prisons

It’s been 20 years, and James Tillman still hasn’t forgotten what it felt like the first time he trudged down the narrow, gray hallways into the bowels of Northern Correctional Institution.

“It was like walking into the circle of hell,” said the wrongfully convicted inmate-turned-activist. “The conditions are so terrible – worse than any animals could be subject to.”

At sixteen years of age, Reginald Dwayne Betts went to prison for carjacking. Decades later, Betts is a celebrated poet and graduate of Yale Law School. But, like many ex-offenders, the consequences of those teenage mistakes have followed him for years.

A pregnant inmate had complained of pain numerous times to staff at York Correctional Institution during the week before she gave birth in her cell last year, but medical workers did not perform an assessment that would have determined she was in labor, nor did they tell a doctor about her abdominal pain or send her to an emergency room, according to a report unsealed Friday by a federal judge.

The nonprofit Judy Dworin Performance Project harnesses the arts to build social awareness, staging performances that draw on issues ranging from incarceration to immigration.

And it has been doing this for 30 years.

This hour, we sit down with Judy Dworin to reflect on this milestone. We also talk with performers and colleagues, and we hear from you, too. How has the Judy Dworin Performance Project touched your life?

William Outlaw is a natural leader. He's been a key figure in helping to lower New Haven's homicide rate over the last decade. He's a strategist and an organizer who can size up a situation quickly. He can defuse a threatening situation with his charisma and charm. He can run a business. 

As a street outreach worker in New Haven, he uses all the same skills today that he used when he co-ran New Haven's largest cocaine gang in the 1980's. 

At sixteen years of age, Reginald Dwayne Betts went to prison for carjacking. Decades later, Betts is a celebrated poet and graduate of Yale Law School. But, like many ex-offenders, the consequences of those teenage mistakes have followed him for years.

In 1993, a lawyer at the Center for Children’s Advocacy brought a lawsuit challenging, among other things, the conditions of confinement at the state’s  juvenile detention centers. Four years later, the court approved an agreement that resulted in the Emily J. Consent Decree, part of which required the state to retool its educational services for juvenile detainees.

Connecticut's "Second Chance Society" has reduced the number of people going into prison and better prepared offenders for a meaningful life when they get out. 

Much of the criminal justice system has changed over the three decades that Rollin Cook has worked in prisons. At the beginning of his career, the main job of correction officers was to warehouse inmates – make sure the jails and prisons were secure, that the prisoners made it to their court hearings, that the gates opened and closed.

Cities and towns have laws to keep people from engaging in behavior that may disturb others, like sleeping on park benches, drinking in public, or just plain “loitering”.

What does it mean when just hanging out in a public space puts you in violation of these laws?

Over the 21 years Sen. Cathy Osten worked for the Department of Correction, mental illness was so pervasive among Connecticut’s inmates that it was not unusual for her to hear from families who were grateful their loved ones were incarcerated because they were better off behind bars than on the street.

The American criminal justice system has become less 'just' over recent decades and prosecutors bear much of the responsibility.

The FBI, the Justice Department's inspector general and the New York City medical examiner will investigate how billionaire and convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein was found dead in his jail cell at Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan early Saturday morning. 

A first-in-the-nation bill that would make phone calls from Connecticut prisons free is moving to the next level. 

The American criminal justice system has become less 'just' over recent decades and prosecutors bear much of the responsibility.

The Connecticut state Judiciary Committee passed a bill this week that could make prison phone calls free.

Senate Democrats have unveiled their plan to legalize and tax recreational pot. Senate President Pro Tem Martin Looney said with neighboring Massachusetts already selling legal marijuana, Connecticut needs to treat cannabis like other adult products.

“What we need as we have done with alcohol, as we have done with tobacco is a scheme for legalization for those who are adults, plus regulation and taxation,” said Looney.

A new report is raising serious concerns about conditions for young people incarcerated or detained in Connecticut facilities.