america's prisons, dangerous, often deadly. there are 2 million people doing time. every day is a battle to survive and to maintain order. >> down on your feet. down! >> located in the deep south, holman correctional facility where most are serving life sentences. we spent months documenting life on the inside where the prisoners have nothing but time and nothing to lose. this is "lockup: holman extended stay."

for the officers and staff working at holman, the biggest challenge is dealing with difficult inmates. >> you ain't got no business [ bleep ] with my -- >> two days ago, he took my mail and threw it in the dumpster. >> that's the [ bleep ] part of it. i don't have any problem. ask any officer that walked by here. i don't know [ bleep ] with nobody. >> and with a steady decline in staff, the pressure is on the new recruits. >> if i fail, i don't even want to think about failing, because it's not an option for me. i'm going to pass. i feel like if i did fail, i'm letting a lot of people down. not just myself.

welcome to the gates of hell. >> charge him double for an armband. okay? hey, and then whoever that armband belonged to, he need to get charged, too. >> in roughly four months of shooting inside holman, warden grantt culliver has shown many sides. >> warden's office. culliver. can i take a message? >> he'll call you back. yes, ma'am. >> you take messages, warden? >> yes, ma'am. we do it all. >> he's firm. >> get your shirt on like you're supposed to. >> but fair. >> take your shot and i'll get you ice cream. >> tough -- >> you're right. i'm going to be with him --

if you would shut the [ bleep ] up, then i could understand why somebody would be pissed off at your as in this place acting like a [ bleep ] child. >> yet understanding. >> so really i'm doing a favor on the one hand. >> but this morning, a side of the warden we haven't seen emerges. >> last month, we lost three cos and we lost three trainees. one new trainee is scheduled to report on the 16th and we're not making any headway. all you got mandated. actually going backwards. it just puts more work on the current staff that we have. and all the time. more than anything else, it's our staff. it puts a lot of pressure on staff. and i just feel like our staff

is -- i don't want to say staff is tired. you can't work but so many overtime hours on and on and on. without at some point you're going to hit a wall. that will work one or two ways for us. neither one of those are good. they'll be more stressed, which means less tolerant, more uses of force, et cetera. which is not good. or they'll start calling in to get some time off, which makes somebody else have to work, which is still not good. there's just not a good situation out of it, at all. >> besides being the administrative lieutenant, i'm also in charge of institution recruitment. that's been going pretty good. as of lately, we've been getting some pretty good recruits in. i think we got four or five at the academy right now and so far those guys are doing good.

>> i came in here as a trainee or a cadet, and basically the pre-part of my deployment before i attend the academy for corrections officer, co1,anythin out at the institutions, is called contraband.

>> you really can't find anything else around here for the type of pay and benefits without a college education. and there's a 25-year retirement plan. and i'll be less than 50 years old when i fully retire here if everything goes well through the academy, so i'm looking forward to that. >> you have to shake down the ball yard before we let inmates out on the yard. >> i've trained pretty hard. i did attend the academy on the 29th of january and there was a portion on the obstacle course and i wasn't able to do it, to basically sum it up. when i came back here, i felt embarrassed that i failed something like climbing a wall. since then i've trained every day and i think i'm prepared and i think i'll totally exceed my expectations. honestly, i cannot let myself fail. i've invested a lot of time. i'm going to pass, and worst-case scenario, if i did fail, i don't have any clue what i would do. i do have a 2-year-old daughter and we just had a newborn son. he's 14 days old today. i have a lot of responsibilities in my life now. and i feel like if i did fail,

i'm letting a lot of people down, not just myself. so my feelings are, i have no outs if i do fail, so i have to make it happen. >> if cadet hardy graduates, one of the responsibilities he may have is performing surprise shakedowns. >> in cell searches, we do what we call 24-hour searches, where there are designated cells to be searched on each shift. priority wise, it should really be high. now, with the shortage that we have, there are any number of times when cells don't necessarily get searched, because you've got other thing that take precedence. so cell searches are not necessarily at the top of the list. but when we get information, and we get information from seg, just as we do get information from general pop, about guys having different things in their cells. you know, if we do the 24 hour searches, we get a answer to pull some stuff out of the cells. >> officers are looking for contraband ranging from drugs and weapons to items not allowed

in administrative segregation, like tobacco. if an inmate violates rules in segregation, he winds up in disciplinary ad seg where even most reading material is considered contraband. >> what are you talking about -- >> that's evidence about the -- about the man that said killed -- i've got evidence in my files. that's evidence, man! you know you violating the law. you ain't got no business [ bleep ] with my legal [ bleep ]! you know it's against the law to what you're doing, bitch. >> i've been there. i'm still here. 25 years. >> you better get your ass out there. >> 25 years i've been here. >> we'll see if you're still go goneing to be here. [ bleep ]. [ bleep ]. i don't care nothing about you. you ain't [ bleep ] me, bitch. >> every day we're going to take care of you. he's not happy.

