“You want to be in the hell you already know”: How prison transfers regularly upend incarcerated people’s lives

Moving people between prisons can improve their access to treatment, programs, and visitation — but transfers can also be deeply traumatizing, disruptive, and destabilizing.

by Iolanthe Brooks

Most people imagine incarceration as confinement in one place. Yet few incarcerated people serve their sentence in just one facility. Many are transferred repeatedly — sometimes dozens of times — before release.

Transfers require incarcerated people to pack their belongings, undergo invasive strip searches, and take long trips while restrictively shackled — what one person described as “the worst experience of my life.” When a transfer bus arrives, its passengers might find themselves closer to loved ones or at a prison hundreds of miles from them. Each move upends nearly every aspect of an incarcerated person’s life, including peer networks, familiarity with officers, institutional culture, rules, housing configurations (e.g., cells vs. dorms), and program and job opportunities.

In some cases, transfers are beneficial. They can move someone to a prison with a lower security classification, more programs, or a safer culture, as well as one closer to home. Such transfers can boost program access and visitation, both of which research has shown to contribute to well-being and reentry preparedness. In other cases, transfers can have the opposite effect, severing program participation and introducing a person to a stressful new environment. Regardless, transfers always bring changes. As one person told me, “Once you become acclimated to a prison… you know how to exist in that prison… But once you transfer, that no longer holds any thread to your daily living. You’ve got to start from scratch all over again. People hate that — it’s nerve-wracking.”

Over the course of a sentence, many incarcerated people are made to zig-zag between prisons across their state due to prison transfer practices. The above image shows a snipped of an animation illustrating all transfers in New York State between 2021 and 2022, animated by week. See the full animation here.

Despite their importance, transfers are a fact of prison life that few non-incarcerated people think about and that have received limited attention from policymakers and researchers. How often do transfers happen? Why do prisons transfer people? Most importantly, what impacts do transfers have for incarcerated people?

To answer these questions, I interviewed 52 New Yorkers who left prison in the last few years and created a novel quantitative dataset, generated by linking together administrative transfer records obtained by public records requests. Although I focus on New York, reporting suggests that transfers are similarly common and consequential in other state prison systems and in the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

Recent legislative efforts in New York and a handful of other states encourage transfers closer to home for parents with young children. These policy reforms show how prison transfer systems could be reoriented to support success upon release. However, my research reveals that, for most people, transfers remain a harmful and all-too-frequent disruption.

Transfers are common, even during public health emergencies

The chart below shows New York’s total monthly transfers from 2020 to 2022. Before the pandemic, the New York state prison system made over 3,000 transfers a month. At the onset of COVID-19, transfer rates dropped precipitously amid concerns — later actualized in New York and other states — that transfers would spread the virus. By June 2020, however, transfers had resumed at close to pre-pandemic levels. After a year of starts and stops, an internal staff email in July 2021 reported that transfers had returned to full capacity, despite ongoing COVID-19 surges.

By 2022, New York was making an average of 3,167 transfers a month, with a total of just under 38,000 transfers in 2022. As I explore more below, only a small number of these transfers were to move incarcerated parents to prisons closer to their children under the new law implemented in late 2021.

Public records obtained from the New York Department of Corrections and Community Supervision show the ebb and flow of transfers between December 2019 and December 2022, as the department responded to the COVID-19 pandemic and new proximity laws.

While some incarcerated people move often, others spend decades in a single prison

Over the course of their sentence, an incarcerated person can move multiple — even dozens — of times. In 2022 alone, two New Yorkers were transferred ten times each. Of everyone transferred that year, about half moved more than once.

Of course, not everyone transfers this often. Interviews with formerly incarcerated New Yorkers showed varied transfer histories. As Felix summarized, “People’s incarcerations take different trajectories… You can land in a spot [and] stay there for a long time.” Or, as he experienced, you can get “transferred all over the place.”

Felix’s 22 transfers were largely for disciplinary reasons, especially early in the two decades he spent incarcerated. He described seeing the same people transferred from one maximum security prison to another. “Every time I’d go to the box, it’s all of us going to the box… It was like, ‘oh, you back? Oh, you here?’… Like, 10 years of just sitting on buses… Not staying in any one place — unless it’s solitary confinement — for any longer than a year.”

The above graphic illustrates Felix's 22 transfers over the 21 years he spent incarcerated. After criss-crossing the state, Felix was eventually released and returned to his family in the Hudson Valley.

Meanwhile, Alexander found himself stuck in one maximum security prison for over 15 years. In his words, “You get used to people leaving — being transferred… and you sitting there. It was troubling, because some of the people that’s leaving helped you get through your stress, and y’all was there for each other… Now, I’m alone… like, damn, everybody who was here with me before is gone. [And] the officers don’t know me now, so I’m being mistreated.”

