Hard Time S2 E6: Prison City

Ross Correctional Institution is a world of its own with a hierarchy and economy and rules drea bye-bye but if you choose to make it your home there may be no turning back for one year National Geographic followed the lives of inmates and officers in the state of Ohio it's a system bent on making inmates better filled with convicted felons who might already be worse got in my face this is a year of a hard time [Music] for the more than fifty thousand inmates living in the Ohio prison system every day comes down to a choice of how you will do your time come on come on prepare to re-enter the free world you read it as 2201 or fall prey to life on the Block we're gambling and hustling and lead to violence this is Ross Correctional Institution and medium and close security prison in southern Ohio home to some of the state's toughest offenders and a society all the time this is a whole different universe so city wooden gates you've got different people from different walks of life and strength is the only thing is recognized name got a survivor fighting you necessary life here is full of pitfalls we do not fulfill them say you got four five violence drugs gangs their pitfalls that can put an inmate at odds with the system and make time harder you don't want better for yourself you can't thank for yourself you want the next man second for you you're in the right place but people were running a month over you in here this ain't about you lost and feared tough this is about using this and survive in prison where people could lose in your chairs we actually give it about you you don't fix what got you here you are coming back they have apprenticeships here they have education here but you got to go after it rehabilitation is on you will you let your sentence changing for better or worse in prison there is no easy path but one thing is certain no one leaves the same way they came in if they ever leave at all I don't think like most people I know that come time don't bother me I've made the best of this of a bad situation Oran Brumley is a fixture at Rice how you doing guys - I know everybody here - they all know me some people call them leader goggle arm pop how's the kid minister to wear your date I step out the front door a long time everyday ten minutes to cool but he never changes look at the routine [Music] seven days a week Bramley mopped the floors and cleans the bathrooms in the captains office and earned seventeen dollars a month they were all losing focus I'll take word that done fourteen years in prison there's a world of difference in doing time from not person 2025 years than what it is today it's a world a different when I started doing my time you minded your business you was either up a man or you got killed I love that I can I wish it was back like that there's nothing in this world that will stop me from being mom sitting that right now at age twelve our moon shot him from the mountains in Kentucky my dad would wake me up at four o'clock in the morning to get drunk with him I was a cold-blooded doc holliday before I turned 13 years old from Lee's addictions filled a life of violent crime a rap sheet that encompasses four decades began when he was a teenager March 1968 that's when I first went to prison I was 17 years old I was out burglarizing stealing everything I could and I got out I stole to a state troopers car and ran over top of him went to prison got out again and I don't number much I'm dubbed and I call her killed another guy and on Moore and Hamilton Ohio and you're 15 to life for that and I got out two got out again it would be his last release to the free world in 2003 wielding a knife he entered the home of an 80 year old man firmly demanded money but the victim refused and Bramley stabbed him 27 times in the neck chest and back his victim barely survived and Brumley was sentenced to 38 years for attempted murder a pattern of violence carried forward from his time behind bars I did stretches in the hole for being drunk I killed one inmate and stabbed another one balanced me man it's it's just it's the answer in you if they turn me loose today I'm thinking I would be in your house tomorrow because I don't know nothing else I'll honestly say it is if they keep you in this prison over 10 years they should never release you you can take out there and shoot you or whatever you know these are Smith & Wesson what the hell find a last thing actually make America huh handcuff mine enough they call me squirrel my name is Wayne from lights out of North Carolina Terry in the mock up for a while [Music] for almost three months now 27 year-old Dwayne Rozier has been locked down in 5a Ross's segregation unit great his charge threatening staff just the latest incident in his 10 year sentence I mean I'm always in trouble I like to tough I like to run my mouth at UC ma'am at today's I'm Mackel Americans not gonna be quiet are you walking - oh no I get what you can no right there segregation is restrictive even by prison standards and mates here are cuffed whenever they leave their cells locked down 23 hours a day few privileges and no movement but even here life goes on hi hi boom and here's everybody knows everybody whoa [Music] better here so it's like a family close-knit family here real it's maybe a bunch of idiots and morons and openings but were nothing we