follow "lockup" producers and crew as they go behind the scenes. "lockup: raw." your right hand. totally relax. >> unlike prison, the majority of inmates inside the nation's county jails are only charged with crimes and are awaiting trials of the resolution of their cases. >> single file line on this wall all the way down.

>> when we travel to cleveland ohio, to shoot "lockup: extended stay," we met one inmate who didn't fit that mold. he was segregated. >> i have to be in a block by myself. >> why? >> i'm high profile. got me separated from everyone else. >> inmate wolford we have inmate -- due to his high-profile case and he has chronic problems adjusting to general populations. >> because all the people i probably fought and the things i got into since i've been here. it's hard to place me. >> robert wolford's reputation at the jail dates back to six years earlier when he was here on a murder charge. he pled guilty to a lesser charge of involuntary manslaughter and sent to prison to serve a 26-year prison sentence. the victim was a homeless man.

>> i gave him some drugs. he said he would pay me back. i trusted him. he said he ain't paying me. we get into a fight. when i seen him reaching, that's when i reached. i got the weapon and killed him. i shot him in the stomach and stabbed him seven times. i just went crazy on him. >> that had nothing to do with why wolford had been brought back to the jail shortly before we arrived to shoot our series there. >> he's here on a high profile case concerning the murder of a young female years ago. >> the cuyahoga county prosecutor's office said he wrote them a letter concerning the disappearance of a 16-year-old cleveland girl nine years earlier. >> i'm writing this letter because i killed a girl. her name was amanda. we were seeing each other the same time she and her boyfriend had been dating. i killed her with a rag. i want her family to rest so i'll tell you where i dug a hole

and put her. >> investigators interviewed him in prison. he described the girl's murder in detail and told them he buried her body in the same vacant lot where he killed the homeless man. they brought him back to the jail and then they took him on a grim field trip. >> investigators had taken him to a lot where he supposedly told them he had buried the missing girl's body. they spent two days digging the up this entire area. it was a big story in the cleveland area because everyone thought the story of the missing girl was finally going to be solved. >> while the search grabbed local headlines in cleveland, it did not turn up the girl's body. authorities concluded that he set them up on an elaborate hoax. possibly as a means of getting away from a conflict in prison. but on the day we met robert wolford and conducted our first interview with him, three months

after he went to investigators he said he was the victim of a hoax. >> i didn't write that letter. >> who wrote the letter? >> another inmate. >> why? >> because we were fighting, beefing. he said he was going to get me another case. he seen her on the tv. down there they got a program where missing kids come up missing. well, she's on there. he seen it on there and he went off the details. they digged in the area where my last victim was killed, they say she's buried there. they want me to point out where i killed him. i said right here. they said she must be over here then they dug the first half up. they didn't find nothing. they went six feet. they did it for 11 hours. they come back and said, are you sure that's where you had him? i was like, yeah. >> we meet inmates as we travel throughout the jail. when he told me another inmate had written the letter, it seemed like a plausible situation.

>> authorities say he had a motivation for changing his story and claiming he had nothing to do with the letter. they're unsuccessful search resulted in a new criminal charge for him. >> they say i obstructed the fbi's and cleveland police investigations. >> wolford was charged with obstruction of justice. he pled not guilty but would remain in the jail until the case was solved. if found guilty he could have several more years added to the 26 he's already serving. >> i got saying, if the glove don't fit, you must acquit. >> wow. >> going to trial. that's o.j. >> i think we all know it's o.j. >> that's o.j. let's go to trial. >> while he denied any knowledge of what happened to the missing girl named amanda, he did say they were friends prior to her disappearance nine years earlier. >> we knew each other since we were little kids. i used to go to her work and talk to her all the time. her best friend was two houses down. i used to hang out at her house all the time.

>> do you think she's alive? >> yes. >> you really think she's alive? >> if she was dead they would have found her body. >> if there was something you could say to amanda's family, what would you say? >> we all know she's still alive. we all hoping she still alive. we all just got to have hope and faith that she'll come home one day. that's it. >> that night when i actually researched the story, i learned that the authorities spent a great deal of time with him and obviously had gotten enough information that would warrant this dig in the lot. in fact, the prosecutor's office says it sent a team to visit robert in prison and spent many hours interviewing him, and he gave a very detailed account of killing amanda and killing her in that lot, which is why they went to such lengths to dig her up. when approached robert with the information, he decided he didn't want to talk about it anymore. >> so as one of the people who decides what "lockup" stories

gets covered on "extended stay" and which ones don't, i let the crew i felt like we wouldn't be covering robert's story. there was too big of gap between what he was telling us and what authorities were saying. as so often happens it was another aspect to robert's story. >> coming up -- >> robert had a brother in the jail named bobby. >> it's weird how [ bleep ] happens. >> we encounter not just one but two more wolford's in jail. later, the story of the missing girl named amanda makes national news and stuns millions.

i think one of the main reasons "lockup" has had such a long run on television is because we don't just feature the loudest inmates or the most violent inmates or the troublemakers.