Alexander was transferred just 5 times in 28 years, eventually returning home to Brooklyn, NY.

Felix and Alexander represent two trajectories through a prison sentence, marked by different levels of movement.

On the one hand, Alexander felt stuck in place. Even without moving, his relationships with other incarcerated people and staff were uprooted as others transferred around him and staff moved on to new jobs or different prisons. People who spent long stretches in a prison like Alexander often wished they could access programs and opportunities elsewhere, move closer to loved ones, or follow mentors who had transferred out. Yet many reported being reluctant to submit transfer requests, since they could not control where the prison system would choose to move them, including to a worse, less safe, or more distant facility. Others were grateful to stay put, having no interest in transferring.

On the other hand, Felix moved constantly and chaotically — what one person called “ping-ponging” from prison to prison, and another called the “I Love New York State tour.” Moving frequently meant he could rarely complete programs or build long-lasting relationships. As incarcerated writers often report, friendships not only afford a sense of safety and stability in a prison’s unpredictable environment but can also provide transformative mentorship and deep emotional support. Constant transfers stymied Felix’s access to such relationships, while exacerbating the turbulence and stress of incarceration.

Transfer requests account for only a small portion of movement between prisons

Even though people incarcerated in New York can request transfers, the data show that transfers are not predominantly driven by requests from incarcerated people. For the most part, moves are involuntary.

In New York, incarcerated people can request a transfer provided they have been in their facility for a sufficient amount of time and do not have recent disciplinary tickets. In December 2021, the state joined several others in passing legislation mandating the department to allow parents of children under 18 years old the opportunity to transfer closer to home. Between June 2021 and May 2022, almost 6,000 people submitted requests under this program alone.

Although the data show an increase in transfers by request in 2021-2022, these moves were overshadowed by transfers for other causes. Indeed, 92% of transfers in 2022 were for reasons other than incarcerated people’s requests. Mainly, transfers were recorded as happening for programming, “general confinement,” and disciplinary reasons. For instance, individuals might be moved to a facility that offers a certain treatment program — or they might be transferred to solitary confinement or restricted (disciplinary) housing units for breaking prison rules, or even as a retaliatory punishment for speaking out about conditions.

The percentage of transfers recorded as happening by the request of the incarcerated individual increased between 2020 and 2022, but was greatly overshadowed by the percentage of transfers for all other reasons.

Research shows that visitation — especially with one’s children — reduces misconduct, bolsters mental health, and is an important part of successful reentry. When transfers are done to achieve these ends, they play an important role in reducing the harm of incarceration. Conversely, when done for punitive or arbitrary reasons, transfers can exacerbate those problems. Recent legislative efforts to allow parents to transfer closer to their children are important first steps toward expanding incarcerated people’s voice in housing determinations. The data show, however, that more work is needed to shift the balance of coercion and agency in prison placement.

Transfers to different security levels are relatively rare

Another reason prisons might transfer people is to respond to security classification changes. Prisons are typically assigned a security level, while incarcerated people’s classifications shift over time. As a result, transfer rates could be driven by changes in security classification. Transfer records from 2021 and 2022, however, show that only one-third of transfers moved people to different security levels. Most transfers shuffle people laterally between prisons of the same security level. Of transfers between security levels, the majority moved people from maximum security prisons down to medium ones.

Most prison transfers happen within security classification levels (for example, between medium-security facilities) or to step down from the maximum security level. Otherwise, transfers to different security levels are relatively rare.

Overall, these findings suggest that prison administrators use transfers for a variety of reasons other than changes to security classifications.

Transfer-driven population turnover creates mass instability

Transfers substantially affect prison populations. Some facilities transfer people in and out more often, but — as my recent article shows - all are implicated in prison-to-prison moves and the turnover it brings. Over the course of 2022, half of New York’s prisons transferred the equivalent of 59% or more of their January populations to other facilities. The other half transferred smaller proportions of people, but most still had turnover rates between roughly 20-60% of their January populations.

Half of New York’s prisons transferred the equivalent of 59% or more of their January populations to other facilities. While the other half transferred smaller proportions of people, most still had turnover rates between roughly 20-60% of their January populations.

Constant population turnover from transfers combines with that of prison releases and new entries, making everyday life in prisons unstable and uncertain. Interview participants, for example, described realizing a friend had transferred when they didn’t show up to breakfast or a standing basketball game. Meanwhile, they recounted fearing who might arrive on daily transfer buses. As one person put it, “You never knew, that bus coming in could be from hell.”

