by Summer Breeze, Prison Journalism Project
February 4, 2024

Life behind bars is chaotic. 

The stress of incarcerated life runs the emotional and physical gamut. People inside have to deal with the consequences of a crime they did or did not commit. We have to follow onerous institutional rules, eating when they say, sleeping when they say, doing everything they say! And we have to cope with being locked away from our friends and family in a foreign place. 

This takes a huge daily toll on our mental health. From sunup to sundown, prison stresses us out. 

We all respond differently to the pains and pressures. For some, ignoring the stress can be deadly. For others, the stress is as irritating as a mosquito bite. 

For me, the daily stress is killing me softly. So I use different coping skills to overcome it. I read my Bible or a book with daily meditations, listen to music — gospel, pop, R&B, rap — and I work out. I do this instead of giving in to the sadness and grief. 

I push through it all. I will not let the stressors of this life break my soul. I channel my inner superpowers to help me stay sane. I use healing thoughts, affirmations and good vibes as a guide to lead me through hardships. 

I block out negative people and situations; I avoid petty conflicts and gossip. I fight to keep the spaces in my mind clean by not letting others take up residence in my head with their negative energy. I pray for my enemies and I forgive my haters. I know that in order for the Creator to rehabilitate me, I have to act worthy of his attention and show my intentions clearly. 

I listen to the wind of life when it blows, letting its melody pull me towards it. I send out good vibes in those winds and I bank on their returns. I hold my head high in spite of the heavy emotional tolls. I rise and watch the heavens open each day. I strive to be thankful for everything I have, everything I am, and for everyone around me. 

I pray that after reading this short article you can find a way or a reason to get over the stress that hassles you. Build a team of people who will encourage you to be your best, do your best, and pray that God will do the rest.

This article first appeared on Prison Journalism Project and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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by Azhdah Enga, Prison Journalism Project
January 14, 2024

My first day in prison was the worst day of my life, besides the day I was sentenced to 17 years. Before I touched down in prison I thought it was going to be like something out of the movies — long dark walkways outside of rusty cell doors with the paint peeling off. I thought everyone was going to be yelling and banging and trying to kill each other. 

It turns out there were no cells, no bars and no banging. Only buildings that looked like military dorms and two rows of tightly packed bunk beds and lockers, with 3 feet between me and the man on either side of me. I’m 6 feet, 2 inches tall. If I stand in the middle of the dorm and touch the tip of my middle finger to the nearest bunk bed, I can almost reach the opposite bunk bed in the other row.

I hadn’t been in prison for 15 minutes when I witnessed a guy get stabbed in the neck while I was standing in the medication line. It happened right behind me. I saw the aggressor and the victim. I immediately walked away without saying anything. I was shocked.

I didn’t know either man. But I knew for damn sure I didn’t want to be the guy with all the holes in his neck, or the guy who was probably about to spend the rest of his life in prison (if that wasn’t already the plan). The reality of where I was hit me like a ton of bricks. My anxiety shot through the roof.

When I got back to my living area, people were talking about what happened as if they were fans of rival football teams. I couldn’t believe how thrilled people were to see someone get hurt. I lay on my bunk and stared at the ceiling, trying to process the violence. I decided not to tell anyone what I saw. It wasn’t my business. 

Not long after that altercation, an old friend of mine from the county jail told me somebody wanted to fight me. I knew the guy he was talking about — our beef was old, childish. Even though I grew up fighting, I didn’t want to fight anybody anymore, especially in prison. But I also didn’t want anybody to think that I was scared. So I went over to another building across the yard to try and talk with him. 

When I found him, we exchanged a few words, and next thing I know I’m getting my head stomped into the ground by him. “How in the heck did I get here?” I asked myself. Then, to my surprise, somebody pulled the man off of me. I got up and shook off the kicks to my head and face. I squared off with the man and we fought again. And again. The fighting lasted about eight minutes. Honestly, I was pretty sure I was going to die, but I held my own. I escaped with a busted lip and a couple shoe prints on me. That was a win. 

Later that day, people kept coming up to me, praising me and giving me commissary items. The guy I fought was pretty big compared to my 160 pounds. 

The next day a corrections officer saw my face and shook their head. Another asked me if I had learned my lesson. Everybody assumed that because I was only 22 I was bound to get into trouble — that I’m the type who goes looking for it. I wasn’t though. If someone just talks smack to me, I ignore it. I only get active if somebody threatens my life or puts their hands on me. 

