MetaFilter posts tagged with prison

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up in the old hotel — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 11:44:19 -0800

In 1965, Carl-Wolfgang Holzapfel was arrested by East German border guards and spent nine months in solitary confinement in Berlin-Hohenschönhausen, the notorious prison run by the Stasi [previously]. Starting today, Holzapfel is back behind bars in Berlin-Hohenschönhausen to remind people how they felt before the Wall came down 20 years ago. You can ask him about his campaign and watch him live here.

"He takes a $1.98 tape into Folsom Prison and comes out with an album."

kirkaracha — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:56:51 -0800

"Hello, I'm Johnny Cash." On January 13, 1968, Johnny Cash played two concerts at Folsom State Prison with June Carter, Carl Perkins, the Statler Brothers, and his band, the Tennessee Three. At Folsom Prison, drawn mainly from the first show, is often ranked as one of the best albums of all time and turned Cash's career around. Reporter Gene Beley covered the concert and recorded some songs from the audience. Cash closed both shows with "Greystone Chapel," written by Folsom inmate Glen Sherley. Cash heard the song for the first time the night before the concerts, and acknowledged Sherley during the shows. Cash had been playing in prisons since the late 1950s; Merle Haggard saw several of his concerts from the audience at San Quentin. The 1968 concerts were the second time Cash had played at Folsom. He'd done a show there in November 1966. Reverend Floyd Gressett arranged the 1966 concert and gave Cash the tape of "Greystone Chapel" in 1968. The 1951 movie Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison inspired Cash to write his 1955 single "Folsom Prison Blues" when he was serving in Germany in the US Air Force. The song's melody and lyrics are very similar to Gordon Jenkins' "Crescent City." Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison [trailer] is a 2008 documentary about the concerts. (It apparently doesn't include concert footage.) In 1969 Cash recorded At San Quentin, which included the hit single "A Boy Named Sue." In 1973 he recorded På Österåker at Sweden's Österåker Prison. Cash's prison albums started a trend that included B.B. King's Live in Cook County Jail and Live at San Quentin, John Lee Hooker's Live At Soledad Prison, Little Milton's Live at Westville Prison and the Sex Pistols' Live at Chelmsford Top Security Prison, Thom Chacon's Live at Folsom Prison, Tracy Nelson's Live from Cell Block D, and Charles Manson's Live from San Quentin [AKA White Rasta]. Freddy Fender's Recorded Inside Louisiana State Prison is a fake live-in-prison album. "If it is a prison recording, then where, praytell, are the prisoners?" AMG Men singing at women's prisons was a trend-within-a-trend, with The Moments' Live at the New York State Women's Prison, Sonny George's Live At The Tennessee Prison For Women, Mack Vickery's Live At The Alabama Women's Prison. Leona Williams reversed the gender roles with her San Quentin's First Lady (with Merle Haggard, who'd done time there). At the time of Cash's concert, Folsom was a model prison. "Administrators came from New York and Texas to find out how Folsom kept its violence so low and its inmates from coming back." It's much worse now.

The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons

wcfields — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 10:48:11 -0800

Prison food is bad but it is getting better in some places, at least nutritionally. Other places, it is just getting cheaper. Who serves this stuff? Recently, Slate took a look at the Association of Correctional Food Service Affiliates Annual Conference. But there is food beyond 'prison food bad': Nutraloaf. It is so bad it is almost unconstitutionally bad.

Do you want to die in jail?

ChurchHatesTucker — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 20:01:19 -0800

They were very resentful about people in prison for horrendous crimes getting better medical care than their families.

"What have we got to lose?"

mek — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 23:03:49 -0800

We welcome anyone to visit our town! There are no commandos in the streets. There is no fence or gate being built around Hardin. People are free to come and go as they please. APF is not running our town or our police force. Detailed discussion of the nature of this company starts here.

I mean, really! Who throws a shoe?

orville sash — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 11:28:33 -0800

"After six years of humiliation, of indignity, of killing and violations of sanctity, and desecration of houses of worship, the killer comes, boasting, bragging about victory and democracy. He came to say goodbye to his victims and wanted flowers in response.

"Put simply, that was my flower to the occupier, and to all who are in league with him, whether by spreading lies or taking action, before the occupation or after."

Muntadhar al Zaidi, the journalist sentenced to three years of prison for assaulting a foreign leader after throwing his shoes at President Bush, has been released from prison after serving only nine months. On top of being severely beaten at the time of his arrest, al Zaidi has claimed that his 9 months in prison were marked by beatings, whippings and electric shocks.