he had a copy of a quarterly newsletter that our department puts out. it's put out for the employees. it's not even put out for the inmates. i don't know where he got it from and it's not something he's allowed to have in his cell. he started claiming it was evidence in a legal trial that he was in and that's why he got all mad about. when somebody starts talking to you like that, your first reaction is anger. you want to lash back at them. in this job, you hear that every day. you have to be thick-skinned enough to let it roll off. you've got to understand, he's not talking to the person, he's talking to the blue suit. you can't take it personally. try to let it go on, let about your business. treat it as a professional thing, not a personal thing. do the paperwork you're supposed to do and you can't take it out against him on a personal level. you have to remain professional at all times. it's a stressful job. this stuff, naturally, builds up

in you and you have to find ways to work it out, deal with your stress. a lot of jobs are stressful and everybody has to learn how to deal with that on a personal basis to get the stress out of your system. i exercise a lot. next on "lockup: extended stay," is the second time a charm for cadet hardy's physical exam? >> alabama corrections has a very strict and physical test you have to pass in order to complete the academy. that's just the tip of the iceberg. for my high cholesterol and my risk of heart attack. why kid myself? diet and exercise weren't lowering my cholesterol enough. now i'm eating healthier, exercising more, taking lipitor. numbers don't lie. my cholesterol's stayed down. lipitor is fda approved to reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke in patients who have heart disease or risk factors for heart disease. it's backed by over 19 years of research. [ female announcer ] lipitor is not for everyone, including people with liver problems and women who are nursing, pregnant or may become pregnant. you need simple blood tests to check for liver problems.

tell your doctor if you are taking other medications, or if you have any muscle pain or weakness. this may be a sign of a rare but serious side effect. [ man ] still love that wind in my face! talk to your doctor. don't kid yourself about the risk of heart attack and stroke. if lipitor's been working for you, stay with it. lipitor may be available for as little as $4 a month with the lipitor co-pay card. terms and conditions apply. learn more at lipitorforyou.com.

as dawn breaks on holman correctional facility, the officers and staff on the dayshift settle into their daily routines. >> yes, sir? >> what are the requirements to getting a picture sent in? >> are you talking about females? female friends? >> yes, ma'am. >> okay.

they can have lingerie on, they can have panty sets on, bathing suits, as long as the nipple area does not show and the bottom part of the genitalia does not show. so you can have those, but that's it. >> all right. >> all right. thank you. >> okay. close the window and wait for the next one. >> meanwhile, sergeant english is on lock fixing duty, one of the many jobs he holds at the prison. >> this is normal. i do this all day long. i walk like this all day long. they call me from seg this morning and told me this lock wouldn't open on the tray door which means every time they feed this inmate, they have to open the door. the whole cell door. which puts them at a security risk every time they feed him. so i'm going to take it apart and fix it this morning.

i mix this oil up. i was a machinist before i became a corrections officer. 48, please. yeah, 1084 to the gate. what you have? >> nothing. >> give me. turn around. >> regardless of how busy sergeant english gets, there's always time to shake down the suspicious inmate. >> just keep standing there. i'll just drop it so i can get my hands -- nope.

you done it to yourself. ask me how i knew. then you lied. david, go on back to your dorm. talk to you after a while. a6, main hall. 22 to the 48 gate. these sandwiches he made in the kitchen, he stole. >> hungry? >> no, i ain't hungry. >> but stealing sandwiches is no laughing matter since it could land the inmate in administrative segregation where some inmates cause nothing but trouble for the officers. >> just two days ago i had some mail come, right? you came by here and took my

