By Elizabeth Coss
KENT, Ohio — The National Conference of State Legislators estimates that one in three Americans has a criminal record—ranging from an arrest to criminal charges or a conviction. Many of these records stay with individuals for life, as do the consequences.
People returning from prison often face significant challenges in securing employment, housing, health care, and access to groceries. These obstacles are even more difficult for those dealing with mental illness, substance abuse or trauma, making reentry a daunting process.
Kristenne Robison, assistant professor of sociology and criminology and director of Kent State University’s prison education programming, said incarceration is a traumatic experience for many Americans.
“Prison itself is a traumatic experience—a loss of rights, exposure to violence—physical and sexual [and] emotional violence. It’s just a really stressful place to live and work,” Robison said.
According to PrisonPolicy.org, the number of people incarcerated has increased since the pandemic, despite crime rates being at historic lows, furthering mass incarceration across the country.
Robison said mass incarceration has systemic consequences.
“If we look at the raw number of people, as well as the rate of people we incarcerate, [the U.S.] is number one in all Westernized countries or industrialized countries,” Robison explained. “There’s a lack of access to healthcare and mental health care while you’re incarcerated because of mass incarceration. There’s just so many people, it’s impossible to serve all those people well.”
Patrick Kerrigan, a former Youngstown Municipal Court judge, spent 10 years presiding over traffic cases, minor civil cases, misdemeanors and occasional felonies.
Though sentencing people to jail was part of his job, Kerrigan viewed incarceration negatively. He often opted instead for diversion or rehabilitation programs.
“I was pretty well known for creative sentencings. I often had sent people to drug and alcohol rehab, I was a big proponent of that. I had sentenced someone to learn how to read,” Kerrigan said. “They weren’t having any success in life with the way they were going, so maybe if they did something and somebody put some discipline on them, that would be better than sitting in a cold, dirty, dank jail.”
Nearly 30 years ago, Kerrigan faced a reversal of fortune. He was charged with extortion and other offenses. While under investigation, he resigned his law license and ultimately pleaded guilty, choosing not to fight the charges to avoid bankrupting his family.
“They had me between a rock and a hard place, and that often happens not just with high-profile people like me being a judge, but with others as well,” Kerrigan said. “There were things that I did and I shouldn’t have done.”
Kerrigan served 25 months in prison, with the last six spent in a halfway house in Morgantown, West Virginia. Prior to that, he was incarcerated at a Minnesota facility.
“That was a scary place. I was at the Rochester facility of the Bureau of Prisons, and that place was kind of a mental and physical health facility as well as a rural, high-security environment,” Kerrigan said.
Although he described the prison—surrounded by barbed wire, patrolled by armed guards, and housing one of the perpetrators of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing—as a frightening place, Kerrigan said the treatment he received there was life-changing.
“I went years being misdiagnosed [for depression], and then I went into the prison system and the guy looked at me, and did a test in the Mayo Clinic area, ‘Oh, you don’t have depression, you’re bipolar.’ His people put me on medication, and this was in 1998, and I’m on that same medication to this day,” Kerrigan said.
After prison, Kerrigan’s biggest challenge was finding a job. He spent about a year as a catering assistant for Jeffrey Crystal Catering, but struggled to find work that matched his skills.
“I had taught at Youngstown State University for 10 years while I was a judge. I taught 20–25 classes there, but when I tried to get a job, I couldn’t even get an interview,” Kerrigan said. “I had one job [opportunity] down in Dayton. Did everything right, did the teaching exam perfectly, was exactly what they wanted, they loved me. It was a Wright State branch campus, and they sent it to the main branch and all they know is, ‘Oh, he’s got a record.’ So, I couldn’t find a job and it was miserable.”
As director of Kent State’s prison education programs, Robison now oversees academic planning at two correctional institutions: Trumbull Correctional Institution in Leavittsburg and FCI Elkton, a federal prison in Lisbon.
At these facilities, incarcerated individuals can pursue a bachelor’s degree or take courses toward one, with the goal of improving employment prospects after release.
The program began in 2021 with five students. It has since grown to 60, with the first two graduates earning degrees in fall 2024. Plans are underway to expand offerings.
“We kind of started [the program] as a pilot. There’s not a lot of bachelor degree rate institutions across the state of Ohio,” Robison said. “Now, we’re trying to expand to offer associate degrees, and possibly more bachelor degrees.”
Elizabeth Coss is the president of the Society for Collegiate Journalists at Youngstown State University and communications coordinator at Oak Hill Collaborative. This article was written as part of her journalism capstone project at YSU.