due to mature subject matter, viewer discretion is advised. msnbc takes you behind the walls of america's most notorious prisons into a world of chaos and danger. now, the scenes you've never seen. "lockup: raw." over the years, lockup crews have ventured inside some of america's most dangerous maximum security prisons. and they have all encountered one absolute certainty. >> we film in extreme environments. most people would never want to step inside a maximum security

prison, yet we send our crews inside some of the most dangerous facilities in america. >> [ bleep ], [ bleep ]. >> yeah, i love pain! >> you can't let your guard down. you have to keep your eyes open in the back of your head. the hairs are constantly up on the back of your neck. because they're violent places, and violence can and does break out at any time. >> [ bleep ]. >> our cameras have been there to capture these dramatic life-and-death conflicts. now we take an even closer look at them through the experiences of our field crews and their raw encounters with violence behind bars. california state prison, corcoran, home to hundreds of the state's most violent and infamous offenders.

hosted "lockup" crews both in 2000 and 2005. >> right before i walked in, i had to sign a document that kind of really made me think twice. and it basically said that in an event that there is a hostage situation inside the prison walls, they will not negotiate for your life and you know the risk that you are taking when you walk in. while at corcoran, you constantly hear these alarms going off. you're never sure what's going to happen in this place. but then when you hear those alarms and everyone dropping down to the ground and you get those rifles peering out of the towers, i mean, immediately it takes your breath away for a second. >> in most cases the alarm sounds when a fight has broken out between inmates. though these incidents are usually brought to a stop within minutes, they always pose serious danger to the responding officers and to our crews.

>> while at corcoran, there was this one instance. we were doing pretty much a routine cell search. we were following along, they had the dogs, it was a very controlled environment. we were in one of the pods, one of the cells. and then right in the middle of it we heard the -- you know, and we saw the guards. guards didn't even say anything to us. they just started sprinting. so i'm like, i'm going. >> on the ground! get on your stomachs! >> inmates know that when alarms sound, they're required to lie on the ground, otherwise correctional officers might target them as combatants. >> by the time we actually got

our cameras on to it, they were already zip tied up and face down and the whole yard of counted 600 inmates, were completely down on the ground. >> okay, get up. >> so officer mitchell, what just happened just now? >> basically, what we had, two guys, they wanted to horseplay, get a little bit heavy. if we allowed things like that to continue, what's going to happen is they're going to start fighting, the possibility of other people getting involved. >> though the alarm call at corcoran ended peacefully, our cameras encountered a different situation at northern california's pelican bay state prison. >> one, two, three. >> just having a routine guard release. >> our producer was conducting an interview with lieutenant ben grundy while a second camera was shooting routine footage on the yard below. then suddenly -- >> there is an alarm in that building right there, a-3.

>> our cameras search for any signs that the trouble is spreading outside to the exercise yard. >> so this is an actual alarm because nobody is waving us off yet. something is going on inside the building. >> what might be happening? >> probably an assault on someone coming out of their cell. some type of cell fight or maybe a slashing. >> officers subdued six inmates involved in the fight. one of them was slashed with a homemade weapon. fortunately, this incident was nothing like the deadly events of february 3, 2000. >> the day they had the big riot i was standing in this exact spot. >> on that rainy day, joshua voss, a newcomer to pelican bay, was down in the recreation yard with scores of other prisoners. many of them were wearing rain gear, not only as protection from the elements, but to hide dozens of homemade weapons. >> and i noticed over here some people started stabbing each

other. >> this surveillance footage reveals a group of southern mexican gang members unleashing a vicious coordinated attack against a group of black inmates. the beginning of california's worst prison riot. >> i looked around and all over the yard there was fighting and stabbings going on. >> doug burrell and dozens of his fellow officers tried to subdue inmates with pepper spray and teargas, but every time it seemed the staff had the situation under control, another fight broke out. >> it looked like the movie "braveheart," fight scene in "braveheart," but it was the real deal. >> they started firing shots. so everybody that wasn't involved in the riot laid on the ground. >> even the gunfire raining down from pelican bay security towers did not quell the riot until one of the inmates was killed. 15 others were wounded. >> after we were done, i was cleaning blood off the walls and

off the floors and benches in here for a good hour. >> pelican bay's worst riot was fueled by the inmates' impulse for violence. and many of those inmates ended up here. the security housing unit, or the shu. >> inmates that were placed into the shu housing unit were placed in here for the most part because of violence. that violence could be against other inmates or against officers. >> it was here in pelican bay's most secure unit that we came across perhaps the prison's most dangerous inmate. >> my name is scanvinski hymes. i got the name from my mother. she wanted me to have the name no other black man in america would have. >> hymes was originally sent to prison for possessing a weapon in a youth facility. at the time our cameras profiled him in 2000, he had been locked up for more than 12 years, almost half his life.

