A California men's prison hopes to keep inmates from returning to crime by training them for undersea construction and dam. The marine technology training program is taught to prisoners serving 14 months to 4 years sentences.

Ironically, the California Institution for Men is landlocked and located on a stretch of former farmland some 40 miles east of Los Angeles.

Officials said, no more than 12 percent of the more than 1,600 inmates who have participated in the program have returned to prison. The figure is much lower compared to the average recidivism rate of 50 percent in California prisons.

The program is targeting to teach about 100 inmates a year and is available to any prisoner in the general population.

Eric Pawling, 44, an inmate jailed for petty theft, said animosity between prisoners of different races had no place in the diving program.

"We leave the racial stuff on the yard because we all have to depend on each other when we're underwater," Pawling said.