pretty much look out for you know hey come here back here at Ross rosier goes by the name squirrel and has built a reputation as a troublemaker everything's a big game most the time I mean I thought I'd like to do is run around play goofball I'll fake nothing's here's your development really fast when you come in here I mean you can come in here young like that like I did squirrel grew up under state supervision foster care and group homes but ten years ago his childhood in the system ended and his adulthood as a convict began in 2000 he washed his best friend shoot a man in a Bosch robbery and helped him hide the gun squirrel was 17 years old and over the last decade the Ohio prison system has become home people on the streets they know that their family raised them to get up every day go to work they seen their mom and dad in Iraq we do this and do that so that's what they know this is what I love like you can put me in any person in state allowed probably any state is probably all pretty much the same they went in 24 hours I can tell you where to get anything who's got wings got a little by sang from who's got a store who's shootin tattoos and you get in tune with the place I guess know by instinct and listing okay just to take over 10 years ago the world chose his path and made a life for himself in prison but now it's a life that's about to come to an end it's the whole world in here praying the world follow their house the block is the neighborhood and the compound is their city that's home right now anyway things don't stop just because that's necessary we may do what we go it's the little reminders of the free world that keep an inmate connected to what he left behind but for those facing life sentences like Davis Stonestreet prison could be the only reality they'll ever know were the outcasts of the world prisoners are I'm not counting on getting out I'm captain Tom's been and rest my life in here so I'm gonna do what I want to do 20 years ago Stonestreet was a teenager and the projects of Akron when he got involved in a grisly murder on August 13 1991 he led two accomplices to the home of a former employer stunts tree claims he was ordered to bind the man's arms and legs on accomplice stab the victim and beat him to death with the butt of a rifle then he put the gun on my head told me kick him or die - I was scared I don't know how many times I kicked that guy no one I know I was covered in blood turn myself in told the police what happened and thank screwed I had 20 years for it [Music] I was real socked when they found me guilty I remember I was crying I don't cry no more I don't have no more like like like like tears like that towards anything Stonestreet came into the system young with a 20 to life sentence and to get through his time he chose to transform to leave stone street behind and become Twiggy [Music] no people Minds change in prison being combined we start adapting your mind starts playing tricks on you and stuff like that and which it does which I've never been with a woman never had sex with a woman I was locked up for nine years before I started any homosexual activity someone got some weed in prison we just rolling it up and I'm getting high and it just no I just got freaky they had sex with another man never turned back sexual activity of any kind is illegal in prison but Twiggy defies the rules and while being gay can make you a target here he puts his sexuality on display and the hope that no one can use it against him when I first got here I went out on the REC yard and laid out in these uh panties and uh gives a little get everybody riled up and laughing and joking and smile and stuff when I got here and it worked call me later call me cars don't mess with me and they don't mess with me you ain't got none to save the day now ha let your man know when you're all the way out you have control when you're in the closet you don't have no control you don't want no one know what you're doing me I don't care so there's nothing you can hold over my head but even Twiggy gets tested and when that happens he puts on his signature accessory in prison someone that looks like me with pink gloves on just whooped you how can you walk around this compound and act like you tough at all how can you even show your face it's a reputation for me I am what I am you know carve out your place and be willing to fight for it it's a philosophy that shaped how Oran Brumley does his time even the 20 year olds can't keep over me I kind of proud of that too [Music] I won't be able to fight back when his jokes are taken anything coming or just to beat them so bad that they will never do it again at sixty years old Bromley is one of the few old-timers in 1a a cell house with a tough reputation known for gang rivalries and extortion tensions that have lately led to violence there have been two major fights here in the past month alone both instigated by young inmates officers quickly control each incident and uncover the suspected cause for Bramley it's just another reminder of changing times man if you harden your right now I can't adjust to these new people like an old diner so I can't change that me not I can't listen to their music I don't like the way the world or pants down to their knees and I can't I can't relate to him with 40 years lived behind bars from leasing the prison system change