"Lockerbie: Megrahi Was Framed"

Joe Beese — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 13:53:40 -0800

"Lockerbie: Megrahi Was Framed" American officials, British officials, and Scottish officials know that Megrahi is innocent. They know that Iran financed the PFLP-GC, a Palestinian group, to carry out the bombing with the cooperation of Syria, in retaliation for the American naval ship, the Vincennes, shooting down an Iranian passenger plane in July of the same year, which took the lives of more people than did the 103 bombing. And it should be pointed out that the Vincennes captain, plus the officer in command of air warfare, and the crew were all awarded medals or ribbons afterward. No one in the US government or media found this objectionable or outrageous, or disgusting or repulsive. The United States has always insisted that the shooting down of the Iranian plane was an "accident". Why then give awards to those responsible? - William Blum (via)

Ask Me Anything

WCityMike — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 06:19:28 -0800

I was shot in the head two years ago. I was in prison for six years. I live in a Taliban hub. I need to be an amputee. I'm four. I'm six. I'm eight. I have a micropenis. I've had sex both with and without a foreskin. My sister and I are in love. I'm in love with my mother. I married and had a daughter with my first cousin. I love my dog. I have killed someone while driving drunk. I have superpowers from chemotherapy. I was in a cult for seven years. I own a woman. I used to be asexual (I am still asexual). I was in porn (and I'm still in porn). I took a boy's virginity. I am killing myself in a few months. I started the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. I started Reddit.

I have a "state of deficiency in understanding, processing, or describing emotions". I have Alice in Wonderland syndrome. I believe free will doesn't exist.

I was driven gay. I am gay in a straight marriage. I was born a woman, became a man, and as a man, I'm gay.

I'm a pawnbroker, mortician, spammer, multimillionaire, working TV/film comedy writer, Freemason, actor's assistant, beekeeper, drug dealer, Catholic priest, kleptomaniac, nudist, prosecutor, suicide hotline volunteer.

I'm a pathological liar. I might be making all this up.

Ask me anything.

"Anybody Can Kill Anybody"

Lutoslawski — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 10:04:16 -0800

Lynette 'Squeaky' Fromme, former member of the Manson Family and would-be assassin of President Gerald Ford, is being released from prison after 34 years behind bars. But did she really try to assassinate Ford in the first place?

We are such stuff: As dreams are made on

ocherdraco — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 09:32:00 -0800

"Theatre," says Professor Lorraine Moller, Artistic Director of Rehabilitation Through the Arts at Sing Sing Correctional Facility, in her foreword to Laurence Tocci's The Proscenium Cage [pdf], "may well be one of the few antidotes to the de-humanizing climate of prisons." The use of theater in prisons has many forms: from projects designed to let prisoners tell their own stories as shown in the Austrian film "Gangster Girls" (trailer in German), to the elaborate, high-concept costume dramas of Italy's Compagnia della Fortezza. Some base their work on Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed, others on Moreno's Psychodrama, but many programs use a more direct approach: put on classic plays, and let the play do the illuminating. That's the approach of Shakespeare Behind Bars, the troupe at Luther Luckett Correctional Complex in LaGrange, Kentucky. Watch the entirety of Shakespeare Behind Bars, a compelling 2005 documentary that follows the troupe for a season as they produce a production of The Tempest. Other programs, books, and articles of interest:

"Prison Drama," an article in the Chicago Reader that profiles the Geese Theater, a US troupe.¹
The Geese Theatre in the UK
"Notes on Prison Theater in Northern Uganda" (Part 2, Part 3)
Prison Performing Arts in St. Louis, Missouri
Direct Action, a program at Ramsey County Correctional Facility in Minnesota
The TiPP Project in Manchester, UK
Theatre in Prison: Theory and Practice edited by Michael Balfour
The Proscenium Cage: Critical Case Studies in U.S. Prison Theatre Programs by Laurence Tocci
Prison Theatre: Perspectives and Practices edited by James Thompson

¹An excerpt:

"There's a violence epidemic going on in this country," John Bergman sighs at the end of a long and exhausting day. "There's a wholesale trade of guns and knives at street level; there's talk of race hatred again. It's not getting better, and something's got to be done. . . . It's very easy to blame society. There's poverty and racism and outrageous government indifference to alleviating the conditions that breed crime. We can't do anything about that. But we're talking about people who have been self-traumatized as well as socially traumatized. Guys seduce themselves with criminal trickery. They learn how to lie and cheat and steal. That can be confronted. I'm willing to put out energy to push people to take a risk and say it might be possible. I don't get depressed. I love what I do. And I learn. I see what those men inside do and what we make together. It comes from them. These fuckers teach me tremendously."

Go Raiders.

Ljubljana — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 09:20:02 -0800

Last Words from Death Row Inmates [via Digg]

Tools made in German Prisons

Rumple — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 14:21:31 -0800

Escape and other tools made by inmates in German prisons, from the photographer Marc Steinmetz. My favorite is the functional battery-powered shotgun, although the hand-made toaster is a testament to the love of a decent breakfast. via.

Free at last!

djduckie — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 15:46:54 -0800

The tragic story of Timothy Cole who was sentenced to 25 years in prison for a rape he didn't commit, and died because of inadequate health care in prison. He was recently posthumously exonerated based on confessions of the guilty man and DNA evidence.