>> everything is the same. nothing really changes too much. i mean, wake up in the morning, eat breakfast, go to the yard. when i get bored, i got -- i got to get into stuff, you know? >> the stuff hymes most frequently gets into is provoking officers to extract him from his cell. each inmate is assigned a security risk classification score based on his disciplinary record. [ bleep ] the average score ranges between 19 and 27 points. >> i probably have the highest classification score in this prison system, i'm over 2,000 points now. i have caught over 30, almost 40 felonies in prison. various staff assaults, stabbed, anything you can think of. only thing i haven't been convicted of in prison is murder and drugs. >> so now [ bleep ]. [ bleep ] [ bleep ] >> hymes is probably one of our

most difficult behavioral. he will tell you to your face his agenda. his agenda is to fight you every chance he can. he'll watch you, and his hope is that you will make a mistake so he can either get out or fight with you. that is his plan, that's what he does 24 hours a day. >> every time i see him, it's to make their eight hours as stressful as possible. >> hymes, we need you to turn around. >> nope. i'm not going to turn around. you know, whatever that may be, be making noise all day. whatever i can do to make their eight hours as stressful as possible. they say, well, i'm going home, i'm going home. but, yeah, when you go home, you'll be back tomorrow. >> close it. close it. >> hold it.

>> hold it. >> come on. >> [ bleep ]. >> that's the thing about this place. well, kick me out of prison. if they don't want me here, kick me out. >> eventually transferred to san quentin state prison, the man who is arguably california's most violent inmate completed his sentence and was released in 2007. >> you have people locked up in this type of environment and then you release them to the street. what do you expect? next on "lockup: raw." >> they'll come across their enemy, slice them across the neck. >> the ingenious weapons inmates use to attack. and the lengths officers will go to in combating them.

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every day in america's prisons, correctional officers are searching for them. >> a lot of these weapons were confiscated on the yards. >> in prison slang they're known as shanks. they're the deadly weapons inmates create from behind bars, with an ingenuity that almost defies imagination. >> what they'll do is get a disposable razor, put both blades, one on each side of the toothbrush. they come across their enemy. and slice them across the neck. because the two blades are so wide apart, it just filets the individual wide open.

>> inmates will do almost anything to hide the weapons they spend so much time manufacturing. >> the first one looks like a wire shank. these are all covered or wrapped in some kind of latex material and then lubricated with whatever they can find. >> how long can they keep it up there? >> i believe the average time is about a day. but when it is time to pull it out, sometimes it won't come out and it leads to other problems. >> because inmates go to extreme lengths to fashion and conceal weapons, officers must be outfitted with a high-tech, nonlethal arsenal of their own. our cameras were rolling at riverbend maximum security institution in tennessee as correctional officers practiced firing 50,000-volt tasers at

inanimate objects. then the demonstration moved to other targets, their fellow officers. >> how did you get chosen to be the lucky guy? >> he volunteered. >> i volunteered. i'm a glutton for punishment. >> are you ready? >> agh! oh! [ bleep ] >> are you all right? >> you okay? >> yeah! >> at the los angeles county jail, we encountered inmates who seemed impervious to tasers or anything else. to control these inmates, deputies had to resort to what's known as a four-point restraint. >> in the inmate reception center, there's a lot of incidences, these guys coming straight off the street. they're angry, and they're very violent. and they often go off.