[ bleep ] mail and throwed it in the garbage. >> this is a holman death row/segregation unit so this is a sensitive, high security area. it does have a different feel here. you have a lot of inmates back there that have been in single cells for a long time, and they, of course, build up hostilities. this time of the year the temperature, the weather is hot and of course that helps to also flare tempers. we have to be very, very cautious. we have to follow procedures because it's a highly explosive area. >> you got no right to touch my mail. that man took my mail two days ago! showed it to me and throwed it in the trash can! throwed it in the trash can!

they don't do nothing about it and i'll tell y'all the real reality what's going on in this prison. you see him over there? because he don't tell you the truth. i'm telling you something. >> i thought you told me we was going to do better. >> two days i will be going home and these folks keep trying to trap me in this prison, lying on me. writing me up disciplinary i ain't never did. these officers down here are trying to trap me in the state of alabama. hey, man, it's critical. the world out there is critical. i ain't no devil. >> jaime bell, constant pain in the side. troublemaker. always got some sort of complaint. and he's just not going to be satisfied. he's just going to complain. >> how long you been in disciplinary seg? >> how long have i been in disciplinary seg? you all had me in disciplinary seg three years. >> three years? and all of it's entrapment, and you don't deserve any of it?

you don't deserve any of it? >> they brought it on me. fight. they brought it on me. jumping on me. i'm going to be in the free world very soon and y'all are going to see, you can't stop god. they trying to take my life in this prison but they can't do it. i'm coming home. >> jaime, and he's been in disciplinary seg, i know he's been there for the last year, and i don't see him getting out anytime soon. these officers work here on a daily basis they deal with these inmates, and you build up a relationship with these inmates and some are good, some are not so good, but again, it's an area where we have to be very cautious and very particular. >> the job of dealing with the inmates brings us back to the mailroom where ms. etheridge's visitors seem never-ending and the questions never change. >> yes, sir? it's okay. >> i need to know what the requirements are to receive a photo. >> you want a normal photo or are you talking about one of

your girlfriend or something or a female? >> of a female. >> female? the nipple cannot show, the genital area cannot show. other than that, they can have on lingerie, as long as it's not see-through. they can have on a bathing suit, bra and panties, as long as it's not see-through. you can't see anything down here or here. >> what about your friend? can they send pictures of them drinking beer and stuff like that? >> no. >> no pictures of beer in the photo? >> no, sir. >> thank you. >> you're welcome. i have never seen him before in my life. coming up, jamie bell like you've never seen him before. >> just trying to get ready to go home soon i hope.

as warden of holman, grantt culliver is always looking for ways to use the prison environment to his advantage. >> what do you do -- >> lettuce. >> there's no lettuce in alabama. what kind of lettuce? >> lettuce like that. >> japanese lettuce? never heard of it. can't grow no damn lettuce in alabama. i tried it. >> you can't grow lettuce? grow collard green. i don't see it, that's what i tell you. i ain't jesus christ. look what i told you. >> warden culliver is currently planning upgrades to the softball field in hopes of

raising morale and lowering tension. >> it has to be backed. this time of the year, the softball field, that's your premiere event. in the afternoons, the guys get out here and play softball. really don't have any problems out of them. keeps tension down. >> they get tired, go in, take a shower and go to bed. >> go to bed. no fights. it's the overall process of trying to improve the facility. >> though there's plenty of room for improvement, the inmates at holman get maximum use out of their softball field in its current condition. >> that's one. my percentage just went up. >> if you were able to transpose, imagine them in uniforms, take the wire away from the fence, just from the attitude of the guys, right, it would be any other male softball league in any small town, america, or usa, doing what they do after they've had a hard day's worker, minus the beer.

it's the same thing with the exception of you're surrounded. i think it has to transcend from being in there all day, you get a chance to get out. and i think it helps to keep the tension down. >> all work and no play wears down even the warden, so he always looks forward to downtime with his kids. >> i coach a rec league team. i actually coach my two sons. and and i've done this before. this is the first time i will have had them on the same team. we go back, run the wheel. bubba going to go to the middle. you go down low, okay? let's go! let's go! on three. one, two, three, defense! good defense! good defense! stay on your feet! stay on your feet! good defense! good defense!

