Photo/Illutration A guard at Fuchu Prison in western Tokyo patrols around 60 inmates’ cells on a night shift on Jan. 10. (Saori Kuroda)

Penal reforms will place more emphasis on the “recovery” of convicts instead of their “punishment” to prevent recidivism, but prison guards say their own needs are being ignored.

Under changes to the Penal Code, prisons, not courts, will decide whether a convict will be forced to do hard labor as part of their rehabilitation program.

And more suitable programs will be tailored for each prisoner so that they won’t commit crimes again.

The reforms will take effect in June.

To prepare for the change, prison guards, who have provided vocational training for convicts to help them reintegrate into society, have been instructed to be more considerate of the inmates’ feelings and emotional needs.

A 43-year-old guard at Fuchu Prison in western Tokyo says the shift has done nothing to increase his job satisfaction.

“I don’t feel any sense of fulfillment at my job, to be honest,” he told The Asahi Shimbun. “A police officer’s job is good because if they arrest someone, people will pay attention to it. But it is us who have to spend a long time with the arrested people.”

His feelings are shared by prison guards around Japan.

In a Justice Ministry questionnaire sent to prison guards in 2023, 40 percent of the 5,032 respondents said they “don’t have a sense of mission or pride” at their jobs.

Among them, 39 percent cited as a reason, “I can’t feel that my job helps society.”

About 80 percent of the guards said, “One difficulty of the job is that society or people of this nation do not understand what we do.”

The guard at Fuchu Prison, one of the largest in Japan housing 1,700 criminals, is in charge of about 40 prisoners.

He supervises their labor at a factory in the prison and makes the rounds of their cells. He also holds interviews with each prisoner, handles clerical work and deals with any troubles that might arise.

He has been working as a prison guard for 20 years.

There have been times when he felt that his advice reached the inmates. However, he rarely feels his job is rewarding.

Fuchu Prison is known as a place for repeat offenders. In fact, nearly 80 percent of the inmates there had previously been imprisoned.

The guard said it is not rare to see an inmate who was released from the prison show up again at the factory.

“There are inmates who have successfully mended their ways. But we only get to see those who have committed crimes again,” he said.

His job has also affected his outside life.

After an inmate threatened to kidnap the guard’s child, he told his child not to tell others about his job.

In addition, the guard said he feels a sense of confinement because he spends entire shifts inside the strong walls of the prison.

“Despite all this, I work diligently. But the only time people pay attention to us is when a problem arises in this prison,” he said.

Another Fuchu Prison guard, 27, who is in her fifth year at the job, often receives verbal abuse from the inmates, including death threats and insults about her appearance. The abuse often comes when she patrols between the prisoners’ cells during night shifts.

However, she stays silent, fearing she will be punished if she yells back at them.

Justice Ministry directives and other instructions stipulate that prison guards “must remain calm and collected and be mindful of appropriate behavior and speech.”

In June after the reforms, the guards will be required to increasingly give consideration to the inmates’ feelings.

The guard said she agrees that such consideration is important for the inmates’ recovery.

But she also feels a balance is needed between “maintaining discipline” and “providing support.”

If she listens too much to what the inmates say, their demands could escalate, she said. She also doesn’t have time to listen to everything they want to talk about.

“I understand the role we are expected to play is changing, but I don’t know how much distance I should keep from the inmates,” she said.

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