America's only "Native Martial Art"?

P.o.B. — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:11:39 -0800

"For a long time it has been a kind of martial arts Loch Ness monster: an American fighting form with supposedly sinister origins that many have heard of but few have seen or experienced. No one, it seemed, had any concrete proof that it existed, or at least none they were willing to share. Until (2:36) recently." Longer (5:19) ver here As the article notes, there wasn't much info available about 52 previous to the past few years. Information was generally secondhand and culled from multiple sources. Here is a link aggregate that extends back many years, including a thread with plenty of (alleged) info embedded in it here. The style(s) include techniques with names like Skull and Crossbones, Catch and Kiss, and The Crown. Catch and Kiss was popularized by a person named Mother Dear on (in?) Rikers Island (second post down). (Wiki) Some inside YT links contain NSFW rap lyrics and marketing.

National Prison Rape Commission releases its final report

Non Prosequitur — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 03:32:11 -0800

A Prison Nightmare. On June 23, 2009, the National Prison Rape Commission released its final Report and proposed Standards to prevent, detect, respond to and monitor sexual abuse of incarcerated or detained individuals throughout the United States. More prisoners reported abuse by staff than abuse by other prisoners.

The Practice of Photography in Sites of Incarceration

mediareport — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 06:31:55 -0800

Pinhole Photography by Incarcerated Girls at Remann Hall, Washington State. Prison Baseball. Guantanamo: Directory of Photographic and Visual Resources. Painted photographs of forgotten incarcerated Russian youth. 19th century prison ships. Pete Brook's Prison Photography blog links to lots of great stuff.

Varg is free!

geos — Mon, 25 May 2009 08:36:20 -0800

Varg is free! But, will all the glitter girls go for black metal? (note: this post does not endorse nazism, murder, church burning, or bad music)

Playing to a captive audience

MuffinMan — Tue, 12 May 2009 01:02:06 -0800

In last night's Sony Radio Awards - the UK's radio equivalent of the Oscars - Electric Radio Brixton won four prizes, including 2 gold awards. The kicker? It is broadcast for and by inmates in Brixton Prison 24 hours a day, part of an ambitious project by the Prison Radio Association. Some background here. - Sorry but I don't think there is a way of listening to the station. It is broadcast via satellite but no details of how to access it appear to be available, if indeed it is possible.

"The best I can do is to live a good life and maintain decent standards of behaviour towards others."

chorltonmeateater — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 23:20:41 -0800

Erwin James: the real me. Erwin James has written about prison for the Guardian for a number of years, from the point of view of an insider: when his column began, he was serving a sentence for two murders. He completed his sentence a few years ago, but continued to write under that name, a pseudonym. Here, he talks about the crimes that he was originally imprisoned for, his time in the French Foreign Legion, how he became a writer during his time in prison, and gives his real name for the first time.

The Changing Racial Dynamics of the War on Drugs

lunit — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 08:11:21 -0800

The Changing Racial Dynamics of the War on Drugs. The Sentencing Project has just released a report (pdf) finding that, for the first time in 20 years, the number of Black Americans in state prison for drug offenses has fallen. Between 1999 and 2005, the number of White drug offenders in state prisons rose about 43 percent, while the number of Black offenders declined by 22 percent. One cause may be a rise in the use of drug courts, which are locally administered programs that divert offenders into treatment rather than incarceration. The Sentencing Project has a recent report (pdf) on this issue as well.

The latest craze in adult dating.

desjardins — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:45:13 -0800

Conjugal Harmony : "Normally you wouldn't think an arsonist would be good at sex. Boy was I ever wrong!" [slightly NSFW]

Hellhole

Joe Beese — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:02:19 -0800

"The United States holds tens of thousands of inmates in long-term solitary confinement. Is this torture?"

Death Row Diaries

sveskemus — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 06:18:30 -0800

Watercolors of people on death row. Part I, Part II.

Reforming the Lorton Reformatory

woodway — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 07:08:28 -0800

“There is nothing like this in the United States," said Leone. "We’ve looked." The Workhouse Arts Center near Occoquan, VA opened in September 2008 on the grounds of a former prison that was founded by President Theodore Roosevelt as a rehabilitation facility for Washington, DC criminals. Its extensive agrarian projects were intended to put them in touch with nature, but by 1917 security tightened and suffragettes protesting before the White House endured harsh treatment there. The city continued sending inmates to the overcrowded facility until Congress ordered the prison to be shuttered. For years it stood empty, but now the historic buildings are being transformed into studios for local artists (previously).

1 in 31.

lunit — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 08:19:15 -0800

A new report by the Pew Center of the States finds that 1 in 31 U.S. Adults is currently under Community Supervision. (Full report pdf). Georgia currently tops the charts, with 1 in 13 adults under correctional control. Previously.