i get an opportunity to spend some time with these kids and in trying to be a role model for some kids. but not overbearing or anything like that. sometimes you're watching kids, you see kids that have a lot of potential and they have some bad attitudes and i realize what a bad attitude is going to end you up at. a lot of times i pull those kids in, hey, look, no sense in you throwing this away because people will turn a back on you if you have a bad attitude. too far for a jump hook. he went straight up, ref. nice, nice, nice! i get something out of it, too. i basically tell these kids, if i give my time to come out here and spend some time with you so we can do twhhis, i expect you give me the effort back. >> it's essential for warden culliver to maintain a life outside of prison.

but it's cadet hardy who's sweating it just to get in. a few days ago the correctional officer in training took his physical examination for the second time, and this time he passes with ease. >> well, i actually ended up doing a lot better than i expected. of course, i had a lot of doubt because of my failing the previous academy in january. i gave it 110% because i had to. i didn't want to do this over again. alabama corrections has a very strict and, you know, tough physical test you must pass in order to become -- even complete the academy. going in i thought that was going to be the hardest thing to overcome, and -- which i passed with flying colors and things like that, but that's just the tip of the iceberg. >> the situation of the system and what we're going into, understaffed, overcrowded. it's probably one of the worst times to be a corrections officer and everything that is taught to us at training camp is for a purpose -- to keep us alive, to keep us safe.

next on "lockup: extended stay," cadet hardy passed his exam, but can he survive his first shift? >> he made a little threat and i called to get backup.

ask me... even if you think you can live with your old mattress... ask me how i've never slept better... why not talk to one of the 6 million people who've switched to the most highly recommended bed in america. it's not a sealy, a simmons, or a serta... ask me about my tempur-pedic. ask me how i can finally sleep all night. ask me how great my back feels every morning. did you know there's a tempur-pedic for every body? tempur-pedic beds now come insoft...firm...and everything in-between... ask me how i don't wake up anymore when he comes to bed... these are real tempur-pedic owners...ask someone you know...check out twitter, or your friends on facebook... you'll hear it all...unedited! ask me how i wish i had done this sooner. ask me how this is the best investment i've ever made. tempur-pedic brand owners are more satisfied. than owners of any traditional mattress brand...

to learn more, or find an authorized retailer near you visit tempur-pedic.com. tempur-pedic the most highly recommended bed in america.

i'm craig melvin. here's what's happening right now. the attorney for former penn state assistant head coach, jerry sandusky, says his clients adamantly denies two new allegations of abuse. one of the new claims involves a family member. six people, including three small children, were killed when a small plane crashed into the mountains outside of phoenix. and president barack obaoba troops serving overseas to wish them a happy thanksgiving and thank them for their service. happy thanksgiving to you as well. now back to "lockup."

well, eneinmates call them horses. it's string they use to move contraband cell to cell, tier to tier. they use dental floss, tear up sheets. they tie an empty tube of toothpaste on it and flip it from one tier to the other. they move cigarettes, tobacco, magazines, anything they can get to read, they'll try to move it. normally tobacco, they won't move anything like tobacco or any pills or anything like that, only if the officer is not presents that's when they'll normally do that, or they know we're going to get it. this is not something we put up with, and we have to put up with a certain amount of it but if an officer is on the tier we try to get those horses to prevent things from being moved from cell to cell. >> toothpaste, you know what i'm saying, shoot it up under the door, pull on it, pull on it,

pull on it, make it jump. we use a trail. she going to break down on you, too. you know what i'm saying? it's all good, though, man. >> it's been more than a week since we last saw jaime bell. >> that man just took my mail two days ago. showed it to me, throwed it in the trash can. >> and apparently we've caught him on one of his good days. >> ready to go home soon, i hope. >> jaime bell. he needed some help today. he's got some legal work he's trying to take care of. last week we had the incident with him, he didn't want to cooperate. jaime bell, when he wants something, he's cooperative. when he doesn't need anything,

he's not going to cooperate very often. >> tried to get you to come out of that cell, didn't want help then. something we deal with every week with him. we're used to it. i'll check on it. i'll look on it. >> tea! tea! tea! tea! >> a shortage of staff has lowered the number of cell searches in ad seg and in turn more contraband is being smuggled in. and sold in ways most officers can't detect.