today it's a far cry from he says he did time on his own terms oh that's beautiful I used to love doing time you had to be a man you had to respect everybody around you and that's the way I like it it was real strict if I came to you and I bore the facts of yourself you and I told you I would pay you tomorrow and just when tomorrow comes I just didn't know you don't say nothing till you I know that I'm gonna get killed anybody that steals off somebody else or if I tell on you for something I should be killed now that's my way I can I can change from that way of thinking because I love that I care the convict code of how to do time may have changed but for young inmates prison isn't any easier and many of them think that power and protection lie in the numbers clicking up joining a gang surviving our there is different than surprising here I don't care what anybody says when you come to prison if you're not in a gang or hang with a certain group of people within six months you're gonna you know I mean that's just how it is [Music] was a little white did it listen to rap and funk a lot of week came to join I was about 130 pounds used to get whooped on without a mouth like I was six six I tried to adapt normally the best way I could from being the person I was on the streets and then coming here and trying to be that same person I found out quickly that women work you know that's not to change what was became what I've seen squirrel where's his transformation on his skin emblems of time served Prison tattoos are a common sight at Ross they swear allegiance to a gang or a memory but outside these gates their meaning can change for the worse I got a big red swot on my side who while trying with a big red spot to get tattooed on their side with a skull and some horns he does that I mean that's not normal but in here is normal they couldn't your teenage with all these guys now these catchers on her face and stuff they don't know when they get 15 60 years old your skin starts to wrinkling the most tattooed minutes they don't realize that right now I mean when I doubt for wilder and I felt like a freak her looking like this I'm not gonna hide anything that you know meaning I went through you know he did was here as part of Who I am now but at the time it felt necessary but now thinking back you might not even been desert [Music] the changes squirrel has undergone in prison superficial or otherwise could complicate any chance at a normal life in the free world a life that is set to begin in a matter of days my little calendar it seems Akita banana stickers I got nine days up eight days it's Friday I got on the next Sunday and I still don't know what i'ma do since I got a DAF at the prison you know I mean the hardest thing now is knowing that about to open that door and kicked me out and I mean so I mean let me out but some basics and kicking me out like I can't refuse like now I'm cool you know I can't do that they angle let me don't think of them I understand as I might have to learn we'll come back the state of Ohio has built its prison system around an organizing principle [Music] rehabilitation through work just don't lock people up you need great ability we're actually teaching somebody something that they can get out and help their families or help their loved ones out and try to give back to the community inmates who choose to stay out of trouble can get on-the-job training and your labors of course the system itself the [Music] slaughterhouse prepares meat for the state's prisons the machine shop prepares its trucks and they are all jobs that pay [Music] inmates just entering the system start out on the lowest rung cleaning dorms for $12 a month but for those who toe the line and choose the path of rehabilitation there are a few jobs more prestigious than the furniture factory at Ross here inmate employees build dusts and shelves for other prisons in the state and earn up to $80 a month more than any other prison job at Ross for David Applegate though working in the shop is about more than money it's a way to stay focused on the world beyond prison I really don't feel like I'm locked up while I'm working just feels like I'm at my job it gives you a different place for your mom to go it's when you leave work you have to drop your pants you've had it down make sure you're not take anything out that's when you remind to tell you're locked up can you walk out on the yard it's directly out into the yard so you know you're there but while I was working I didn't feel like I was locked up that's the key do something that makes you not feel like you're here Applegate spends about six hours a day working at the factory and back on the block he's known as the jailhouse handyman the other day a guy brought this phantom he had the cord cut off of it said here you might need a support so what's wrong with it he said why are the guy who gave it to me said it was burn up say well did he use some sandpaper on the shaft and put a little oil on and see if the bearing or bushing is Nestor's to not into anything to it so I'm fixing topics I put a new port on it runs fine yeah it's easier fix things fix myself that's for sure do they ever call me MacGyver all that have hid repairing other inmates appliances is a small-time hustle for applicator one that keeps them in touch with the life you knew on the street had a mobile