Oddly enough, after every fight I’ve been in, the guy who fought me always wants to be cool. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve become close friends with after a fight. I’ve been incarcerated over nine years now and still don’t understand this dynamic.

My first day in prison changed me in many ways. The paranoia inside is real. Prison is so unpredictable. The people around you, including the ones you don’t even know, are watching. Not every situation has to end in violence and not everybody has to be an enemy. The ones who are your enemies are the ones you choose to make your enemies. 

I don’t have issues with many people, but every day I wake up thinking that I might not live to see tomorrow. The best way to do your time is to be humble and stay focused on the end goal: your freedom.

This article first appeared on Prison Journalism Project and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Azhda Enga is a writer incarcerated in Arizona. He is using a pseudonym.

To read more articles written by incarcerated writers, check out these other articles:
Who Benefits From the Death Penalty? by Dennis “Abbadunamis” Mintun
Sending Teenagers to Prison Has Severe Consequences By Robert Schultz

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by Dennis “Abbadunamis” Mintun, Prison Journalism Project
April 14, 2024

In late February, my state of Idaho tried to execute a person for the first time in 12 years. According to an Idaho Statesman article, the execution team searched for an hour for a suitable vein to inject Thomas Creech with lethal drugs, but was unsuccessful. The execution was eventually aborted and he was sent back to death row. 

Creech has been incarcerated for nearly 50 years and on Idaho’s death row for close to 44 of those years. He has been convicted of five murders and received his death sentence after killing a disabled inmate in his prison in 1981. According to The Associated Press, he claimed to have killed as many as 50 people, but authorities believe the number of possible killings to be closer to a dozen people.  

As you can see, this man was once a bad person. “Was” is the key word in that sentence, because many people believe that Creech changed over close to five decades behind bars.

I have never met Creech, but I have spoken with a couple people who have, and they say he is a better man now — always polite, respectful and ready to help people in need. Creech is highly regarded at Idaho Maximum Security Institution, where he resides. Recently, I was being transported to an outside hospital for an MRI, and the corrections officers transporting me were having a conversation about Creech and how well-respected he was in the prison system. Even the judge who sentenced him to death and a former warden have supported taking him off death row.

Idaho Department of Correction Director Josh Tewalt told The Associated Press in February that some corrections officers have “grown up” with Creech.

“I don’t want to be dismissive of what he did and the countless people who were impacted by that in real significant ways,” Tewalt told the wire service before Creech’s scheduled execution. “At the same time, you also can’t be dismissive of the effect it’s going to have on people who have established a relationship with him. On Thursday, Tom’s not going to be there. You know he’s not coming back to that unit — that’s real. It would be really difficult to not feel some sort of emotion about that.”

I believe that a person can change for the better, even someone who might have killed close to 50 people. This belief has been shaped over the nearly 22 years that I have spent behind bars. I’ve seen others change, and I have changed myself. I started a new religion during my incarceration, in large part, because of discrimination I faced from churches as a gay man. One of the things we teach is not holding people’s past against them, but accepting them as they are now.    

I wish that we could view Creech’s life that way. But many people have said Creech deserves to be killed. What would that accomplish? Who would his killing serve? 

In this case, it might serve family members of Creech’s victims. At least two family members have publicly called for his execution, asking for closure. 

Yet, we don’t know how every family member feels; and if some disagree with his execution, then how do we decide whose feelings are more valid? 

When I read interviews of victims’ families, it often sounds like they want to get on with their lives more than they want to see someone die. In several instances, family members of victims have spoken out against executions, according to a database from Death Penalty Information Center. 

Sometimes, they believe the inmate can be rehabilitated. Sometimes, they believe life in prison is the right punishment — still harsh, but providing the perpetrator an opportunity to live. Others cite the fact that killing another human won’t bring their loved one back. 

One quote in the database, from the daughter of a murder victim, stood out to me: “I cannot imagine what good it would do to kill a person who is incarcerated and away from the public. No one would be made safer. However, I can think of many people who would be harmed by his death — including his innocent family members and the prison workers who would be asked to carry out his execution. Not a single person would be healed.”

Other family members against executions have said they do not want to contribute to the racial disparities present in executions. As of early 2023, about 55% of people on death row were Black or Latino, compared to 33% of the U.S. population. There’s another glaring statistic from Death Penalty Information Center: “More than 75% of death row defendants who have been executed were sentenced to death for killing white victims, even though in society as a whole about half of all homicide victims are African American.”