Transfers do not do enough to bring incarcerated New Yorkers closer to home

When a person is incarcerated far from home, they are less likely to receive visits, which have been linked to everything from mental health benefits to reduced recidivism. On average, transfers in 2021 and 2022 originated about 175 miles from the transferee’s county of conviction, which I use as a proxy of their home area.

While requested transfers brought incarcerated New Yorkers an average of 147 miles closer to home, most transfers have little impact on distance from home. People transferred by request started farther from home than for other transfers, an average distance of 225 miles compared to 169 miles. Their transfers brought them much closer to home — 78 miles away on average, compared to 199 miles for all other transfers. Aside from transfers by request, all other transfers brought incarcerated people an average of 29 miles farther away from their conviction county, an increase of 17% from their average starting distance.

Transfers and Distance from Home

People transferred by request started farther from home than those transferred for other reasons, and typically ended up closer to home. All other transfers brought incarcerated people an average of 29 miles farther away from their conviction county.

Harrowing journeys, with long-term impacts

For incarcerated people, transfers can be harrowing. As documented by journalists and academics alike, they often involve long trips with circuitous routes, including stops at multiple prisons and breaks for corrections staff. During transfer trips, incarcerated people have little access to food or bathrooms, and recount uncomfortable seats and painfully restrictive shackling. As Hugo put it, “By the time you get off the bus, you either got a cut or your leg is swollen [with] black and blues.”

For Linda, who is in her mid-sixties, transferring was “the worst experience of my life,” adding that, “You’re on this bus, you’re shackled to somebody else.” To avoid needing to use the bus bathroom while shackled to a stranger, Linda decided not to drink anything and to skip eating the bagged bologna sandwich she was given for lunch. Her bus left “early in the morning” but didn’t arrive at the next prison “until late evening,” despite it being about a six-hour drive away. Overall, she felt that “[the officers] don’t care about you. They don’t care if you use the bathroom. They don’t care if you’re going to eat. They just want to make sure they get you from one location to another.”

Because transfers upend nearly every aspect of incarcerated life, the first few weeks in a new prison can be especially difficult — and even dangerous. Recently transferred people need to restock possessions lost during transfers, requiring them to spend their often limited funds on exorbitantly expensive commissary goods. They also have to learn the rules of their new facility, including formal policy differences and informal “politics.” Without this know-how, recently transferred individuals are prone to disciplinary tickets and victimization.

Overall, the destabilization of a transfer often proves challenging. As two participants commented:

It was hard. Don’t get me wrong, I was furious because my whole life was planned out and everything was just taken away. And that’s kind of what these transfers do: they disrupt your life. What little life that we had in there, they just broke it up. So, when you have a plan, and you want to get these programs… they take it all away and you got to start all over.

— David, incarcerated 25 years and transferred 6 times.

It’s designed to break you…They move you from plantation to plantation. You lose people, you lose property. You lose so much through a transfer… In prison because of all the violence, who’d want to get moved? You want to be in the hell you already know, the hell that you already got comfortable in. Now they’re sending you to another man-made hell that you got to start all over [in]… No one wants that.

— Wyatt, incarcerated 29 years and transferred 9 times.

In the long term, transfers disrupt relationships that are essential to prison safety and stability. These relationships can not only provide mentorship and care but also a helping hand during reentry, and are the crucial building blocks of incarcerated organizing.

While transfers create disruption and loss, they can also have enormous positive potential. They can bring incarcerated people closer to their loved ones, move them to prisons with the specific programs they are interested in, remove them from dangerous situations, and add variety to the monotony of a long sentence. Policymakers have the opportunity to balance the positive potential of transfers against their negative impacts.

Expanding incarcerated people’s agency in transfer decisions

Transfers are a common part of prison life with dramatic effects on incarcerated people’s well-being. From suddenly-severed friendships and arduous bus rides to the constant turnover they produce, transfers are often stressful and destabilizing experiences. As they upend incarcerated people’s lives, they have the opportunity — and risk — of bettering or worsening their access to loved ones, programs, jobs, and safety.

Rather than continuously shuffling incarcerated people, transfers should be used to prioritize stability and autonomy. Policymakers can mitigate the punishing aspects of transfers without undermining their positive potential, following in the footsteps of recent legislative reforms. For instance, existing legislation is tailored to parents of minor children but could be expanded to people with aging family members, adult children, or indigent loved ones who cannot afford long journeys to visit. Likewise, giving incarcerated New Yorkers the opportunity to “veto” the prison that the state determines for them following a request might diminish fearfulness around submitting them. Above all, incarcerated people should have the opportunity to stay in place if they prefer, particularly if they have no disciplinary issues and are succeeding in their programs, jobs, and relationships.

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For more information, including detailed footnotes and our methodology, see the full version of this briefing on our website.