Nine years ago Lorrann Hatchett sat in the Missouri Department of Corrections on a drug charge.

Initially released after 120 days on condition she stay away from illegal drugs, Hatchett was forced to serve the full two-year sentence after breaking probation by getting caught with cocaine, the drug that got her into trouble to begin with.

Determined to go straight, Hatchett looked for work after her release, only to lose the jobs when employers discovered the felony in her background.

"It was never that I wasn't doing a good job," she said. "It was always that I had been in prison."

Hatchett said she never forgot the frustration and worry of being a newly released offender.

"You can't get a job, and your family loves you but they lose faith in you," she said. "We go out into the community and try to fit in and can't."

Today she has a job helping other ex-offenders find work, housing, transportation and therapy as a counselor with the Missouri Reentry Process at Cape Girardeau's Community Caring Council.

She can relate to what her clients go through as they are released from prison with little more than the clothes on their backs and a brown ID card indicating they are a released offender.

Hatchett shared her story with 27 people who came to the Show Me Center on Tuesday to hear about the Missouri Re-entry Process and the benefits of helping offenders acclimate to life outside of prison. The meeting was open to the public and several local business owners were in attendance.

The program is offered through the Missouri Department of Corrections. The state is one of two chosen by the National Institute of Corrections to adopt the Transition from Prison to Community Initiative last year, said Julie Boehm, manager of the Department of Corrections re-entry program.

Teaching life skills

The Community Caring Council and Southeast Missouri State University partnered with the Department of Corrections' Missouri Partnership for Reentry last March to offer counseling and life skills workshops to ex-offenders returning to the Cape Girardeau area.

Salena Hamilton, another Cape Girardeau counselor, said 32 offenders have participated in the program to date. They are offered the first and third Wednesdays each month at the Community Caring Council. Participants must be referred by their prison, she said.

Of those referrals, 13 have attended the life management skills workshops and one has obtained employment as a result, she said.

Boehm told the gathering that necessity was the driving force behind the creation of the program. Missouri currently has more than 30,000 individuals in its prison system and more than 70,000 under probation and parole supervision.

Revolving door

With 34 percent of released offenders returning to prison, Boehm said, the DOC wants to stop the revolving door offenders face every time they are released.

She dismissed critics who call the program soft on crime. Helping offenders make a smooth transition into society benefits the community, she said. "We're holding offenders accountable. If a safer community is important to you, it's very important for employers to get involved."

Speakers from the Federal Bonding Program, Missouri Probation and Parole, Missouri Department of Corrections and Set Free Ministry explained how they can help employers who want to hire offenders. A job fair scheduled for May 23 at the Salvation Army in Cape Girardeau is geared toward matching offenders with employers, Boehm said.

Anyone wanting more information can call Hatchett or Hamilton at the Community Caring Council at 651-3747.

carel@semissourian.com

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