Beyond racial imbalances, executing someone has often been torturous — and far from humane — even in modern times. One researcher identified  276 botched executions between 1890 and 2010 — 7% of all executions. For 2022, the percentage of botched executions was clocked at a whopping 35%.  

People have been poked with needles for hours, like Creech. In one case, a man’s arm was cut open to insert an IV. Other people have suffered in pain for extended periods of time, instead of experiencing the quick death they were promised.

Alabama, a notoriously tough-on-crime state, called for a moratorium on executions in 2022 while it investigated multiple botched executions. But earlier this year, the state returned to executions by killing Kenneth Smith with a new method: nitrogen suffocation. 

The state has claimed that Smith’s execution went smoothly, while witnesses have said he writhed violently in pain for minutes. Mississippi, Oklahoma and Louisiana also have approved the new form of execution, and other states could follow. 

We had a chance to reconsider the inhumanity of executions; but instead, we just moved forward and found a new way to kill people. 

I am not necessarily protesting the death penalty categorically; but if the state is going to carry out killings, then it should explain why those killings are necessary and why they benefit society.

The specter of dying as a punishment for killing someone has also not stopped murders. If a person is intent on taking a life, they are probably not going to stop and say to themselves, “I might be put to death for this.” Either they believe they will get away with killing someone or they don’t care about the consequences. It doesn’t make sense to kill someone to show that killing shouldn’t be done. 

In my view, state executions just introduce pain and suffering into more people’s lives. And if it’s true that “hurt people hurt people,” as the saying goes, then we are contributing to further harm down the road.

Creech’s next execution attempt has not yet been scheduled, but the state will try again eventually.

(Additional reporting by PJP)

This article first appeared on Prison Journalism Project and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Dennis “Abbadunamis” Mintun is a writer incarcerated in Idaho.

More by Dennis “Abbadunamis” Mintun

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The post Who Benefits From the Death Penalty? appeared first on .

By Robert Schultz, Prison Journalism Project
April 9, 2024

Fyodor Dostoevsky once wrote, “The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.” 

Then what can be said of a society that sends teenagers to prison?

In 2009, when I was 17 years old, I got involved in gang violence and was soon charged with first-degree murder. I’ve had many family members and friends who were locked up, which led me to expect incarceration for myself. Initially, I assumed I would face 20 to 60 years and only serve half my sentence.

I was sent to an adult division of the Cook County Jail in Chicago — even though I was just a teenager at the time. Then I learned that my prediction was wrong. I was informed that I was facing a 45-to-85-year sentence to be served fully, without parole or early release. Not once during my trial and sentencing did I appear before a juvenile court or stay in a juvenile detention center. My route to prison was the same path taken by adults.

A young man goes to prison

I fought my case from the county jail for two years. Most of it was spent anxiously waiting for a miracle. My lawyer attempted legal maneuvers to help me, but nothing was successful. Eventually, my co-defendant agreed to testify against me, and my lawyer advised me to plead guilty if the state agreed to waive a gun enhancement charge. In Illinois, if an adult uses a gun to murder someone, an additional 25 years is added to their sentence. 

In March 2012, at the age of 20, I pleaded guilty. I was given a 25-year sentence with no opportunity for parole or early release. 

From there, I was sent to Menard Correctional Center, a maximum security prison, where many inmates were 20 to 30 years older than me. Many of those men had also been sent to prison as teenagers or young adults.  

The prison was about six hours southwest of my hometown of Chicago. It provided little programming and had a reputation for violence. 

From the moment I entered the cell house, I was overwhelmed by how loud it was. Everyone was yelling over each other. It was only quiet at night, when I lay in bed and thought about all the opportunities and moments I had lost, and all the opportunities and moments I had yet to lose.

Constantly pondering these dark outcomes caused me to slip into depression for the first several months of my sentence. Every little thing began to irritate me, and I would let that irritation build to the point of combustion. There was no relief. I became a short-tempered person who reacted irrationally to small inconveniences even if they didn’t directly affect me much. This led to fights between cellmates and friction with my family.   

Lingering mental scars

The experience of prison at such a young age has nearly broken me. Mental scars still linger today. My lack of experiences outside of prison makes me feel insecure about my ability to be successful in a career, maintain mature relationships and have a fulfilling life after prison. I feel like I have to get all those things right on the first try because I don’t have many more chances if I fail. 