>> everybody else sit down. >> sit down. >> one inmate in particular just couldn't deal with it anymore. he went completely berserk. >> move it. >> freeze! >> move it! >> have a seat. >> and they had to restrain him. and one of the ways they do that is these four-point restraints. and they tell him exactly what they're going to be doing. >> mental health staff has ordered you to be placed in four point restraints. do you understand that? >> yeah. >> i need your cooperation. the more you cooperate, the faster you will be out of points. >> sergeant gilbert duran supervises the carefully choreographed restraint process. >> the deputies have already been briefed as to who will take the upper body, who will take

the lower body extremities. sometimes it takes a couple of extra deputies to hold the upper body if they're struggling or really upset about what's happening to them. and about how many four points are done per week? >> we average up here -- on day shift and p.m., probably anywhere from three to six a day. >> as extreme as four-point restraints are, inmates sometimes take an equally extreme measure to attack officers. one that is particularly vile. >> gassing is what we call it. it's a mixture of feces and urine sometimes fermented for days until it stews into something that is so grotesque that you can't mention it. >> during his 14 years on the job, san quentin officer jones has never had a worse experience than being gassed. >> i would rather be punched, rather be kicked, rather be

stabbed than to be gassed like i was back in '92. >> we have never heard a more extreme account of gassing as the one described by kentucky state penitentiary inmate fleece johnson. >> i asked everybody on the wall to [ bleep ] in a bucket. send it down to me. and i would take, two, three, light bulbs, put it in some toilet paper, step on it, break it up in little fragments, so when i throw it on them, they wipe it, it will cut into them and get in their blood. and i was standing there with a big old bucket of it and throw it in their face. they would just go nuts. and so the corrections finally made a law that made it a felony. and then that's when i stopped.

coming up on "lockup: raw." the most violent confrontations behind bars. cell extractions. >> they tell you to back up to the door. if you back up, you're a bitch. join us at projectluna.com

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some of the most dangerous confrontations in prison happen when correctional officers are forced to extract an inmate from his cell. extractions are carried out by specially trained teams of correctional officers according to exact guidelines. >> i'm officer allen. i'm the number three man on the team. i'm responsible for controlling the inmate's left arm. i will use the least amount of force necessary. >> the entire process is carefully choreographed and videotaped for the protection of officers and inmates alike. >> inmate come to the door. [ bleep ]

[ bleep ] >> when we visited the kentucky state penitentiary, we met inmate dwayne harper, who had a long history of forcing officers to extract him from his cell. >> [ bleep ] i fight sometimes. i argue with the guards but i'm not violent. you know, i've done a lot of time. i've been doing time on and off since i was 12 years old. >> when we first met harper, he was serving his third year in administrative segregation or solitary confinement for having assaulted correctional officers. >> in my opinion, duane is a really stressed out individual. >> don't just strip me out for talking.

strip everybody out for talking you [ bleep ]. >> shortly after "lockup" arrived at kentucky state penitentiary, officers had to extract harper from his cell again. >> he threatened us with throws feces on officers spitting on us through the door he threatened our families. >> a lot of the older ones like lieutenant gill, all of them, they know me from when i was a youngster back down here so we have a different type of communication level and understanding. >> every night you are going to go through this. you hear me? every night you work, you racist, redneck, no good [ bleep ] [ bleep ]. i know us a coward! >> harper will serve at least two more years in segregation. >> i made things hard for

myself. i have been in segregation for three years. i don't blame nobody else. because i had an opportunity to get out of here. i let my anger and things get to me that i shouldn't have. and as a result of that, i'm still here. >> i can't say i'm sane. i'm pretty off balance, but i keep it in a certain amount of control. >> another inmate at kentucky state penitentiary who is no stranger to cell extractions is victor hiatt. prior to interviewing him, our producer was duly warned. >> victor hiatt is a very, very dangerous individual. probably the most dangerous individual in this institution. >> i remember watching victor being led to the interview. and he had such an intense security detail that it almost felt like i was about to interview hannibal lector, quite frankly. he was cuffed behind his back.

but i'll never forget, it was like a normal fiberglass and metal cafeteria chair. there was nothing special about that chair. and he wasn't chained to the chair itself. the chair was not secured to the ground in any way. i start to think to myself, here i am about to interview this guy. i'm knee to knee with the most dangerous man in the state of kentucky. and he's not chained to anything. all of a sudden all of my questions, everything i prepared for the interview, went completely out of my head. >> victor, tell me what, originally what your crime was that brought you to kentucky state penitentiary, how long that sentence is, and then how long of that sentence you have served? >> i'm in for murder. life sentence. convicted in 2001. >> are you proud of that notoriety? i mean, we've heard you are one of the most dangerous guys here. how does that -- >> that's what i hear. i'm actually one of the most laid-back guys here.

