Locking minors away for decades doesn't solve anything.
I spent 24 and a half years in prison
I've got a lot of letters from prison. Lost was a big prison show. But it's really crazy when you get the letter that says, 'So, I'm getting out in three months, I've only been in for 17 years and I'd really like to meet you.'
I've wanted somehow to convey to you the sensations - the atmospheric pressure, you might say - of what it is to be seriously a long-term prisoner in an American prison.
To be in prison so long, it's difficult to remember exactly what you did to get there.
I don't believe that man was built to be put in a 5-by-7 for 30 years and have his sanity when he comes out if he doesn't find something to escape.
You can't be sent away to prison for life and feel OK about it.
You can see how prison could affect some of the other guys that are there for longer than a year. Because eventually, it starts to eat away at you. And if you don't work at yourself mentally or physically or spiritually, eventually you're going to be swallowed up by circumstance.
I have friends in prison. I send them money. I send them food. They say, 'Bro, get me out of here.' There's nothing I can do. They're five years in on a 20-year sentence. They went in at 16, they'll get out at 36. That's a lifetime.
I didn't understand that you could go to jail for the rest of your life for selling cocaine. I thought life sentences were for murderers. I didn't know that you could get it for supplying something to someone that they asked you for.
There's no doubt I expect to die in prison.
If only I could manage, without annoyance to my family, to get imprisoned for 10 years, "without hard labour," and with the use of books and writing materials, it would be simply delightful!