The idea of reentering the outside world makes me anxious. I read books aimed at helping people manage their thoughts. I have also found that sharing these thoughts with a group of people can be helpful. It’s comforting to know that I’m not alone and that others are attempting to overcome these same obstacles.

Throughout my incarceration, I have experienced weeks of hopelessness that I couldn’t escape. During these times, my mind raced whenever I tried to sleep. I would once again fall into deep thought about opportunities I had missed. 

Three years into my sentence, I went to a doctor. He told me I was dealing with anxiety and depression. This was new for me. Fear and sadness were never ruling emotions in my life. Before prison, I was often cheerful and energetic — someone who could brighten up a room. I didn’t know how to process my circumstances. 

These are common emotions for juveniles who are sent to adult prisons. According to a report last year from The Sentencing Project, youth detention facilities expose young people to abuse and impede their educational and career success. These youth are far more likely to have depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and suicidal thoughts than their peers who are not incarcerated. 

In other words, prison can create problems for young people that didn’t exist before. As of 2017, Illinois had about 1,100 people serving sentences that stemmed from an offense committed as a juvenile, according to a report from Restore Justice, a nonprofit focused on reforming the Illinois criminal legal system.

More reform needed

The national picture is even more astounding, although real progress has been made. Around 2001, almost 250,000 juveniles were tried as adults nationwide, according to The Sentencing Project. By 2019, that number had dropped to 53,000 youth. A massive improvement for sure, but prisons are still causing harmful mental consequences for the teenagers and young adults who grow old within them.

When I went to prison, Illinois had an automatic transfer law that allowed juveniles younger than 16 to be prosecuted as adults for a number of offenses. Reforms in 2015 raised the minimum age that someone can be tried as an adult to 16 years old, and narrowed the offenses. Now, to be tried as an adult, people must be at least 16 and on trial for first-degree murder, aggravated criminal sexual assault or aggravated battery with a firearm.

Illinois has ended gun enhancement sentences for juveniles. And the state has banned life-without-parole sentences for most juveniles who received their sentences after May 2019. But there is much work to do. Truth in sentencing, which requires offenders to serve substantial parts of their sentences and reduces the possibility of parole and earning good-time credit, still prevents many juveniles from earning time off of their sentences. 

And as important as some of these changes have been, they are for the most part not being applied retroactively. There is a 20-year gap for youth sentenced under the old rules who still have to serve their sentences under the harsher laws. 

I am one of these people. We are being kept in prisons for decades or a lifetime — well after we have grown into an adult and become a completely different person from the one who arrived at prison. It seems like folks on the outside have forgotten about us.

These changes would have helped me when I was sentenced by allowing my case to be reviewed by a juvenile court judge. That judge could have made the decision to try me as a juvenile. Instead, I was automatically tried as an adult. 

If these reforms were in place then, I would not have been facing up to 85 years in prison, the de-facto life sentence that influenced me to plead guilty in exchange for a shorter term. Instead, if I went to trial, I would have faced 40 years at most.

Most importantly, I would have had the ability to appear before a parole board after five years in prison. Instead, my 25-year sentence came with no chance at parole.

What comes next?

It’s tough to grow up in prison. I have tried to discover and define myself among people who are years older than me. There is rarely hope for a future on the outside beyond harder, lower-paying jobs, unless I find a different path for myself. Even if I find a good job, I believe I’ll still struggle with a lack of confidence for the rest of my life because of how young I was when I received this too-long sentence. It’s challenging to talk to my family about what I’ve been through because I don’t want to scare them. 

But we still have an opportunity to make things better. We need to divert our youth away from incarceration. And for those who already have been locked up, we need to consider that many of them will be released after years in prison, coming home profoundly damaged after spending formative years behind bars. I worry that if we don’t support them, they’ll fail to adjust during reentry and self-sabotage whenever they have a chance at happiness. 

The earliest I can leave prison is 2035. I will be 43 years old. I filed for clemency in 2020 because parole doesn’t exist as an option for me. On my application, I asked the governor to consider what life I am expected to live after coming to prison as a teenager and spending the next 25 years of my life behind bars. 

After all this time, once I return to the outside world, who am I supposed to be? Who does society want me to be?

This article first appeared on Prison Journalism Project and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Robert Schultz is a writer incarcerated in Illinois.

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