For ex-cons, help breaking into the workforce

But many inmates, including Eckhoff, say they are tantamount to slave labor. Others point out that "lifers" often are placed in the best work programs to keep prisons from having to train a constantly changing short-term inmate group.

One result: Those prisoners headed for release into society tend to get shortchanged.

To remedy that, some communities are stepping up job-placement programs. In Boston, for instance, probation officers, religious leaders, and employers have come together to help ex-inmates find employment opportunities.

In Texas, a program called RIO (Re-Integration for Offenders) last year placed 23,351 ex-inmates in jobs, according to Joan Goodwin, a RIO program specialist who herself served a short sentence for distributing marijuana.

Nonprofit groups like The Safer Foundation in Chicago and the Center for Employment Opportunities in New York provide similar services.

While some companies work hand in hand with job programs, many are hesitant to advertise them. RIO officials, for instance, keep the names of their participating employers secret.

That policy took effect, says Ms. Goodwin, when a florist shop in Fort Worth watched its sales plummet by half when a newspaper article drew attention to the fact that it had hired an ex-inmate.

Ex-convicts themselves sometimes find they can help ease reentry for others. John Sweeny is a soft-spoken man who spent 17 years in prison for robbery and kidnapping (a man was restrained during the robbery).

He now runs Hope Ministries and helps South Dakota ex-cons rebuild their lives. He shuttles them to job interviews, suppliers of donated clothes, churches, halfway houses and counseling sessions.

His was, in fact, the first face Dwayne Eckhoff saw as a free man. The clothes that Eckhoff wore during his Monitor interview were provided by Sweeny.

"People expect these guys to go out and get jobs right away," says Sweeny. "But first they need the basics. For most of these guys, being out here is a completely different reality. In a way, they're like children."

As a staple of prison culture, tattoos are often markers of identity and affiliation. But once beyond prison walls, they often are unwanted markers – and barriers to job offers.

Some states are trying to lessen the stigma by removing convicts' body art. In South Dakota, state officials have mounted a mobile laser device in a van that travels to area penitentiaries. Chris Hart, one tattoo-zapping physician, says the device can serve 30 to 40 inmates a day.

The program is especially designed for gang tattoos, but Dr. Hart says she is also asked to remove designs ranging from the merely decorative to the profane. "Everyone seems pleased to get them off," she says.

Not everyone is pleased about the removal programs, however. One California Congresswoman, Lois Capps, recently came under fire after landing $50,000 from the Justice Department to support a tattoo-removal program in her district.

Critics on radio talk shows and in newspaper editorials chided the move as government waste.

Ron Utt, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, calls the program the epitome of monetary mismanagement.

"I'm sure that people who have tattoos wish they didn't, but is this really a federal responsibility?" he asks. "Couldn't they spend that money on drug addiction and counseling?"

Advocates maintain that the tax money is well spent if it can keep even a small percentage of ex-inmates from heading back into prison.

An aide says Rep. Capps is no longer commenting on the issue. On Jan. 10, she defended her actions, though, saying the program "has broad community support, ranging from the Sheriff's office and probation department to local hospitals."

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