>> as all officers, i've received threats from different inmates for bodily harm. he's the only one that's actually ever tried to follow through with it. >> come on in! i'll show you what a redneck can do! >> hiatt's refusal to cooperate with officers has resulted in numerous violent cell extractions. >> they tell you to back up to the door. and if you back up, you're a bitch. if you make them come in and get you, you get a little bit more respect. i've never backed up yet. >> take him down. >> well, you knocked about four of my teeth out. it takes a lot to put me at that point. but when it gets to that point i kind of go blank inside my mind.

i get like tunnel vision. and you have to expect to be killed at any time. next on "lockup: raw." our producer witnesses a vicious prison attack. >> i look down and saw these two younger hispanic guys kicking him in the head. and later -- >> he threatened to kill everybody out there, staff and all. >> an inmate goes too far in a confrontation with staff. >> i can't get along with people too much, especially when they're evil. [ man ] we love to eat. we just didn't know that our plants did, too. then we started using miracle-gro liquafeed every two weeks. now our plants get the food they need while we water. dinner's ready. come and get it. no one goes hungry in this house. so they're bigger, healthier, and more beautiful. guaranteed. with miracle-gro anyone can have a green thumb. and a second helping. [ both laughing ] when you feed your plants... everyone grows with miracle-gro.

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veronica de la cruz. firefighters in colorado say they are getting the upper hand on a massive wildfire. they say it's 55% contained. the fire has destroyed nearly 500 homes and killed two people. a plane bound for new york was diverted to scotland after a threatening note was found in the bathroom. the passengers were rescreened before it took off again. kim kardashian has given birth to a baby girl. father kanye west was by her side during the delivery. and now back to lockup. due to mature subject matter, viewer discretion is advised. with "lockup," we film in some of the toughest prisons in america. every time we send a crew out to a maximum security prison, you never know what might happen with regards to violence.

whether it's a stabbing, whether it's a fight in the yard, or even a riot. there's always a chance that violence may break out. >> we found that was the case when we visited california's legendary fulsom state prison. >> you can feel it. it's like electricity in the air. it's so thick you can actually breathe in the tension. >> in the blink of an eye in that much time it can change. because there is the real threat an attitude or a temper can change in a moment. >> and tempers did flare while our cameras were in the yard. >> we'd just gotten done interviewing, basically, a prison preacher. >> i'm a born again christian, and i believe that everybody should know the lord. if you don't know the lord, i encourage you to know the lord. >> i got done putting the camera down. my cameraman was walking around. and then i started hearing a bing, like bing, bing, bing.

literally five feet away i see this man probably in his late 50s, early 60s, and i look down and i saw these two younger hispanic guys kicking him in the head, like, repeatedly, and his head was bouncing off this pole. >> what you saw here today was actually a battery. they were stomping his head. he's pretty messed up. >> the inmate who was attacked survived because of a quick response by staff on the yard. his assailants were sentenced to six months in fulsom's administrative segregation unit. some of the most violent gang attacks have taken place here at california state prison corcoran's security housing unit, or shu. we visited the shu's now vacant exercise yard, which has been the scene of some of the prison's most brutal violence. ♪

>> i can see why fights went on in that exercise yard. because it was literally like a cage. there was nowhere for you to go. and if you really wanted to take someone out, that was the place to do it. it's literally like the most extreme ultimate fighting thing you would see. >> correctional officers showed our cameras how they quell the violence with an arsenal of their own. one that includes nonlethal and lethal weaponry. >> get down! get down! >> the first rounds we fire are wood blocks. hopefully the hurt will make them stop. if we really have to escalate with our nonlethal options, we use what's called a scat round. which is really irritating. see those are a little bit louder. the smoke you see, that's cn gas. it's no fun. it messes up your sight, makes

