HV037- Prison

Inmate with microphoneHearing Voices from NPR®
037 Prison: Life Behind Bars
Host: Joe Richman of Radio Diaries
Airs week of: 2010-03-17 (Originally: 2008-11-12)

“Prison” (52:00 mp3):

“Doing Time” (16:10) Radio Diaries

A Prison Diary (2001 CD | NPR series) from a former Polk Youth Institution, North Carolina. Former inmate. John Mills is out now and co-hosts our hour with Prison Dairies producer Joe Richman. (Check the accompanying Picture Projects 360 Degrees, a multimedia “Perspectives on the U.S. Criminal Justice System.”

Voices and sounds of youth in at Utah’s Washington County Crisis Center, a techno tone poem. Handcuffs, metal detectors and slamming cell doors are striking musical instruments, and incarcerated teenagers in this streetwise chorus. (PBK: site | space.)

“Not All Bad Things” (3:34) Chana Joffe-Walt

Payton Smith’s calls her mom in prison with some questions, produced with Transom.

“Serving 9 to 5” (3:20 excerpt) Radio Diaries

Another Prison Diary from Sergeant Furman Camel, a guard at Polk Youth Institution, North Carolina.

“Tossing Away the Keys” (11:01) Sound Portraits

The Louisiana State Penitentiary, Angola Prison, is a sprawling old plantation on the Mississippi River. Angola holds more than five-thousand prisoners, mostly African Americans. Unless they’re pardoned by the Governor, lifers know they will never again see the outside world — that they will die inside Angola prison. Producer: David Isay with Wilbert Rideau and Ron Wikberg; mix engineer: Anna Maria deFrietas.

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Comments (11)

Amazing. I want to reel off a string of cliches . . . “should be required listening”. But this is true.

I hear something like this and I wish I had done it. Can’t praise it enough.

One of those interviewed (probably more, wasn’t listening closely enough this morning) mentioned hope, reminding me of Bill Clinton’s “I still believe in a place called Hope” and Obama’s “Audacity of Hope”.

I doubt very much that either of them (certainly Clinton) understand what these prisoners understand about hope. Just as Oppenheimer and other participants in the Manhattan Project felt that world leaders should be required to witness an atomic blast, I believe Obama and leading politicians should be required to speak with people like the prisoners interviewed here.

I am struck that the right so easily demonizes so many who have been convicted of crimes and imprisoned. What does it say of the right-wing Christian foundation philosophy about the possibility of redemption or change?

Comment added by Hugh Sansom on 11.16.08

Dear Sirs:

I have a person who I feel would be worth looking at for your Lock up series. This person has been locked up for over 17 years for a murder he was convicted of when he was 18 years old. He has become some what of a local celebrity having produced a prison workout video and has a few Ideas about how the State of Ohio could capitalize on the hidden talents of inmates. I will provide you with a link to his workout video on YouTube. He has also written a book and is really just an all around good story for T.V. Please feel free to contact me if you need any further information about him. His convicted name is Gary Boyd but he has changed it to Sol Amen Ra. He is currently being held at Warren Correctional Insitute in Ohio. freegaryboyd.blogspot.com/2006/09/my-story.html http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=36355346

Comment added by Colleen Moore on 12.30.08

I woke up this morning listening to this on the radio. I had never heard about this before. It makes you think. But I have been living for 6 years a much different reality, and that is when the system doesn’t work, and your son is doing time for a crime that was never committed. By anyone. The real criminals are the ones making a false allegation, that is later compounded by lawsuits for monetary gains. But that doesn’t change the day to day living the prison life, when you did nothing wrong to earn your way there. This impacts the family, and the injustice compiles year after year. Luckily we are nearing my son’s Habeas trial, and God willing this nightmare will be over soon.

Comment added by Joanne Linarte on 03.20.10

Dear Sirs,

This radio programme about prisoners was one of Hearing Voices finest… especially the part where we learned ..one lifer talking about his own life as a daily, living graveyard– in which he would never having again the chance to touch another human being …and knew that he would only die only as a number.”
I know of three murders of persons dear to my heart. Their perpetrators sit in such cells. When I heard those words, a cold place in me ……thawed.

I would like Colleen Moore’s address, or please let her have mine.
We have a project where we want to use the work of all kinds of prisoners, in a project where they will be helping others.

Comment added by Claire Blue on 03.29.10

truely enjoyed the prison segment and found it thought provoking/moving. I was wondering how John Mills is doing and if he got married yet?

Comment added by Ray Metz on 04.04.10

Hi,
Thanks for your question about John Mills. He has a good job. He is married and they are doing really well. And best of all they have a young daughter named Jaylin.

John and his wife came to New York City last year (his first time in an airplane) for an event we did at the City University of New York with past diarists. And hopefully we’ll do another event with John over the coming year.

Thanks for your interest… and for listening.
Joe Richman
Radio Diaries
http://www.radiodiaries.org

Comment added by BG on 04.05.10

In Place Of Truth…

Defendant’ s mail fraud and money laundering convictions are affirmed in part where returning certain victims’ investment in defendant’ s scheme was intended to “promote the carrying on,” of the “scheme” at the heart of the mail fraud count…

Trackback added by In Place Of Truth on 05.27.10

the link from the episodes list is out of date, and should be updated, thanks!
this is the current url:
http://hearingvoices.com/news/2008/11/hv037-prison/
this is the right url:
http://hearingvoices.com/news/2010/03/hv037-prison/

Comment added by stephen w on 04.12.12

Please withhiold my name. In response to the comment left by Joanne Linarte 3/20/10. sometimes the criminal are guilty and found guilty, and the family of the criminals hound the victims for years, 11 years from the crime to the habeus is over, and no question in any reasonable person’s mind that the pedophil is
guilty of the crime he was accused of. Two innocent children were horribly damages and the family continues to persecute these children., getting private investigaters and Foundations for “injustic” involved. it is time for those guilty of the crimes, and the mother who codone those actions to stop hounding the innocent.

Comment added by Barbara on 08.18.12

nice

Comment added by Tushi on 09.08.13

Joanne Linarte 3/20/10 can preach all she wants. Her suffering is the direct result of her neglect & actions. She can claim innocent until the day she dies. Her son will rot in jail, spending his days being brutally molested, just as he did to 2 innocent children. If Joanne so deeply wants her family reunited, and her son to be “innocent of all crimes”, then perphaps she should’ve protected both him and the victims by preventing and stopping his disgusting, disturbing, repetitive acts of sexually assaulting children. He CONFESSED to his crimes. He was found guilty by a judge and jury, all of his appeals denied, as well as her own appeals of innocence. Over a decade of legal actions & proceedings have all independent come to the same conclusions… The undeniable guilt of Joanne & Franky Linarte. If she wants to spread her lies, then I will equally spread the truth and reality of a sequence of events. She can call the victims liars & shout her innocence, but that will never change the guilty verdict of both her son and the crimes she committed. At the end of the day, he is in jail, she’s a convicted criminal.

Comment added by LH on 09.10.13



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