THE WASTED YEARS

[Music] foreign knowing that I would never get out I would rather have been executed can you remember the good things outside they're always on your mind every time you think it's something you will hear something on the air you remember well what was I doing back then out in the Free World there's no words uh no description that will uh nothing could be said that can compensate for one's freedom I mean if a man had a million dollars like if I had a million dollars a day I'd give a million dollars to be free I mean a million of us wouldn't mean anything to me in here so uh that still give you a fair idea what feeling of penitentiary means you know life at Stateville the Wasted Years narrator Hugh Hill foreign [Music] this is Hugh Hill at the gates of Stateville prison you are about to see an accurate account of what life is really like inside a large penitentiary the accepted view is false in this jail there are no big shots no tough guys only pitiable human beings doing time in one of the toughest institutions in the world it is not our intent to disguise the purpose for their incarceration the men who are in these institutions were convicted of crimes ranging anywhere from burglary to murder some have spent 20 to 30 years of their lives Behind the Walls you will hear their story As Told by the inmates themselves and if this account of Life at Stateville deters one youngster from wasting his years the same way the result will be worth the effort new prisoners arrive by bus almost every day they call the new inmates at Stateville fish they're entering a Maximum Security Prison built for half the present population of 5221. their first look at Stateville disguises the true purpose it's a camouflage of clean buildings beautiful grounds small groups of prisoners with apparent freedom of movement as a Chicago sociologist puts it this is an institution that has its nose wiped its shoes shined and it's tie straight but except for the physical improvements imprisonment at Stateville is the same unrelenting shackling of the spirit that it has been since the beginning of time there are about 210 000 inmates in the United States doing time in 230 state and federal penitentiaries Statesville because of the nature of its population is one of the toughest it is the only prison in the nation that has round cell houses the rules here are strict the routine rigid the convicts become institutionalized more rapidly because the pressure is Never Off We Begin our story of what it means to do time at Stateville prison at 7 00 am in cell house d to five seven nine all prisoners must stand at their cell doors for the morning cow check the two officers walked by and count selecting here's prisoner 199e describing the morning routine the first thing you do when you get up in the morning seven usually wash up clean up [Music] and get ready to go to work Authority that's all you have to look forward to 46. I mean what else have we got with my kind of percentage uh what else is there to look forward to 11. I mean actually uh it's the same thing it's the same routine day after day on one Gallery 123 123 right one two Gallery one six two one six two right on the three Gallery one eight three one eight three right one six eight right ciao life at Stateville is made up of a series of movements the same each day timed almost to the second a constant shuffling of prisoners from one place to another to breakfast where this group is going to school or work assignments back to lunch into the South and during all that marching the no talking rule is strictly enforced listener knows that in the penitentiary you must live by the room There Is No Escape because there are always ways of making you obey them Paul jencot has been in Stateville for 25 years sentenced to 199 years for murder plus two life sentences under the habitual criminal act he has learned that this is a world of can't that's right you can you cannot eat with whom you please you cannot see the movie you please you see one movie a week whether you like it or not uh you cannot go to the yard when you please you go to the yard when they tell you to go to the yard and you come in when they tell you to come in uh you march in uh self formation on the gallery you cannot skip a cell or fall back a cell uh you cannot go to church when you please you go to church I won't specify a day a week or on holy days of obligation uh you cannot go swimming because we have no swimming pool you cannot go fishing because we have no streaming here uh you cannot go to the ball game because in the winter time we don't have ball games we have the movie and uh likewise in the summertime you cannot go to the movie because you have a ball game on a Saturday so everything is King you can't uh whistle in the cell you can't shout in the South you can't talk loud in the South you can't eat what you want to eat because you eat what they serve if you uh pass something you just passed it that's all there is to it Warden Frank paid came up through the ranks of guards to succeed the famous Joseph Reagan now the Illinois director of Public Safety Warden Pate carries out Reagan's philosophy of strict discipline to ensure order at a maximum security Institution Warden Pate why must Stateville prison be so secure why does it have to be so tight as they say down here because we're equipped to receive the uh long timer the troublemaker and the repeater and a long timer I mean a man with extensive sentence uh we have over 700 minerals Sins Of Life or even more confined in this area now that doesn't mean to say that