Absolutely how it is. My first night as a trainee (wasn't even certified), some kid got his ass kicked and was banging on the cell door. The dude who beat his ass wouldn't let him lay down and he wanted me to do something. The guy who was training me was like

, he couldn't give any less of a fukk.
Next night, a dude slit his wrist with a piece of metal and tried to bleed out. CO's did not give a flying fukk, some even laughed about it. I was mind fukked.
No offense but it takes a special kind of person to be a CO, even though you can make great money I couldn't deal with having to be in the environment on a daily bases and having to look up men's rectums all day. Did you guys draw straws to see who had to oversee the inmates coming back from visitation and court appearances
But seriously, while I've never be incarcerated I've worked for 7 years with a law office that represented police and correction officers, I've done the ride alongs and prison tours and I've had a couple of family members and close friends who are never going to see the outside of a prison again. As I said before the people running the prisons do not care about the inmates as they are disposable income, meaning if you find yourself in the system your are providing jobs for the Judges, the CO's, the Court Clerks, the Construction Companies, tech companies, food and beverage companies, phone companies, commissary providers, and the list keeps going. You're literately paying these people's wages.
One of the last cases I did with the law firm was for Corcoran state prison. One of the CO's who was a brother was accused of betting on inmates and making them fight and killing the loser. He was guilty as hell but black and mexican's lives aren't worth a damn so he walked. After that case I had to leave the firm because I couldn't be part of that demonic system.
My best friend in high school murdered his girlfriend and was given 50 years in prison. He didn't make it more than 4 days at San Quentin before he was ordered by one of the shot callers to kill a prison guard because the guard had cut his visit short. Can you imagine being told you have to kill a guard 4 days after getting there they said because of his time it wasn't like he would ever get out of prison. His options were to either say no and get himself killed or bartered off to one of the other gangs, Kill the guard and live in shu for the rest of his life, or go to PC for the rest of his sentence.
He chose PC, but the guards wouldn't even put him in there because he wouldn't tell them who ordered the hit so they put him back in GP he lasted 3 days before he got stabbed up by his cellmate after he got out of the hospital they finally put him in PC Now he has to live his life surrounded the worst scum in the system with child molesters, rapist, transsexuals, and snitches. Even PC'd up he's been ordered to smash on certain inmates that were hiding from gangs or well known rapist. He will never be safe regardless of what prison getting PC'd up isn't a get out of jail free card.