madison County is considering an ordinance that would prohibit convicted felons from working as tattoo artists. And many businesses have policies of not hiring convicted felons.

“They’re more worried about a person’s image than their identity,” said Kojak Fuller of Man 4 Man Ministries.

Organizations such as Man 4 Man and the Urban League work to help former prison inmates find jobs.

Jim Ott, a convicted felon who works with Man 4 Man, sees about three to six people a day who have served time in prison but can’t find work.

If a felon cannot find work, they often go back to breaking the same laws that got them sent to prison in the first place, Fuller said. Then the cycle repeats itself.

Many of these felons are not violent offenders, Ott said. Some are highly qualified in various fields, from technology to culinary arts, he said.

For instance, Cottrell had trouble finding work when he was released from prison. While in prison, he received a degree in educational psychology from Ball State, but no one would hire him because of his status as a convicted felon.

It was discouraging, he said. But he kept trying to find work because he did not want to disappoint his mother, as he did when he was first thrown in jail.

“I want to keep a smile on her face,” he said.

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