>> sign language keeps police out of our business. most police don't know sign language so that will be a way to beat them. >> we asked antonio easter to translate sign language from a previous episode. >> he's telling him that he's got ten bugles for him. buglers worth so much back then, you can make like $150, $200 on one pack of bugles up there. i've heard folks dingling, you know? >> what's that? >> stick them up their butt, you know what i'm saying? all kinds of crazy stuff to get bugles up there, you know what i'm saying? it's a lot of different ways to get it up there. i wouldn't tell you my way, because i don't want to get caught, you know what i'm saying? >> this is smoking tobacco up in seg, they put it down and this

put the deodorant back over it and it will do a good job. put deodorant back over it. kept the vel cellophane back on it. this right here, hollowed out, he had marijuana filled up to there. he put this back on and had it glued in there. you just look at it -- he had three tobaccos, one marijuana and had all the matches. and what really gave him away is when i was shaking his property down before i got to this point i found rolling paper. here's a card, just a regular card for rolling paper. this inmate right here actually had -- this is a disciplinary he received. he had it glued together and he had rolled up paper and that. it's kind of hard to deny it's yours, it's got your name on it. he had two boxes inside a box glued together and had the matches all down the sides. one individual done a very good job one time, he took his whole

part off his shoe and took the whole bottom off. there's not much cushion in these state shoes but he lined it with tobacco and when he took it off, i knew -- i took my knife and cut it. it just popped out, so much tobacco in there. this right here is a false bottom. you put one bag down inside another bag and you glue it back up. everything is not what it appears in prison. that's just some of the ways they get it. i'm sure i get beat often but i catch quite a few. i do it for a living. i enjoy it. coming up, officers in ad seg hope to put a stop to the tobacco business with surprise cell searches. >> smoked all the tobacco. that's all he had left. as far as the tobacco goes. and an officer brutally stabbed in the course of duty. >> he stabbed me one time. here, went into the muscle. he stabbed me three times in the forearm and cut me twice on my

upper arm and slashed me right down through here. mocking bird pronto! mom's calling an audible. head to bedding. [ male announcer ] black friday's here. deals start thursday 10 pm. more electronics start at midnight. and we're open all day and night so you don't have to wait outside. walmart. fantastic! [ man ] pro-gresso they fit! okay-y... okay??? i've been eating progresso and now my favorite old jeans...fit. okay is there a woman i can talk to? [ male announcer ] progresso. 40 soups 100 calories or less. you're gonna have the hottest car on the block. [ airplane engine rumbles ] show me the carfax. yeah, show me the carfax. we...we ran out. what? just show me the carfax. before you buy a used car, get a carfax vehicle history report. see accidents and service reported to carfax and a price based on the car's history. ask your dealer or go to carfax.com. just say, show me the carfax.

this is not your everyday job that you walk in and fill out an application for and that any and everybody can come in and do. you have to realize you work in a prison and it's a maximum security prison. >> you know it's against the law what you're [ bleep ] doing, bitch.

>> you have to be prepared to be disrespected, you know? you have to be prepared to be called names. >> lock him up. >> you have to be prepared for the violence. you may have to break up a fight which didn't have anything to do with you, but then you're obligated to protect life. if there's a fight between two inmates and if it's -- let's just say it's in the housing unit. so there's one officer in the housing unit. number one, you'd call for assistance. that's the first thing, get some assistance. two, tell the guys to stop. and the third thing is to use a chemical agent to break it up. >> when proper procedures aren't followed, it's the officers in who are in danger. >> we were preparing to do an institutional count bed check. over the in-house radio we had came a -- what we call a code blue, which is telling us that an officer needs assistant in a dorm, that he just had a

fistfight going on. >> me and an inmate had an argument. a senseless argument, to be truthful. we had an argument up by the front of the dorm by some ice, passing ice out. i said, we don't have to get into it. and he said, well, i'm going to do what i have to do. so i stood up, stepped back out of that and say, well, no sense waiting any longer. we might as well get started now. so he, like, went for the pocket. i started backing out of it. we had an argument over in the corner, right? he's drunk and he comes out of his pocket, with a little thing, a little knife. i catch his hand, right. >> myself and three other officers ran down here to this cell, and we came in and observed the two inmates back toward the back of the dorm, fighting. >> by this time the police coming, they're running. the police end up tackling me not realizing the guy got a knife so that's when he got the chance to swing the knife and i get cut or stabbed, so to speak. i get stabbed like in the side of the jaw and in the back twice. yeah.

