Law360 Canada (June 16, 2026, 10:21 AM EDT) -- “You don’t go to prison to make friends” is one of the aphorisms new prisoners often hear.

Connections with other people are fundamental to human life; we all need meaningful relationships with others. There’s lots of evidence that a lack of human connection is bad for our physical and mental health. But human connection takes on a very different form when you are in prison.

It’s one thing when you are on remand or have a very short sentence. Though you live in very uncomfortable conditions with strangers, you know that this will only be the case for a few days or weeks. Most of us can survive that. Contact with others can be kept transactional — how the place works, how to stay safe, getting through your time.

It’s quite another matter when you are facing years of incarceration. Even worse, a prison sentence often ends marriages or other relationships and spoils contact with children. For those who do maintain contact, visits are difficult, phone time is limited, many people don’t write letters. So there you are, facing a big deficit in your relationships, yet in a setting where making new connections is fraught with problems.

One huge barrier is that just being in prison proclaims loudly that you, and everyone else there, has done something quite bad. Most people are ashamed and feel vulnerable. You can’t help thinking, “Are these people I want to get to know?”

Fear is another obstacle. New prisoners fear prison as a place of violence and exploitation. I remember how frightened I was at the prospect of going to prison, of the physical danger and of extortion. In fact, most prisoners behave reasonably most of the time, and you can have more problems from guards than from prisoners. But the fears are real. Caution and distrust of others are starting points, which does not help in creating meaningful relationships.

Then there is the frequent injunction to “do your own time.” This means not being curious about other people, not asking questions about them — not just about their crime, but about them in general. Yet asking other people about their lives is an essential part of building connection.

Prison rules also can militate against friendship. In the minimum-security prison, we were not allowed to share food, for example, and required permission from guards to be in houses other than our own. These interfered with basic aspects of hospitality, and so with building connection with others.

However, people do need connection and will find ways to create it. Most prisoners spend endless hours with their cellie, a person you need at least to get along with for life to be bearable. Some people knew each other from outside or from other stints in prison. Even during a couple of months in the Assessment Unit, I got to know most of the other men to some degree. After all, you are spending all your time with just those 20 or so people.

Though you start out with distrust of everyone — they are all criminals, after all — you soon learn that prisons have a lot of people in them who are just like you and perfectly fine to be around most of the time. I was lucky to be on a range in assessment that did not have any really horrible people, one or two of whom can create hell for everybody else.

In the less restrictive environment of the minimum, where we were not locked in cells most of the day, prisoners met through common work; for example, I got to know other prisoners who worked with me as tutors in the school or were students there. You inevitably get to know a fair amount about the five or six other men who live in the same house as you. Some men walked or exercised together. Others formed groups by ethnicity, or for purposes such as playing music. One prisoner created a writing group. There were also sports competitions, sponsored by the inmate committee that exists in every federal prison.

Who would I have described as my “friends” during my time in prison?

First, there were two men I knew from support groups while on bail, both of whom were in the assessment unit at the same time I was and then transferred to the same minimum prison. I had a lot more connection to one of them than the other, but the three of us did spend a lot of time together — playing cards in assessment when we were out of our cells, and then doing that or going for walks outdoors together in minimum.

These guys were very important to my being able to cope with my prison time and, they told me, vice versa. However, both of them were released months before I was. People come and go in prison — another reason one is cautious about building friendships. One of the lifers I shared a house with told me he had seen so many guys come and go over the years that it was hard to get interested in new people, and he pretty much associated only with other lifers.

Even with those frequent changes, I met most of the men who were in the minimum with me. There were always others that I felt I knew and liked reasonably well — and of course others that I didn’t particularly like: people who were bullies or took pride in their criminality. Many more fell in the first group than the second. I met men who were kind, or funny, or gentle, or helpful. There were many I would be happy to have as neighbours. Yes, more than a few had issues of substance abuse or mental health, but that did not necessarily make them problematic. It felt like a cross-section of humanity.

After release, however, very few of those connections, even those you might consider friendships, remain. There were quite a few men I got to know fairly well and liked. But it was not long before the only two I spoke to were those two I met outside. No matter how well the friendship works in prison, once you are out nobody wants to be reminded of that time in your life. People who mattered in one setting are people to avoid in a very different one.

I have sometimes thought it would be fascinating to track the men with whom I was imprisoned and find out what has happened to them since. I hope it has gone well for them, but the research suggests that for many, if not most, it has not.

David Dorson is the pen name of someone who went through arrest, case disposition, imprisonment and parole in Ontario a few years ago. Law360 Canada has granted him anonymity because he offers a unique perspective on a subject that matters deeply to many readers, and revealing the author’s identity would make re-establishment in the community after serving his sentence much more difficult than it already is.

The opinions expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the author’s firm, its clients, Law360 Canada, LexisNexis Canada or any of its or their respective affiliates. This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal advice.

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