ABSTRACT
Xinjiang, like Gansu and other provinces, A has a prison system which is ultimately accountable to the Ministry of Justice in Beijing. Its prisoners are generally regular Xinjiang residents. However, Xinjiang is alone among provinces in that it has another large prison system which functions with considerable autonomy. The prisoners in this system, in most cases hardened criminals, have come from various provinces for long terms (the majority having been sentenced to more than ten yearsB). They have often arrived in contingents of 500 to 1,000 from a single province or municipality. Even though members of such a group are soon scattered to different parts of the prison system, they continue to think of themselves as a cohort, and sometimes maintain contact by the grapevine or by chance encounters in work-
places. Because of their backgrounds and the often hopeless situation in which they find themselves, they are considered particularly difficult to supervise.