you, you know, makes your snot roll. and of course, we have a lethal option. we have a mini-14 here, 223 round. we use that as a last resort. >> today california state prison corcoran no longer has to resort to drastic measures to control violence in the shu yard. they closed the yards down and now inmates exercise in walk-alone areas called the cages. but even when officers are able to quell violence, sorting out its cause can be just as difficult. as our crews found out at the spring creek correctional center in seward, alaska. >> slow down. slow down, mr. seiko, slow down. >> blood on the floor over there. blood pathogens need to be cleaned up. mr. seiko, you need to respond to me so i know you're all right. let's go a little bit more. okay. okay. >> joel brooks is doing 12 years for assault. his adversary, john seiko, is serving a six-year sentence for

sexual assault. our cameras were there when officers interrogated them about the fight. >> what was this all about? >> well, he's a rapist. i was talking with an inmate in the meal line about it with him. >> you were talking about his crime with another prisoner. >> i was talking with a prisoner about him being a rapist. he said, you aren't [ bleep ]. i said, you're not. >> i told him to stop talking about me and i repeated it. and he said, what are you going to do? and i repeated it again, stop talking about me. and then he walked up to me in my face and said, now what are you going to do? >> five minutes later he bum rushed me. >> don't come at me. >> slammed me against the wall. >> i put my hand in his face. i don't know what i did after that. >> he starts scratching my face. i grabbed him around the waist and threw him on the floor and hit him twice in self-defense to get him to let go of my neck. i have 100 witnesses i can bring

up at d-board. i'm not worried about it. >> about him hitting you first or you talking about him and starting it. >> about him hitting me first. >> okay. you've got witnesses about him? hold on, i'm talking, you're not. do you have witnesses that you were talking about him? >> well, yeah. >> to start this? >> well, i didn't start it. he -- he -- >> we'll figure that out in d-board. do we have the camera? he is going to be back there a while until we get him calmed down. strip him, lower body over there. any more marks. >> the bottom line is he hit me first. that's what it comes down to. >> i think it is the bottom line you were talking about somebody else. >> so what? >> how about he starts talking about you? >> so does that give him the right to hit me first? i didn't think so. >> well. >> don't, don't move. >> whoa. whoa. >> what, you think you're a bad ass, too? >> no, not at all. >> then don't cop an attitude. >> i'm not -- i'm not coming an attitude. >> [ bleep ] punk. >> i'm sorry, what? >> you heard me. >> no, i didn't. >> you better.

>> i didn't hear that. >> after a hearing, the disciplinary board ruled that he had been provoked by repeated taunts. while seiko wasn't punished, brooks got 30 days in solitary confinement. >> prison is something that you will never get over. it will always stick with you. and even though i don't have life, but one moment of anger is a lifetime of misery. because prison will always stick with you. coming up -- the victim of one of the most brutal attacks ever profiled on "lockup." >> the doctor said i don't know how much more you could have taken. >> an officer faces her fears as she returns to the scene of the crime.

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join us at projectluna.com over the years, we've learned that attacks on officers are an all-too-frequent occupational hazard.

when we visited indiana's wabash valley correctional facility, officers in the security housing unit were dealing with the latest in a string of violent incidents involving convicted burglar douglas mccombs. >> since he's been inside the shu, he's been on strip cell. when you see the offender coming out of his cell only wearing his underwear, he was on strip cell for resisting staff or trying to assault staff before. we have had trouble with him on about every range we've put him on so far. >> i can't get along with people too much. especially when they're evil. >> one of the people mccombs claims was evil, officer sachen. >> an average day in the shu can be pretty mundane. you have rec and showers to do. chow to serve, md sick call, so on and so forth. some days like today get a little more exciting. we had an offender who became

belligerent in the shower. >> the offender was mccombs who told us he had good reason to be upset. >> tried to get me to take a shower, but they don't have no soap or nothing. i said, ma'am, i just came from the other side, it was nasty where i come from. i need something to wash, a bar of soap. she's talking crazy to me. right? she come up here and talking to me and started, talked to me, well you [ bleep ], you called me a [ bleep ], and i said wait a minute. i said, i just asked you for some [ bleep ], and i snapped on her. >> he threatened to kill everybody out there. staff and all. when we tried to get him to come out of the shower, he was refusing and started throwing toilet water on myself and several other staff members. >> i got it all through my face. all down my back. it was toilet water. >> our cameras were present when mccombs was moved from his cell.

