Dawn Ostrem
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Aug 25/00) - Traditional healing programs are changing the way corrections services are dealing with inmates at the Yellowknife jail.

From inside the tall chain-linked fence that's brimmed with razor wire, the sense of being trapped hangs heavy.

The Yellowknife Correctional Centre is a patchwork quilt of rooms from years of adding onto and renovating the jail. The atmosphere is similar to that of a bus station, hazy under fluorescent lighting, and most rooms echo the buzzing and muffled sounds of overcrowding.

At any given time, a large group of inmates crowd around a section of payphones in the hall, using phone cards to speak to family and friends if granted that privilege. Many others are busy doing shift work in the kitchen or crowded around television sets.

For those unable to leave, more than paying the price for their criminal conduct, they are given ample opportunity for reform. And according to the employees of the facility, the system is making it easier for them to do that.

"I could see a difference the day it started right up to now, people are working from the inside," said 30-year veteran YCC employee Ray Tuccaro.

Speaking from within

The traditional counsellor and liaison officer was speaking about how the program focused on reflecting aboriginal values and beliefs, is radically changing corrections in the North. Traditional healing programs began there about a year ago.

"People are speaking from within," Tuccaro stressed. "Sometimes they have to go back into their childhood, go back and speak about the negatives in their lives and how they've been weakened."

Tuccaro came to work in Yellowknife in 1970 as a cook and has served as a correctional officer, supervisor and senior supervisor before taking on his current role.

He works with sexual offenders, taking them out on the land about four times a year to explore their traditional culture and their place in it.

Aboriginal inmates make up close to 90 per cent of the centre's population.

"When they're talking about their offence they get down to the nitty gritty," Tuccaro said.

"So when you take them out on the land, away from the centre, they really release what's been built up."

Originally from Fort Chipewyan, Tuccaro spent 11 years in a residential school, the reason he feels he can make a connection with many of the inmates.

"From age three to 14 I was in a residential school and I learned a lot of things since then that I'm still working on and a lot I still don't really want to talk about.

"At one time I asked them how many have been in residential schools and eight out of 10 said they had. I told them about my experience and what happened to me without family love," he said adding lightly, "And that it's a good thing I have a good wife."

Healing circles and sweat lodges take place in the facility or in the teepees, that can be seen anchored in the yard as you drive by the facility on Kam Lake Road.

Inside the shelter is a fire area and a circle of seats. Tuccaro said sometimes the talking is like a flood, voices washing away the grit and grime painted on their thoughts like a compulsion. They also hold sweetgrass and pipe ceremonies, all for purification.

"Before, inmates were blaming the world," Tuccaro said. "Now they're taking full responsibility for their actions."

One former YCC inmate agrees that taking responsibility is the key issue when it comes to rehabilitation, but isn't convinced traditional healing is the easy answer.

A resident of Yellowknife who did not want to be identified, the man has been sober since 1985. He proves the existing correlation between alcohol and crime as he explains the pattern of his life.

"I drank half my life away," he said.

"I sobered up, not through YCC, just by myself. You've got to make up your own mind because nothing else is going to help you. I would have just used that to get early release."

The Yellowknife man spent time in YCC on and off for 26 years for crimes such as breaking and entering, shoplifting or assault, all related to alcohol.

"I like it now, I'm living good now," he said, mentioning his wife stayed with him through many of those years, hazed over from alcohol, and he thanks her for it.

He isn't against traditional healing, but neither is he optimistic.

Most inmates, like himself he feels, may merely use it as a tool to get back on the streets lined with intoxicated alcoholics and beckoning bars.

"It might help some people," he said. "I sure hope it does."

Angus Ekenale made news headlines in the North when he was sentenced to five years at YCC for manslaughter.

The story of the death of Elizabeth Rose Yendo haunted the hamlet of Wrigley for nearly 30 years before enough evidence was gathered to charge Ekenale.

Although one side of that story paints him as a man who escaped justice for many years and leaving a 19-year-old victim in the wake , another is of a now 54-year-old man struggling with many problems, including turning to alcohol to ease to heavy burden.

"I've suffered lots and I didn't really understand it until about a year ago," he said from inside YCC.

"At first I was afraid to talk about it but later it was ready to come out ... The healing circle helps me pretty good. It makes me sleep good at night and makes me really happy."

Ekenale served a previous sentence for sexual assault several years ago before traditional healing programs were introduced and said this time it is making a big difference in his outlook on life.

"I really want to get out on the land after I get out. I don't want to be back in the same place again," he said.

"Even in here I start thinking September is coming and I want to hunt because I miss a lot of those things.

"I'll never let go of healing circles and things like that ... I don't want to be back in here again after I get out."