that was before the police realized he had a knife. >> and the confrontation between myself and him which seemed like an eternity was probably three or four minutes. he stabbed or cut me approximately eight times. one time he went into the muscle. he stabbed me three times in the forearm, cut me twice on my upper arm, and slashed me right through down here. it was a homemade knife about 7 1/4 inches long, about 1 1/2 inches wide. i was lucky the inmate that was being stabbed was very lucky. he had one puncture wound in his back that just barely missed his spine. at the hospital you could actually see his spinal cord, it went that deep, so he was very fortunate that it didn't kill him. the inmate was trying to kill him. >> i'm trying to tell the police, turn me loose, the man got a knife but, you know, i guess when they're trying to do their job, that's how it comes. >> it's dangerous.

like i tell my wife, you know, i try to tell her every morning when i come to work, you know, i love you, because there's always that chance that you don't come home. it's stressful but i love my job. i wouldn't be here 20 years. don't do that. be nice. >> i think the stabbing incident may have opened up a few people's eyes, because i think as you work as a correctional officer, you have a tendency to become lackadaisical. everything's the same every day. i think it pulls you into a false sense of security that everything is okay. if something happens, it wakes you up, it brings you back to consciousness that you need to be very prepared, that you need to take your time, not rush. you need to follow procedures. next on "lockup: extended

stay," officer hardy tells us about his first night on the job. >> then all of a sudden i got hit in the back of the head with a aa battery. ratulations. congratulations. today, the city of charlotte can use verizon technology to inspire businesses to conserve energy and monitor costs. making communities greener... congratulations. ... and buildings as valuable to the bottom line... whoa ! ... as the people inside them. congratulations. because when you add verizon to your company, you don't just add, you multiply. ♪ discover something new... verizon. since ameriprise financial was founded back in 1894, they've been committed to putting clients first. helping generations through tough times. good times. never taking a bailout. there when you need them. helping millions of americans over the centuries. the strength of a global financial leader. the heart of a one-to-one relationship.

together for your future. ♪ and here's what we did today: supported nearly 3 million steady jobs across our country... ... scientists, technicians, engineers, machinists... ... adding nearly 400 billion dollars to our economy... we're at work providing power to almost a quarter of our homes and businesses... ... and giving us cleaner rides to work and school... and tomorrow, we could do even more. cleaner, domestic, abundant and creating jobs now. we're america's natural gas. the smarter power, today. learn more at anga.us.

okay. you guys, we've got a project. we've got to go do this one. we've got some inmates that we need to shake down. supposedly running a tobacco business back there. >> in an effort to cleanup segregation and to prevent anymore tobacco negotiations, the captain and his team prepare for cell searches. >> we're going in there and looking for any kind of contraband, weapons, drugs. tobacco is a big thing so we're

trying to get tobacco out of there. all right. let's go out there and see what we can find. >> a lot of times, an inmate will tape stuff to his door. you can have a knife taped to this door. there's enough clearance in here for this door to open and close, with a knife. you can see where he's been smoking. cigarette ashes here in the door. but no sign of tobacco. >> the search for contraband continues in another cell, one that belongs to anthony patterson, an inmate with whom our crew is quite familiar. >> so, how are you adjusting to

seg life? >> it's hard, right? but i'm almost through. i had 90 days through, and i did all of them except 13. that's -- you know why i'm here, right? >> no. having your penis, indecently exposed, urinating. come on, man! >> while the indecent exposure and possession of marijuana landed him in seg, today anthony is just the subject of a random cell search. >> they found a couple of book -- newspapers. other than that, i didn't have anything illegal, really. so i think i'm good. i don't think i'm going to get any more write-ups or nothing, i don't think. i don't know. but i hope not. yeah, i hope not. >> since officers don't find any contraband in his cell, anthony won't receive any additional time on his one-year sentence in ad seg.

another cell search produces a familiar face to our crew. the last time we saw terry moore, he was being locked up for stabbing another inmate. >> move! >> it's not my first stab. it's not the first time i ever stuck, so -- >> after a full morning of cell searches, the officers' diligence pays off in moore's cell. >> he done smoked all the tobacco. that's all he had left as far as the tobacco goes. and he had these rolling papers. did you all find that much over there? >> small amount. all right. it's tobacco.