but because he is so dangerous, we were restricted to shooting from the unit's security center. i'll be on your ass every time you come [ bleep ]. >> easy easy. >> put him on the wall first, have him face the wall. we want him facing the wall. we don't want him turning his head, getting mouthy and this and that. that's when you get spit on. we want his nose to the wall. i don't want to talk to him. he can talk to the wall. >> face the wall. turn around. face the wall. >> [ bleep ] sit up there and talk to him. >> face the wall. >> [ bleep ]. >> why don't you [ bleep ]. [ bleep ] why don't you just [ bleep ] >> stand still. >> mccombs freely admitted to our producer by the time the officers put him back in his cell, he was looking for any possible way to hurt them.

>> i just grabbed some water out of the toilet started bombing them. i am just getting tired of what is going on with these people, man. if they don't get me out of here, then i probably will -- might end up killing somebody or they might kill me. >> today mccombs remains incarcerated and has been transferred to another state prison. >> i figured that if it was going to happen, it would happen within the first year. >> in 2004 karen talley was in her sixth year as correctional officer at indiana state prison when she was so brutally attacked by an inmate, she nearly died. we met her two years later. >> you know, they all know me. the guys know me. i used to work in the intake unit when the new arrivals would come in. they know me. i'll be all right. never imagined it for all these years later. never imagined it. >> at the time of the attack,

officer talley was responsible for supervising "b" cell house. an important part of her job was securing the inmates back in their cells with a system called rolling of the bar. an older, manual cell locking device. >> that day, chow lines had run late. i said, come on, guys, go in your cells. you miss roll-in, you know what happens. i figured all of them would be in. i rolled the bar. bigger than anything here is three of them didn't make it. so i went down the range. i started at the end and worked my way up. the last cell that missed roll-in was 424. i locked his door. went to 418. locked his door. went to the next cell -- 410. i said, come on, go on in your cell. he said, i'm not going in. >> officer talley alone on the tier with the inmate says she knew immediately she was in trouble. >> at that time a sick feeling just overcomes you, and you

think, wow, something's not right. so i called for my sergeant on the radio. he said, it'll be a minute. and the guy just hit me. both of my eyes were busted right in the eyebrows. i had 50 stitches in my eyebrow. he broke my jaw. it was broke in two places. the doctor said, i don't know how much more you could have taken. had he kicked you one more time, he could have killed you. without a doubt, you could have died. close three! >> her attacker received an additional ten-year sentence for aggravated battery. and after recovering from her injuries, officer talley took the brave step of returning to work at the prison. this time monitoring the trucks that deliver food to the facility. she no longer has any contact with the inmates. >> in life itself, within seconds your whole life can change. and in a prison environment,

sometimes it doesn't even take seconds. in the blink of an eye it could be over. >> you're all right. you're okay. >> the day after her interview with us, talley surprised our field producer when she said she was ready to return to the cellblock for the first time since the attack. >> keep your chin up. >> escorted by officer chris st. martin and our crew, the return proved to be far more emotional than she could have imagined. >> there you go. safe and sound. want my chair? take the big black one. sit down. sit down. there you go. >> though returning to the cellblock was difficult, talley told us it was also cathartic. >> yeah, i was down for a while. but i'm not dead. they didn't kill me.

i'm okay. emotionally, i'll heal some day. and the sleepless nights and the worry and the wonder, "oh, my god, is this ever going to happen to me again?" i've dealt with most of that and it's really a hard thing. next, on "lockup: raw," an inmate turns violent against himself. >> i swear i'll break my neck [ bleep ]. yeah, i love pain! yeah, yeah! >> etters, stop. with greek nonfat yogurt loaded with protein 0% fat that thick creamy texture, i was in trouble. look i'm in a committed relationship with activia and i've been happy and so has my digestive system. now i'm even happier since activia greek showed up because now i get to have my first love and my greek passion together, what i call a healthy marriage. activia greek. the feel good greek.