every man was like a sentence is a troublemaker are particularly vicious but we do have some dangers and vicious people here however I think they're in a minority but we have some will take any means at hand to uh uh leave us to escape the place I can show you what I mean over here well it's quite a sample case you have Warden yes this is contraband that we've uh picked up and searches here over a number of years and put together for the purpose of instructing student officers uh gives them some idea of what these men can develop here's a spoon just a simple uh spoon with the end of it sharpened and I fashion out of that how they sharpen it by uh putting it on the concrete which we have just rubbing it on the concrete that's right yes sir here's uh another spoon with a key fashion of it to work one of the the doors got a good key it's a good key it would work uh here's a another knife or dagger made from Simply rolling up a tobacco tin and wetting it the end of it on the concrete here's a very simple but a very dangerous weapon made from a race of a bed and here again individual homeless Sharp Edge on the concrete took some time of course uh we know that the bar can be cut with various things if given enough time Emery Dustin string for example [Music] the warden of Stateville has an effective means of punishment to handle what he calls the non-conformist it's called isolation stateville's version of solitary confinement it has changed very little over the years except that now the maximum time in isolation is 15 days an officer checks each cell every 20 minutes the inmate leaves everything behind when he enters the cell he has nothing to do for 24 hours a day but sit stand or lay down sleep or think all right hold it up all right right in close the door behind you [Music] all right [Music] well you find out tomorrow when the captain interviews you help me check what do I eat well you'll eat tomorrow we only feed once a day here it's uh it's nothing good about it it's very bad I just try to imagine sleeping on three tissue paper thin blankets you got a commode in there tap water nothing left one meal a day and that one meal consists of I don't know I say about uh two ounces of beans or whatever they have on the main line one slice of a slice of bread and on Sundays you may get a ration of meat and that goes on for Fifth Third can go on for 15 days no clothing yes you have clothing and now you have a jacket and a pair of trousers let me sleep on the floor sleep on the floor and if you decide to do something about it such as bugging up creating a lot of noise after you come out if the fish is deemed fit they can put you in segregation that happened to me the inmate and segregation is completely isolated from the rest of the prison population he is alone in his cell and even when he is led to a small courtyard for recreation he is alone that half hour in the yard is the only time that he is allowed out of his cell during a 24-hour period the average stay in segregation is three to four months but one man stayed there for 14 years another for 11. in past year segregation was a trouble spot the prisoners would break up the toilets and beds and throw the pieces at guards so now the beds are bolted to the concrete floor and the toilets are made of metal they get three meals a day and books to read but they must stay in the cells all day every day but not all the prisoners get into trouble some conform to the rules immediately this man did here you didn't have much of an education not in English couldn't speak English well while I work in Chicago I picked up a few words Jesse Gonzalez has been a model prisoner since the day he entered Stateville five years ago if he had not conformed to the rules he would not have been allowed to start grade school and go on to Stateville High School grade school I started in first grade it took me 18 months to graduate and then I went to high school there are 100 in the high school and 200 in grammar school the name of the school does not appear on the diploma there are 46 in the TV junior college and 800 men are taking correspondence courses from Stateville High all the instructors are inmates like Gonzalez some of the students couldn't speak English when they entered prisons they'd learn in this class so when you see that word there how would it read feed and how would that read need so then we're going to the uh double o that has the u sound Espanol is foreign food book so is any questions everybody understand that huh all right Morton Pate says he wouldn't know what to do if it weren't for the schools at Stateville it's not only a way to educate the ignorant but it is another method of keeping the inmates busy and that's a major task at Stateville prison Pate says I know that when we teach a man to read and write he may go out and hang some paper and forgery would bring him back here this mathematics teacher by the way is a physician many of the inmate students get good grades in school they have plenty of time to study there are also some excellent artists in Stateville they work in oils pastels and watercolors the man who painted these pictures is doing 18 years for burglary and assault to rape his work has been displayed many times on the outside he can't offer for sale anivia's paintings Warden Pate says we teach just about everything in our schools except chemistry but even in school the maximum security is never relaxed a man coming into school must be searched or frisked or shook down in the state-filled parlance the frisking of the inmates goes on everywhere all day long neither