DOCUMENTARY: The Fear of 13 (TRAILER)

A Death Row inmate petitions the court asking to be executed. As he goes on to tell his story, it gradually becomes clear that nothing is quite what it seems. THE FEAR OF 13 is a stylistically daring experiment in storytelling that is part confessional and part performance, Nick, the sole protagonist, tells a tale with all the twists and turns of classic crime drama. A final shocking twist casts everything in a new light.

Directed by David Sington
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DOCUMENTARY: The Returned (PBS POV)

WATCH THE TRAILER

WATCH THE FULL DOCUMENTARY HERE

In 2012, California amended its “Three Strikes” law—one of the harshest criminal sentencing policies in the country. The passage of Prop. 36 marked the first time in U.S. history that citizens voted to shorten sentences of those currently incarcerated. Within days, the reintegration of thousands of “lifers” was underway. The Return examines this unprecedented reform through the eyes of those on the front lines—prisoners suddenly freed, families turned upside down, reentry providers helping navigate complex transitions and attorneys and judges wrestling with an untested law. At a moment of reckoning on mass incarceration, what can California’s experiment teach the nation?

The directors, Kelly Duane de la Vega and Katie Galloway, have spent much of their careers making films about the criminal justice system in the United States. In The Return, winner of the Audience Award for Documentary at the 2016 Tribeca Film Festival, they follow newly released prisoners Bilal Chatman and Kenneth Anderson and the people who supported them on their paths to reentry, including attorneys Mike Romano and Susan Champion of the Stanford Justice Advocacy Project.

“Three Strikes was sold to the public as a way of locking up the ‘worst of the worst,’ but its ultimate effect was to incarcerate more than 10,000 people—for life—for crimes as petty as trying to steal a car radio, possessing $10 worth of meth or purse-snatching,” say Duane de la Vega and Galloway.

“Many of those we interviewed came from families struggling with mental illness and drug addiction. Because African-Americans and Latinos receive disproportionately longer sentences than whites, most were people of color, people who needed support, not incarceration. People who were locked up due to bad policy based on fear, without any understanding of structural barriers they faced.

“After decades of inhumane criminal justice policies, we stand now on the precipice of change. Bipartisan lawmakers are calling for sentencing reform and uniting around legislation that prohibits employers from demanding that applicants disclose criminal records. Businesses are beginning voluntarily to ‘ban the box.’ We sincerely hope the film will inspire further efforts to correct the terrible injustice of misguided sentencing law.”

The Return is a co-production of Loteria Films, American Documentary | POV and the Independent Television Service (ITVS) with funding provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in association with Chicken and Egg Pictures.

DOCUMENTARY: Into the Abyss (Werner Herzog) – State sanctioned killing

I myself certainly think we are excessive in too many ways in our obsession with punitive solutions to what I feel are social problems (i.e. drugs, mental illness).  But I confess I do sometimes struggle with those that are less “social” and more clearly in the criminal realm (i.e. more “anti/a-social,” psycho/socio-pathic).  As in, that realm in which people are hurt and violence and violation are king.  Is life without parole enough for those who commit these types of brutal crimes?  Or, do we as a society, or as individual victims of crime–spiritually or otherwise–need to physically and definitively purge these people?  Is there something about the death penalty that offers more closure than life without parole.  Certainly the finality of either option is undeniable.  It goes without saying though that one is much more final than the other.

This film is pretty chilling from all perspectives and certainly brings this question of finality to the fore.  Is society made safer if we choose one option over the other?  Is safety the primary objective of the criminal legal system?  Or ought it also deal with other things like retribution, catharsis, vengeance, etc.  Can the state really, truly bring back what a victim has lost as a result of a crime?  If it can, even only in parts/degrees, is the death penalty able to recover more in this regard than life without parole?  In other words, is there some “value added” to the criminal legal process that makes capital punishment a superior option in certain cases? I really don’t know one way or another.  I think it would be hard not to be out for blood if someone hurt one of my loved ones.  Yet I also can’t help but wonder about those individuals who have been wrongfully executed (and their families, for whom the pain may be greater since it is sustained).  Herzog’s film hasn’t really helped me decide.  Still, despite making the waters even murkier, it’s worth watching.

Description from IMDB

Into the abyss explores a triple murder which occurred in the small Texas City of Conroe in 2001. Michael Perry and Jason Burkett, under the influence of alcohol and drugs, murdered a middle-aged housewife; they then gunned down her stepson and his friend. The film features Conversations with the two inmates and those affected by their crime. Unlike many of the films that deal with crimes, into the abyss isn’t concerned with figuring out exactly what happened, but rather serves as an examination of why people – and the state – kill.