mechanic business my own business make good money I live good out there I had a lot of lot of good people around me have me a nice family they didn't give me here I got myself here I want them to support me with his factory job Applegate doesn't have to rely on his family on the outside for money as far as he's concerned his actions have cost them enough already six years ago Applegate was accused of an attack that led to the death of another he was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and sent to prison for 20 years but Applegate is determined to not let the time go to waste when I got locked up I thought well I'm 25 if they give me 20 years I'll be 45 I have to do basically my whole life almost over again but behind bars [Music] where I'm working unless I'm thinking about that's how I do it Applegate's job lies at the heart of his routine and routine is the bedrock of prison life every day at Ross is arranged on an unchanging timetable three daily meals seven daily counts work and recreation a schedule that provides comfort purpose and distraction when an inmate faces decades in prison but that structure can also be dangerous after years lived in the system it can seem impossible to live outside of it I don't think about meals and kid and of the house my house what that I don't know that isn't this is my house right I'm living a gas station bathroom through it with another guy yeah prison is where I've adapted myself to like a lizard one of them little lizards that can change the color of whatever's around them I didn't change my color to what's around me and now I can't change that [Music] inmates call it getting institutionalized when life within the gates feels more like home than what lies beyond them [Music] as a fait David Applegate is trying to escape I strive not to turn into some of the guys that have been down for 20-plus years they're not right there has to sing live the next 14 years this is my own I'm trying very hard not to let it get the best of me but Applegate's intentions may face a test there's a rumor circulating that the Ross furniture factory is closing down and if it's true David Applegate will have to find a different way to do his time I got a commitment to get to this it comes to that prison and don't do nothing with your life especially the saying it even gave up on life because right here is the best place to get yourself together because you have nothing but time to find your real self and if you look hard enough you will find your real self [Music] for the last six years and made David Applegate has been working toward a future outside of prison he's an employee at the Ross Furniture Factory where inmates can make six times as much as other prison jobs in the state that money has broad significance and inmates income becomes credit which is used at the prison store to buy commissary goods like snack food coffee or pre-stamped envelopes back on the block these store Goods become valuable commodities traded for anything from home-cooked meals to tailoring I used to draw for some people now I really only tailor pants these were a little bit wider when it started and I'll just sit there take and fold them over and sew like clear up to the knee so that way they're more of a straight leg I charge about three coffees which is about six bucks it's pretty much like a dollar an hour almost I guarantee all my works and then you bring it back for free the side jobs are called hustles and they are the fabric of the underground inmate economy a hustle it's like a job you know I'm saying it's like the job which because everybody has to do something or to survive you got to get money so uh Ohio makes sure every inmate gets a minimum of twelve dollars a month in state pay for their prison job some inmates have friends and family on the outside putting money on their books others rely on what they earn at their prison jobs to buy commissary order outfit surrender clothes or go grocery shopping yes I'm allowed to buy extra know things I want instead of things are needed some people like seeing money home today family this is a better job to do that but today Ross has made an announcement orders for furniture in the prison system are down so the state has decided to close the factory stores it was rumor for longest it was a rumor then it came down yeah we are shutting down they said that the economy out there is just so bad that nobody is buying furniture you can't produce furniture if no one's buying even prison isn't immune to the pressures of the outside economy and the inmate employees will have to find other ways of getting by without programs how does man supposed to rehabilitate they're not gonna be able to so what are they going to do they're going to fall back to what they know out there on the street you know hustling I don't want to do a hard time you know I have 20 years I don't want to do 20 years a hard time I worked there for I think over five years so I got into a routine of that now that's gone it's like started all over again in here you know then you realize just how much you get caught up in you know being here this atmosphere [Music] the factory's closing is a painful reminder that Applegate is locked up dependent on his routines to get through the next 14 years and for some inmates a far-off release date can become too much to bear that mean that