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oneself. >> open 11. 22-year-old inmate caleb etter, suffered severe burns over two-thirds of his body when the methamphetamine lab he was running exploded. when we interviewed etter, he was also serving time for both sexual assault and for attacking a peace officer. >> i pushed everything to the limit, because as you can tell, i think i'm unstoppable. i think nothing will stop me. nothing will ever kill me. i thought i was god. reality check, i'm not. >> in spite of his calm demeanor, a few hours after this interview, etter got into a verbal confrontation with a female correctional officer that quickly escalated. c.e.r.t., the correctional emergency response team, was called in to extract him from his cell. >> he's been banging his head on the door, spitting at the glass, refusing to move or comply with any orders.

we have permission to use force to extract him from his cell. >> for security reasons, the prison videotapes all extractions. >> you ready to move? >> put your hand out. other one. >> a mask is placed over etter's head to prevent him from spitting. >> let's go. >> initially he seems to be compliant. but as they pass through the doorway, etter explodes. >> hey, hey, hey. >> [ bleep ] [ bleep ] [ bleep ] i swear to -- break my neck. break my neck! i swear to god, break my neck. yeah, i love pain! yeah! yeah! etter, stop, stop, stop banging your head. >> yeah. hurt me more. >> secured. >> etter, let's walk. no more banging your head. understand. >> i'll kill you all. i'll kill you all, you [ bleep ]. you understand?

i'll kill you all. i'll kill you. >> etter. calm down. >> hey, calm down. >> put him down. >> on the floor. >> all right. >> got his legs. >> all right. easy. >> hurt me more. hurt me more. ow. ow! let's go up. stand up and walk normal. >> etter. etter! >> as his fit continues, etter is taken to the suicide prevention unit for observation. >> [ bleep ] come on, hurt me more! come on! hurt me! >> nobody wants to hurt you. >> why are you [ bleep ] and smashing me against the wall if they didn't want to hurt me, huh? >> to prevent him from harming himself, etter is placed in four-point restraints. >> lay back. lay back. >> no. it's not bruised. >> our cameras were there the next morning when a nurse came in to check on him. >> etter, are you feeling like

you still want to hurt yourself? >> i never wanted to hurt myself. >> now, were you banging your head last night? >> yes, because i was frustrated. i do that when i'm frustrated. >> that's not the right thing to do though, is it now? >> it's better than hurting somebody else. >> well, you're right. when i'm going to do now is call the psychiatrist and see if we can discontinue the four-point order so he doesn't have to go back into them now. i don't feel he is of any threat to himself or others at this point. >> released from the four-point restraints, etter is moved to a 24-hour observation cell and is placed in a suicide smock. a tear-proof gown to prevent him from hanging himself. our crew later accompanied the nurse when she asked etter to relay his version of what led to the extraction, the confrontation he had with a female officer. >> she started antagonizing me on my door. i said, get lost.

get the [ bleep ] out of here. i don't like you, i don't want to talk to you. she made a smart allic comment. i smashed my head on the door. i said, you see that right there? next time it's going to be yours. i said, get the [ bleep ] on. and then i spit on the window. that's what i think of you, you're nothing but trash. i said, get the [ bleep ] gone. she started [ bleep ], saying, at least i ain't some meth-using, something like that. i snapped. i said, if you want to go there, i'll have someone on the outside pay you a visit and it will start [ bleep ] and rape every one of your kids and kill you. how do you like that? you don't [ bleep ] go there. >> four days later, etter is released back to his cell. >> you seem to be doing a lot better to me. i hope you feel you are. >> yeah, i'm doing better. >> i'm glad to hear that. just keep it up.

>> i just get a little frustrated. i react off my emotions. i never think ahead -- i never plan ahead about what i'm doing. >> etter has since been moved to iowa state's maximum security unit due to ongoing disciplinary issues. while no one can tell if he'll hurt himself again, etter still feels it's better than the alternative. >> i've learned to take my aggressions out on myself instead of other people, you know? it may be the wrong thing to do, but i've learned hurting other people will get you more in trouble than it does hurting yourself

msnbc takes you behind the walls of america's most notorious prisons into a world of chaos and danger. now, the scenes you've never seen. "lockup: raw." this is the hardest part because you're in here with very little to do. you sleep. and you eat. and you sleep some more and you eat some more. >> it is a life of profound monotony. >> can't do nothing. just sit in here and look stupid