Kim Oteyza just wanted to get out of prison sooner when he went to the correction system?s boot camp.
“I didn?t realize it was a privilege at first,” Oteyza said. “I was just looking for an early release.”
Convicted of selling drugs in Harford County, Oteyza, 29, leaves prison in February, 14 months after he began serving a five-year sentence.
John Goldring, 35, serving his second prison stretch after a drug conviction, said boot camp changed his attitude.
“I feel good about myself now,” Goldring said.
The camp involves six months of intensive physical training, education and what Oteyza called “mind games,” designed to modify the behaviors and mindsets that led the inmates to jail in the first place.
However, criminologists, such as Doris MacKenzie of the University of Maryland, College Park, have found that military-style boot camps, combined with aggressive treatment for prisoners, are no better at changing anti-social attitudes than normal correctional facilities that offer the same treatment.
But Goldring and Oteyza have seen the value of the camp.
“I just think it?s a great program for someone who wants to do something with themselves,” Goldring said.
In addition to losing 25 pounds, he said he gained an appreciation for teamwork and other values.
“I?ve got to go home and be a father to my kids,” said Goldring, who has six children. “I?ve got to be a good citizen.”
Goldring will be released next month and has a job lined up at a chemical plant in Clinton.
Oteyza said the program seeks to answer “how do you face a situation that?s pretty much forced on you” and “how do you find healthier solutions to the problem.”
A user of the drugs he sold, Oteyza had been through rehabilitation programs, but said the boot camp program was the best.
“This experience has shown me that I need some kind of structure in my life,” said Oteyza, who hopes to join the military or work with a friend at a computer networking firm when he is released.
“Through my letters, my family has recognized the change in me,” he said.
He?s earned his GED diploma and is taking tai chi.
Goldring said confidently, “This is the last time” he?ll be in prison.