I got tired I was taking of LSD and I was in a fillable myself I was tripping on acid and I took a he hits at one time and I had to end up doing two years of no institution because of it for 1,700 stitches in my throat Norm's cut my guts out and everything I'll go home to burn out or die I wanted to go brain build or die but uh I got over there I don't feel like that now and the rowdy guy laying here go nuts they got stuff outside people families on it I don't don't know about it so I don't think right now I like it here it's nephews and nieces and stuff like that I don't know Mullins that's two pictures they were made in a bar me and my brother I don't even know I don't know Rocky's nunim that's pictures my dog's house my first all right there the Boston Terrier looks cold calling dollar bill nice I missed most of my teens all my 20s and I'm bucking this all my 30s so the my Glock I don't have no life what do I know in here a mark none I don't know what's out there on a loud outside world don't every day I watch on TV to love and movies and everything like that that's what I think outside world is I don't know if I am gay or not I got on the street would I be doing what I'll be doing right now I don't know I don't know yeah I watch TV I understand a little bit what's going on out there but man I don't know what's going on out there I don't know how to survive out there you know everybody I mean every human being you fear James I could even if you hate something you're doing in life you you don't want to change it cuz you don't know there's gonna be better or worse to what you change sometimes it just seems inevitable like you're going to come back but it's hard to imagine not being back it's hard to imagine not being here for real I think I was lost in line I lost who I was I know that I had the same personal one I've changed a lot ten years came by that's real still a little kid man throw off any by the 15 year old for room twenty ten years old it's three days out from the end of inmate Dwayne Rose ears 10-year prison sentence and he's leaving segregation for one of the first times in three months to start the release process these are the first steps to freedom what every inmate goes through before getting out Bruce here huh no myself security number name your name number Rogier three eight nine through photo Richard date birth 112 83 already they 2:19 you can go through throw away with still one over there Qatar Doha South when it's a foreign address it's to the mailroom and all so what are you taking home with you just mailed the best that I'm throwing anything else with on everything else what you had $5 42 cents on your personal challenge to get $75 actually money title baby 22 that you'll receive on Sunday when you leave versus just what the hell is this the prison makes sure every inmate has a way home once he's released if he doesn't have a ride you will be taken to the bus station a friend is picking squirrel up at the front door on Sunday a necessity for an inmate who hasn't been outside the gate in 10 years [Music] if you set me outside that gate right now and said okay go home and I was on my own I look at you like you [ __ ] like okay yeah sure oh whatever I go what the hell is this building I know there's a road out there but I don't know what road it is which way when I got on that road was where I have to go I'd have a 50-50 shot of going the right way because I know there's one Road right there the Peugeot has a pretty good shot I'm not no Indian tracker nothing I can't tell you like oh yeah the Sun is right there so I got to go that way is north I can't see that know anything I'd literally be lost I have no idea where I am none but even after he leaves Ross squirrel will not be a free man can you just sign right here for your ID when you leave Sunday make sure they give it to you have you reporting Monday at the Canton APA office he's been assigned to a transitional center to help him adjust to life in the free world if he violates his parole he could return to prison for another five years I got 24 hours before I got turned myself in to the halfway house I want a gal turn drink pop pills I'm gonna turn myself back in sometimes I think I'm gonna charm you either be good I tell myself like man you gonna get out there we can do good if you want to I mean do I really want him and it took 10 years of my life for nothing I really want to give him six in one month Oh we'll see mmm one way or other we're gonna find out soon definitely gonna find out I stopped by a cool bar guys come on across camp another inmate is undergoing a change of his own got any problems when you get everywhere stop up the office and see me you need Oran Brumley is being moved to another cell house his current block 1a has being turned into a 20 and under dorm they switch to the dorms over 220 and under I guess they trying to isolate against a little troublemakers just like juvenile person these kids are going to go around beat each other they don't know anything but a lot of the time subject the Jungman they've took it over this is our joint now the old-timers got to step aside but Jesus I'm happy to step aside look what they've done through the system I mean yeah they can have it does it but if I gotta go out too and drop my pants down to my knees my dirty on the world hanging out in everybody's face walking