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Anyone watch this series:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xvSvWg8550

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxBuDGl5NN0

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Jim Greider speaks Thursday at Indiana State Prison’s sesquicentennial celebration. Photo by Matt Field

Behind Bars

Prisoners, officials speak at ISP sesquicentennial event

By Matt Field
Staff Writer

MICHIGAN CITY — A succession of people — prisoners, superintendents and others — has come and gone over the past three decades at Indiana State Prison, but not Jim Greider.

The state’s oldest prison is turning 150 years old, and for a substantial amount of time, Greider has been on the inside, a prisoner behind the facility’s 40-foot perimeter wall topped with 10 feet of razor wire.

Just as on the outside, there has been progress inside. The prison hires female correctional officers now, for instance. But some things don’t change.

“The scene doesn’t change, it’s static. You walk down the street in this place, you see a 40-foot wall,” Greider said. “Eventually, you become immune to the 40-foot wall. You don’t even see it.”

*
Along with four other prisoners and current and former prison officials, Greider spoke to a crowd of staff, guests and dignitaries at ISP’s sesquicentennial ceremony Thursday.

After the day’s speeches, officials led a tour of the prison, shedding light on life behind bars. There’s a hospital. There’s a recreational yard with a basketball court, weight machines and video games. There’s the Prison Enterprises Network Products facility, where Greider does clerical work and others manufacture products, including license plates and cabinets.

In one cell house, prisoners live two men to a cell. Many have TV sets. MSNBC’s coverage of the national tax-cut debate flickered in one cell as the tour passed.

But for the most part, life on the inside is routine: work, recreation and often prayer.

The prison has a long history. When the prison wall was replaced in 1999, parts of it had been standing since Abraham Lincoln’s presidency. Speaking to the crowd, ISP Superintendent Bill Wilson said the prison is a testimony to life, giving men the opportunity to better themselves.

“Everything good about life is right here, it has been for 150 years,” he said. “We forget about that sometimes because of the environment, the name, the prison.”

For Greider, those words ring true. Though he’s spent 34 years in ISP, he said it takes too much energy to be bitter as he grows older behind the wall.

“I’m being blessed by stuff that people on the street, in the free world, don’t have,” he said.

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Inside story ... Sir Trevor McDonald listens to cop killer Benjamin Ritchie

One inmate killed two people for not letting him mow their lawn.. but I still felt sorry for him

By LAURA CAROE

VETERAN Trevor McDonald has struck up a bizarre bond with a KILLER caged for 170 years.

The legendary broadcaster made friends with the prisoner during filming for a documentary at a US jail.

Sir Trevor told TV Biz about his sympathy for Ronald L. Sanford, who slayed two OAPs as a 13-year-old.

The former News at Ten anchor met Sanford during his encounter at the maximum security Indiana State Prison in Michigan City.

Sir Trevor, 73, said: “What Sanford did was vile, unspeakable and appalling.

“He killed them because they wouldn’t let him cut the grass.”

Yet Sir Trevor said he felt sorry for the 39-year-old inmate, who will not be eligible for parole for nearly 100 years.

He added: “I was terribly moved when he talked about all the things he had never done.

“I tried to picture a life where he hadn’t been to the prom, never been out of the country, never had a driving licence.

“It’s not until you itemise those things that you get an image of the life, bereft of all those experiences.

“Those were the type of things that played on my mind and kept me awake some nights. He was 13 — you can’t write people off at 13.

“So I am sending some books to him. I got the prison’s permission.

“They don’t let you send books to prisoners but they assured me that they would make sure he got them.”

Filming the two-part Inside Death Row, which starts at 9pm on ITV1 on Thursday, left the broadcaster with nightmares.

He also confessed that he had developed a soft spot for other inmates — who are kept behind bars for 23 hours a day — after meeting hitman John Serwatka, serving life with no possibility of release after killing two people he never met.

Sir Trevor added: “He said he had read some of the things I have done and the people I have met and said, ‘I would love to sit and chat with you sometime.’ I found myself saying, ‘John, that would be very nice.’ And then I thought to myself what the bloody hell am I talking about. Under what circumstances am I going to sit and talk to John about my life?

“John was essentially a very nice man to talk to and somebody who I would probably on the outside consider going for a drink with.”

Being surrounded by child killers, drug dealers and sex fiends for two weeks has left Sir Trevor suffering flashbacks about the inmates. He said: “It’s not a pleasant place. I didn’t feel that my life was ever in danger but it is a frightening, dangerous place and I think you ignore that at your peril.

“It is a maximum security prison. There are 1,900 people who have committed unspeakable crimes.

“I never thought, perhaps stupidly, that anyone would kill me. What worried me more is that they would spit at me or throw excrement at me, which they do.

“Thankfully, it didn’t happen — but that is what I feared.”

Sir Trevor also met Frederick Baer, one of a dozen on Death Row awaiting death by lethal injection.

He heard how he slit the throat of a young mother and partially decapitated her four-year-old girl.

Sir Trevor said: “I was sitting on his cell bed and he was handcuffed. It was one of the occasions where I thought, ‘What am I doing here?’”

Benjamin Ritchie, sentenced to death for shooting and killing a cop, also gave a candid interview.

Sir Trevor, who said he did need convincing to take on the project, admitted: “I’m not sure I would have wanted to see an execution.

“I’m not particularly excited about the prospect of watching someone being put to death.”

Fredrick Baer once claimed to be so soft-hearted that he cried if a butterfly hit his windscreen. He is devoted to his pet cat Lucky, whom he describes as his ‘heart, soul and world’.

http://bit.ly/10kWeUa



http://bit.ly/11PVdA8

[ChickenCityRoller]

So the guy doesn't want to harm a butterfly but has no problem of randomly slitting the throat of a mother and her daughter.

[Tim]

"“It’s not until you itemise those things that you get an image of the life, bereft of all those experiences."

Um - he KILLED someone. THAT is why he has a life "bereft of all those experiences"

This guy feels sorry for him?

Unbelievable.

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So in federal prisons, convicts are labeled and called: 'inmates' but in state prisons, they are addressed as: 'offenders.' Quite an extraordinary revealing interviews in the 2 part TV show by the way....including the one with beefy Superintendent Bill Wilson.