the inmates nor the guards like it but it must be done the inmates earn no money in school prisoner Gonzalez had to quit in his second year of high school he wants to buy books in Spanish and to get the money he has to work in a factory no I'm working in the furniture Factor how much have you heard well right now I got 70 66.25 because that's uh they're on my savings and uh I ordered some books that's about it I got a ten dollars with a common salary that's all I have [Music] in The Tint Shop music is typed in over a loud speaker there's so much noise in the place that it's hard to hear Morton Tate know that if he teaches a man to weld he may go out and work on a safe but there has to be a way to train a man and at the same time keep him occupied prison officials call it a hot shot because a weapon can be Stamped Out fast says the warden let's face it they can stamp out a knife in three minutes many prisoners naturally want to work where they get paid the most money they can earn an average of 12 to 14 dollars a month the bigger money is called long bread the smaller amount shortbread thank you the inmates are issued tools when they enter the factory they must account for all of them and turn them in when they leave they are placed into a shadow board Silhouettes painted on the back of a tool chest every shadow must be covered by a tool if a tool is missing they might shut down the factory and call for a general Shakedown sometimes the tool isn't found and in those cases the tool is usually destroyed where no one can use it because it's so hot that no one no man when any sensible state of mind would bring it out in the open where he could use it you know he throws in the sewer or something and and in a couple of instances I have known him to dig up sores they dug bias yard up here about five years ago looking for a weapon a knife even if a tool isn't missing the men are searched again as they leave the factory they must pull out everything from their pockets take their hats off and hold them in the air arms of Kimbo while the guards go over them the men hate it yeah that's one of the things that sickens you why I mean well it's uh it's because you're always going into your pockets and taken out your smoke and then your handkerchief and your cup and your cigarettes and everything else that you got and they're always hanging it out there this is the busiest Penitentiary intersection in the world inmates coming from schools and factories Converge on this spot make the turn and head for the dining room okay just like in the Army hurry up and wait all meals are timed and the first man in is always the first man to leave to give the last inmate the same amount of time to eat as the first this is probably the cleanest Kitchen in the United States it is constantly being scrubbed down before during and after the meals new prisoners must take their turn in the kitchen Chester wieger serving a life sentence for murdering a Riverside woman in Starved Rock State Park is still working in the kitchen each one of those portable tables is moved to a point on the outer rim of this circular dining room the inmates go by and pick up their food from that location today's menu includes a slice of cheese beans and pork and Cornbread beans are the most popular dish in the prison Joseph Reagan says he has seen men pass up roast beef to get to the bean the man must move through the chow line swiftly they eat in chips 20 minutes to each ship the dining room is the most ticklish trouble spot in the entire prison it's the only place where so many men gather together in one place Warden Pate says if you run out of a favorite item you better have something as good or better to replace it or you'll have trouble there are three officers in the tower armed with rifles and tear gas five or six years ago there was a no talking rule strictly enforced in the dining room now they're allowed to talk but only in low tones older convicts actually object to any talking at all during memes one of them said there are so many guys driving Cadillacs and chasing blondes you can't get a decent meal some inmates say there's a lot of tension in the dining room one day a plate was dropped on the floor the entire assembly sat both upright waiting for something to happen no spoons by the way are watched carefully by the guards and once again they're counted as they leave the dining room each guard is responsible for his group of men he doesn't dare have one missing the dining room is emptied swiftly to make ready for another shift the entire population of this prison has been fed in one hour and 15 minutes not a scrap of food is wasted if an inmate leaves just one slice of bread you may have his privileges such as listening to the radio taken away for as much as 15 days some prisoners went confronted with this type of penalty have asked to spend three days in isolation instead the requests are always turned down Warden Pate says this may seem like tough punishment but what if 5 000 prisoners left just one slice of bread Martin paid also says that if he could he would like to see many changes in maximum security type of imprisonment in this state but I would like to see in this state is more institutions not the maximum security type I think our state has enough maximum security prisons to last for 100 years what I have reference to is minimum security institution minimum custody open type institutions we have many men here at Statesville that don't need all this custody uh they could be handled very easily in the minimum security Institution fortunately Illinois is getting a new institution in the southern part of the state for this type of individual one four this is the 13th count of the day there will be three more during the night the Catholic chaplain father gervay springman says the following 14 hours that's the toughest part of doing that here's how an inmate describes showtime in the winter time because like they say you got to be yourself Sundown there's Sun up winners are long and rough always 66 I don't know some guys might say well it's a snap already [Music] you won't ever get up well I got a chance to see the board in 33 years ready you think about it all the time the two can't help think about it 33 what year will that be that'll be in 1983. 