around your don't bag your look they can happen [Music] I don't got too old the answer messing around these youngsters going crazy even in prison times change and now after 40 years in the system Oran Brumley must make way for the next generation he's been assigned to a cell house with older inmates a retirement home of sorts and a comfortable place to live out the rest of his life behind bars [Music] except there's a need to come because I a lot many many years ago you can't fight the system you have to just adjust to it and go along with it like these young guys they're fighting it and they ain't doing nothing only thing they do is ever ever we could go there packing their stuff and unpacking going to church as a whole and back out and holding back up I just got tired all that so now just leave I just I just do it day by day going to be released back into society that's what the real test coming in that are you gonna hold strong to your belief or you gonna fall back whether I learned or am I gonna let the devil you it's a choice [Music] it's been nearly four months since the closing of the Ross Furniture Factory and David Applegate has found a new job he's working in the maintenance shop manning the spray station but rather than earning $80 a month his salary has been slashed to just 20 like being a CEO of a company and now you're just a regular ordinary worker and beard your pay cut work at the furniture itself may be little easy the lower salary means leaner times and to road ahead that may have gotten that much longer I'll try to wrap my head around from doing 20 years I just take it day by day year by year so it's over that's what it has to do [Music] while David Applegate contemplates his future David Stonestreet has gotten news that has him setting out on a new path as well he has his first parole board hearing coming up a strong incentive to abide by the rules so he's doing his best to stay under the radar which means a regulation haircut a cell script of decoration and letting go of his prison persona after 20 years he's leaving Twiggy behind could I go out there and live yes I could could I go out there and not jaywalk and never come back to jail you know yeah could I be as a productive citizen yeah I think I could that's a 20 million dollar question right there if they let me go [Music] I might be a comedian hello I make a living at that talking about this crazy stuff in prison I'd be a good story life of a prisoner be a good book title [Music] across camp Dwayne Rose years life as a prisoner is about to come to an end today he's getting released from Ross Correctional Institution re-entering a world he's been apart from since it was 17 years old do you think about getting out every day you're visiting every day for the last 10 years I thought about the day I get out man I can't wait to dig out man I can't wait the bad guy every day I've been thinking about this for years I mean it doesn't seem real you know I mean I never had a job never had a car never let him on huh I know you the cell phone but on computers running and there's none they still blaring pages not everybody have pages he's up my mom [Music] where he'll want to work where do you find work well today with a big red and black freak right across my neck 1488 across back my like a squirrel on the back of my head hey mean you mean tomato just burgers for your tongue you know how to do that literally hold on it never had a job literally don't know how to do nothing I know I live in prison that's not a job skill they could come back that loan no their life locked up and turtle nacho I mean what have you got I killed a 26 year old man in the bar and he had a wife and a couple kids all that time I did and building up all this hating me I mean I I hate so bad I could taste it the joint changing man I mean it changed me all the way like complete 180 I'm like a totally different person [Music] turning seventeen-year-old the ones to just get high and drunk and to have fun and a month that I want to get high and party and then be a some man this stills you would hate me in here like real bad you hate everybody hate the police you hate people to be part of your group [Music] real I hope I can change all that man if I come back I know I'm give up and I know this is gonna be the rest of my life in and out or just all out a license [Music] I'm pretty much to almost honor time piloted by him to come back this was master [Music] Corky got Nazi Bonamassa records she had a deep directive oh that's my world in there man it's different i ah very zen of it family first now what is lay down there [Music] I'm free like I can just start walking if I wanted to know [Applause]

Channel: criminals and crime fighters

Views: 2,704,549

Rating: 4.6576061 out of 5

Keywords: Hard Time, Hard Time Series, Hard Time Full Series, Hard Time Full Episode, Hard Time Season 2, Hard Time Season two, Hard Time Documentary, Hard Time Prison Documentary, Hard Time Crime Documentary, Hard Time Prisoners, Hard Time Against the Wall, Hard Time Season 2 Episode 6, Hard Time New Inmates, Hard Time Cellmates, Hard Time Ohio Prison, Hard Time Full Episodes, Hard Time Prison Series, Hart Time Doku, Hard Time Battle Behind Bars, Hard Time Lockdown, Hard Time Prison

Id: X98nkAbx7mI

Length: 49min 59sec (2999 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 15 2017