UDGE ELENI DERKE cuts an imposing fig-
ure, shrouded in her black robe and seated
behind the elevated wood-paneled bench in
the county courthouse in Jacksonville, Flor-
ida. From the jury box and lawyers’ tables,
you can’t see what else she’s wearing: wildly
patterned yoga pants.
More than 25 years ago, Derke discovered
yoga. She was suffering from the searing
abdominal pain of Crohn’s disease. Her
doctor recommended surgery. Hoping to
avoid it, she went to see a cousin who was a
yoga master. He taught her the upside-down poses known as
inversions. They are said to clear the body of toxins, though
there’s no scientific evidence to support the claim. Derke’s
symptoms quickly subsided. “Yoga saved my life.”
She trained as a yoga instructor, and if it’s not too hot, she
holds free monthly classes on the courthouse lawn. When
lawyers drone on at trial, she will order a break and lead jurors
in standing stretches and breathing exercises. But she’s best
known in legal circles as the judge who sentences offenders
to take yoga behind bars.
Derke handles misdemeanors, such as shoplifting, minor
drug possession, and driving under the influence, punish-
able by up to a year in jail. Offenders can cut their time by 40
percent or more if they take a weekly program called Yoga 4
Change. She sees yoga as a way to quiet self-defeating chatter
in the mind and quell rage, fear, anguish, and compulsions
that drive bad behavior.
“Once you let go,” she said, “you make room for the positive
things.” Her colleagues, though, didn’t buy it at first. “Come
on, yoga?”
Many offenders had a similar reaction. “I thought it was
really weird,” said Cecil Reddick, an inmate at Jacksonville’s
Montgomery Correctional Center.
An evaluation of the program in three Jacksonville facilities
found that after six weeks, participants reported significant
improvements in sleep, overall health, and the ability to man-
age anger and anxiety. At least two more county judges now
offer the yoga option.
Some offenders choose to do their full sentence rather than
try yoga, but Reddick grabbed the get-out-of-jail-quick offer
from one of Derke’s colleagues. He was surprised by how much
the classes relaxed him, soothed his sore back, and stirred a
sensation he’d never felt: “Serenity.”
In a state prison near
San Diego, California,
Patrick Acuña rests
in Savasana, a deep
relaxation position,
with Zeus, a service
dog he’s training,
during a class spon-
sored by the nonprofit
Prison Yoga Project.
Acuña has practiced
yoga behind bars for
more than 20 years.
J
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