You can help us fix our broken criminal justice system: Online form to urge your senator to take action

Tens of thousands of people are in federal prison — sometimes for life — for low-level nonviolent drug offenses.  Often receiving much longer sentences than those convicted of rape and murder.  But with your help, we can roll back the disastrous mandatory minimum sentencing policies that put so many people behind bars. Tell your Senators to support reform of mandatory minimum drug laws now!

Form to contact your senator and demand reform

From the Drug Policy Alliance website and posted on “The House I Live In” Facebook page – A movie you must see if you care about these issues and that you must see if you don’t as it will convince you that you need to care.

 

CNBC Original: Billions Behind Bars

With more than 2.3 million people locked up, the U.S. has the highest incarceration rate in the world. One out of 100 American adults is behind bars — while a stunning one out of 32 is on probation, parole or in prison. This reliance on mass incarceration has created a thriving prison economy. The states and the federal government spend about $74 billion a year on corrections, and nearly 800,000 people work in the industry.

Web supplements and extras to this documentary here

PBS Frontline: The New Asylums – America’s Prisons (part 1)

Fewer than 55,000 Americans currently receive treatment in psychiatric hospitals. Meanwhile, almost 10 times that number — nearly 500,000 — mentally ill men and women are serving time in U.S. jails and prisons. As sheriffs and prison wardens become the unexpected and often ill-equipped caretakers of this burgeoning population, they raise a troubling new concern: Have America’s jails and prisons become its new asylums?

PBS Frontline: The New Asylums – America’s Prisons (part 2)

“We are the gatekeepers of a lot of persons who are mentally ill, and that’s not something we relish. … We don’t like the idea that we’re being charged with fixing a lot of the woes of our communities,” says Reginald Wilkinson, director of the Ohio Department of Corrections. “In addition to being the director of the Department of Corrections, I became a de facto director of a major mental health system.”  In “The New Asylums,” FRONTLINE goes deep inside Ohio’s state prison system to explore the complex and growing issue of mentally ill prisoners. With unprecedented access to prison therapy sessions, mental health treatment meetings, crisis wards, and prison disciplinary tribunals, the film provides a poignant and disturbing portrait of the new reality for the mentally ill.

PBS Frontline: The New Asylums – America’s Prisons (part 3)

In “The New Asylums,” FRONTLINE goes deep inside Ohio’s state prison system to explore the complex and growing issue of mentally ill prisoners. With unprecedented access to prison therapy sessions, mental health treatment meetings, crisis wards, and prison disciplinary tribunals, the film provides a poignant and disturbing portrait of the new reality for the mentally ill.  “It was surprising to see how much treatment was going on inside Ohio’s prisons,” say FRONTLINE producers Miri Navasky and Karen O’Connor. “And while the prison system is doing a commendable job, you are still left with the feeling that prison is not the answer to this very large social problem.”  As the rising number of mentally ill inmates shows no sign of abating, those working inside the nation’s prisons are struggling with a system designed for security, not treatment. Corrections officers now have the responsibility of not only securing inmates, but also working with mental health staff to identify and manage disturbed prisoners.

PBS Frontline: The New Asylums – America’s Prisons (part 4)

As the rising number of mentally ill inmates shows no sign of abating, those working inside the nation’s prisons are struggling with a system designed for security, not treatment. Corrections officers now have the responsibility of not only securing inmates, but also working with mental health staff to identify and manage disturbed prisoners.  “Providing effective psychiatric care in a maximum security prison is extraordinarily difficult,” says prison psychiatrist Gary Beven. “If you have untreated manic depression or bipolar disorder, untreated schizophrenia, somebody might be hallucinating and extremely paranoid. If you don’t identify the fact that [a] person has schizophrenia, if you don’t provide them with the proper medication, if you don’t place them in an environment that allows them to function at an adequate level, then it’s just a matter of time, perhaps, [that] something aggressive might occur.”

PBS Frontline: The New Asylums – America’s Prisons (part 5)

Eventually, a majority of mentally ill inmates are released back into the community, generally with a limited amount of medication, little preparation, and sometimes no family or support structure. “We release people with two weeks’ worth of medication. Yet it appears that it’s taking three months for people to actually get an appointment in the community to continue their services … and if they don’t have the energy and/or the insight to do that, they’re going to fall through the cracks and end up back in some kind of criminal activity,” warns Debbie Nixon-Hughes, chief of the mental health bureau of the Ohio Department of Corrections.