133 right welcome after the guard locks the cells with a key a second block is turned from the guard Tower by a hydraulic switch and it's crowded in there three men in each cell they have plenty of time to think at almost every night you think about your relatives after you uh for so long after you're here and they soon drop off stuff right into you stop coming to see you and that's why it really hurts your relative doesn't come down your kids you don't know my mind today I hardly know in fact they are strangers to me it's just like you are my daughter if I saw the day I wouldn't know yeah they're proud of everything you know all of a sudden you know everyone that you love or think anything about it all is uh away from you you can't see them in certain days you know match you dream about them you wake up well it's I guess uh you cry a little bit and everything else you know you're miserable with a beyond the description yeah I've looked at the wall uh I stand on my in my city and myself many times and look at the wall I can see trees because it's growing up that extends perhaps above all the wall you know and I'm only a few feet away but yet as far as freedom is concerned I'm at the end of the world it is hideous it is it is hideous I mean it's no description for it it's not there's no description for it all your social life is gone you uh little things that you wouldn't ordinarily notice on the street here is obviously absent you know like like uh well for instance like seeing children and uh hearing the voice of women and uh being able to step out when you want to go to bed when you want to eat what you want to you know and when you wanna mm-hmm and uh there's so many things that that it would take ours to describe Stateville prison is a strange almost inbred Institution it's a world set apart it even has its own language and it has a separate set of Moorings we have declined the temptation to include a description of that part of prison life fears and the haters one former inmate actually told me that this place is a hate Factory we have passed over the story of the prison Underground although even the warden admits that one exists we have foregone an account of the informers although there are some here Joseph Reagan was once quoted as saying if three men are talking in the yard two of them are mine he probably never said it but many of the inmates here believe that he said it and meant it there are probably some ex-convicts who are watching who would disagree with our portrayal of life in Stateville but to this reporter it seemed that the real punishment here adds up to one thing and one thing only the finality and completeness of the regimentation the separation from the insignificant pleasures and freedoms of the outside world that punishment is what turns the days the nights and the months into the Wasted Years life at Stateville the Wasted Years [Music] thank you [Music] thank you now WBBM TV editorial expressing the views of this station's management ladies and gentlemen vice president of the Columbia television stations Division and general manager of WBBM TV Mr Clark B George good evening I would like to have you see and hear three Stateville prisoners I urge you to listen carefully two of these men are brothers one has been paroled the other is due for parole this week but the important point is that they went to prison together for armed robbery and murder and spent 10 years of their lives in confinement the third man was sentenced to 99 years for murder he has already spent 12 years of his life at Stateville and is not even eligible to ask for parole for another 21 years listen my father although he was anxious for us kids to get an education and he would kick us out of the house and send us to school he didn't see that we stayed there consequently well no interest from home wow those kids would play hooky five out of six days or better than that even I say we play hooking 90 of the time after he came back out of the army in 1946 what happened then well I went out stealing again just running around once in a while get a job to make my mouth feel a little better but other than that I'd be on a steal all the time and it didn't work you never worked no I know what you'd call work no education so I didn't know what to do couldn't get a good job where are you gonna get a job who's going to hire you and the kind of work I know nobody wants it it won't employ it uneducated the way I was I didn't know I didn't understand other people you know and really I didn't even understand myself and uh I looked at everybody else as my enemy and uh of course I think that was partially caused too but living through the depression you know as a kid and uh especially the law officials prison officials I thought they were all and even the taxpayers after coming to prison I thought they were all my enemies I figured their taxes was the