write him a disciplinary? >> yeah. >> it's good to get any tobacco out of here that we can. i'm afraid the one guy had done smoked it up before we got there, but it's always good to remove this clutter and trash. >> in the mailroom, ms. etheridge doesn't run into many problems, but every so often an inmate lashes out at her. >> i got a letter this morning. it was addressed specifically to "that mailroom whatever man," and it's from kenny wilson down in segregation.

and he wrote to me about his -- it was a musical card that he got and they can't have musical cards, but we've never rejected the card, itself. what we'll do is take the letter opener and go through the back and take the mechanical piece out, the battery and everything. and we'll just throw it away and we'll send them their stuff instead of just rejecting it. but he wrote to warden culliver and to me and sent the card to warden culliver and said that before i run crying and whining to warden culliver, he asked me, who do you think you are? and asked me, i don't have the right to disrespect his mail and it says, "does it say in your job to tear up the mail? you will pay for this card, i promise you that, and you will find a new job because you've crossed the line dealing with my mail. my name is kenny wilson. you must not know i hate you low life white people as is.

he doesn't even have correct grammar. he can't halfway spell, but yet he wants to be derogatory and racist and that's the kind of stuff we have to deal with when we're doing our job. we didn't ask for them to come here. they're not on vacation. they're not at the ramada. i'm doing my job. if they don't like it, they shouldn't come. >> been here a couple months getting more familiar with things and getting used to the inmates and things like that, you know, building a relationship with everybody. >> after months of training, cadet hardy has finally become correctional officer hardy. >> i've been working a lot of overtime. the way the overtime system works is you have to cover a whole another shift. so we'll work 16 hours when we do it. today i came in at 2:00 p.m. and i won't get off until 6:00 a.m. in the morning. so it's a long ride, especially

when you have to go home and still spend time with your family and things like that. but the money is good. that's what's appealing to you and you want to do it. you know what i mean? this morning, i got up at 6:00 a.m. and i had to go home and get a little bit of sleep and get back up here. eight hours after i punched out. it can get overwhelming sometimes, but hey, you know, it took a long time to get this, and i'm very proud to wear it, and i come in here each day and try to do my best. my first night on assignment was housing unit "a," which is this dorm here. it was 10:00 p.m. when i came here that night. and the first thing you're thinking is, man, you don't know any of these inmates, you're all by yourself. as soon as those gate rolls, you've got 114 inmates in this dorm and it's just you. you're the only one that is with you on that side. it's an overwhelming feeling that goes through your body. i know i had a pen in my hand and i was fidgeting with it and all of a sudden i didn't realize, but i broke it in half because i was so nervous. if you're not nervous, you've got a death wish, you know what i mean? because this place is not a joke. as you walk by, everybody is looking at you. every inmate.

they're wondering what you're about and things like that. they're automatically seeing what kind of officer you're going to be. i got stopped halfway in the dorm and this one guy stopped and started getting a little irate with me because he was upset i kept walking. i was just trying to get familiar with things. anyway, he made a threat and i called to get back up to come down here and get him just in case it got serious and all of a sudden i got hit in the back of the head with a battery, a aa battery. before i knew it, i was getting hit with shaving cream balls and all kinds of stuff thrown at me. you know, it was an interesting night. you know, and -- but after the time went by, you know, i got comfortable with people, got to know who the inmates were. i talked to some of the guys i thought it might have been and i had, look, we can make this easy or hard. you know what i mean? so i understand this is their home, you know, this is where they got to live. i'm not trying to be a rude officer. or someone that's going to come in here every day and be a bad officer to them directly. i just let them know, hey, we can get along or make this hard, you know what i'm saying? preferably, i have 25 years to

go until i retire. so i want to make the environment as comfortable as possible for them. as long as they're not hurting each other and stuff like that, we can make this easy, but you know, after time went by, a couple weeks went by and i was down here a couple more times, it did get a little better. but they definitely don't make it easy for a rookie officer, that's for sure. >> i have a really good staff here. over the years, they take pride in what they do and i think they look out for each other. it's a tough job. you have to be prepared when you walk outside to go back to the community. somebody says, oh, you work at home? we had a guy, he lasted two weeks and he found out that, you know, he would rather be driving a truck than trying to tell them grown men, put your shirt in. get out of my hallway. step inside the block. don't break line. everybody cannot do this job. but when you find somebody that can, then you've really got a special person.