ones that supporting this prison and family officials to keep me here you know we would go out at night to Douglas Park and Jefferson Park and uh for the just for fun we would roll bombs for cigarettes that was mainly what we would do just for the kick of it we rolled a bomb for a pack of cigarettes and we thought it's something big we never got over a pack of cigarettes seldom we got a half a pack but it was there was some thrill to it we had taken something you graduated from that we graduated from that two lead pipes we'd knock them out in the head for a half pack of cigarettes well to be honest which I've done that a lot of thinking and I believe that had our lessons instead of thought I knew it all I wouldn't be here it was if I had to listen to what my mom told me years ago it would have never happened stayed in school stayed in school and just quit running with the gangs these studies the changed my whole attitude towards everything I know that if I went to school and uh the way I have here on the street that I would never come to prison now you're getting out after 10 years after 10 years what have you got to go to on the outside well I have nothing now uh it's 10 years and the pad didn't have anything when I come to prison actually and uh now the 10 years has passed in between well there's even less I had two children when I come in one of them was 18 months old one was three years old and they're practically grown now and don't even know me and uh of course I've got a wonderful family that's going to try to do everything they can to try to help me make the grade and I'm certainly going to do what I can I don't think that the state will ever have anything any more trouble out of me I'm sure you will agree that the scenes you have just witnessed were dismal and depressing probably nothing in a man's experience in a free Society can equal in tragedy the loss of his personal freedom his friends his home his family yet there are literally hundreds of young people in Chicago today who will face this loss of Freedom if they continue to travel the paths that they are currently following and one of these paths leading to tragedy begins when a young man or woman drops out of school Dr James B Coleman former president of Harvard University has said although the causes of juvenile delinquency are complex and there is no one solution employment opportunities are clearly important a youth who has dropped out of school and has never had a full-time job is not likely to become a constructive citizen of his community quite the contrary has a frustrated individual he is likely to be anti-social and rebellious and may well become a juvenile delinquent WBBM TV has deliberately linked this editorial to a documentary on Prison life to bring as forcibly as possible to parents children Educators and employers alike the Dreadful proven potential social Dynamite which exists today because of the problem of dropouts Governor Kerner in an address before the sales Marketing Executives Club on February 13th stated the boy who drops out of school before finishing high school has little Prospect of any job he faces months and years of unrelieved idleness he is made for trouble he will become almost of necessity a costly dependent or costlier delinquent the easiest path for the young unwanted dropouts is quite clearly charted it runs from dependent to delinquent to adult Criminal ladies and gentlemen there are 5221 prisoners at Stateville it is estimated by prison authorities that nine out of ten of these prisoners have never finished high school and the future looks very dark because according to The Chicago School Board 37 percent of our high school students currently drop out before graduation and if the present Trend continues this percentage will rise to 50 percent in the Years just ahead think of it one out of every two high school students a Potential Prospect for tragedy now there are a number of agencies and some business firms trying to do something about this mounting problem the Drake school project being conducted by the public school administration The Double E education employment program carried out by Carson Perry Scott and Company in cooperation with the public school system and the needle trades training project underwritten by the Ford foundation and involving the cooperation of The Amalgamated clothing workers art Schaffner and Marx B cuppenheimer and Company and the Illinois State Employment Service these are examples of enlightened Civic and business and labor leadership but we believe the heart of the problem lies in the family and in the young people themselves and thus we are trying to communicate to you parents and children alike what terrible potential consequences can befall those young people who cannot get jobs and thus join the more than one million between 16 and 25 years of age who roam the streets of the United States today as Chandler Brossard senior editor look magazine says in an article in look February 27th which we recommend to you jobs and factories stores and even on farms that used to be open to kids with no particular training are almost disappearing the majority of employers are extremely reluctant to hire a Dropout because his lack of Education makes it difficult to train him government schools business and labor can Aid in this problem but the real solution must lie in the realization by parents and children that nothing can be any more important in the lives of young persons today than the completion of a high school education a life of tragedy of Wasted Years can be the alternative thank you