>> you are refusing to do what you're supposed to do. >> i didn't refuse nothing. i have my back to you! >> we go into prisons and jails across the country to try to find a cause and effect. producers start by asking the first question, which is -- >> what's the status? what are you charged with? convicted with? >> what did you do to get in here? then they ask the more important meaningful question. >> what happened? >> donald coleman's answer was concise. >> me getting in trouble just being in and out of jail, getting in trouble. i was working for the military making good money. i screwed it up because i wanted to make fast money selling dope and gang banging. now i'm in here. >> coleman's story was not unlike that of many inmates, but what happened to him in jail two weeks before his release was a true cautionary tale. >> we met donald coleman when we responded to a fight call in the jail. we got there and the staff was separating the various people

involved. i approached both coleman and the man with whom he had been supposedly fighting. that man declined to be on camera. coleman was fine with it. >> we're just assessing him for injuries. looking for anything that's fresh. >> they were telling the story they had been horseplaying. >> were they fighting or what? >> said they were horseplaying. horse playing. >> it's not unusual for inmates to say they never fought. there are always repercussions for fighting in jail. >> horse play? >> yeah. >> so everybody comes up with the same story. i fell off my bunk. i slipped in the shower. i was horse playing with somebody. >> coleman was serving six months for violating his probation on burglary and credit card fraud. he was due to be released in ten days. >> initial story was they were not fighting. they were horseplaying. that didn't seem likely. there was a altercation going on between these two. >> i tried to help him up. that's how i got the blood.

>> got the story from the first inmate. detail of what just happened. >> the mop, i solid, he tried to do it and his shoes gripped and he hit his head on the shower. >> take him over there and talk to the other guy. >> i let him go and brought the other inmate in. his story differed drastically from the first inmate. >> you don't know what happened? >> no, sir. >> no previous fights earlier in the day? >> i don't know. >> i don't know nothing about anything. that's the standards response. >> the shirt got blood all over it. >> what happened? >> i have no idea. don't have a clue. >> both inmates written up for fighting and horse play. they'll get a disciplinary hearing. they'll be moved to segregation until they have their hearing. a disciplinary officer will determine what they get. >> while coleman waited in a holding cell, we have asked the question we have asked so many times before. >> what happened? >> just goofing off.

>> then he just slipped and had this horrible gash in his head? >> pretty much. >> is that your story you're going to stick to? >> yeah, because y'all got me on camera. >> what difference does it make, you're getting out in ten days. >> if i knew you weren't going to tell the sergeant you were what happened, i'll tell you something. >> ultimately the truth comes out to due the explanation. >> he called me a [ bleep ] and i split his head open. you have convicts and inmates. convicts mind their own business and do their time. you have inmates that want to run their mouth and make it difficult for everybody else to do their time. that's basically what happened. >> so, donald, you're so close to getting out. tell me how you're going to handle this. >> disciplinary board going to ask what happened. i'm going to tell them, slipped and fell. he's going to say the same thing. can't prove nothing unless y'all say something. >> what if they don't believe it? >> then i'm going to be in the hole. doesn't matter just for horse playing.

it's what it's going to be. 45 days in the hole. i leave in ten days. >> most inmate fights do end with time in the hole, or disciplinary segregation. locked in the cell 23 hours a day with nothing to do is already hard but sometimes there's a higher price to pay. >> coleman is symbolic of so many inmates that we meet. he actually has a great shot. he's going to be getting out soon. he has a family and he has work on the outside that he can go back to, and yet he consciously engages in a fight that sets him up in a much worse situation. it could possibly get him outside charges which would give him a lengthier sentence in prison. >> that is if the jail or the other inmate files criminal charges, and for coleman, it was another 9 1/2 years of probation ahead of him. that possibility began to sink in. >> if i get charged with assault i'm going to the penitentiary

for 9 1/2 years flat. even though it's an internal charge, they can be jerks and make it an outside charge if dude shows up in court and i go to the penitentiary for nine flat. >> that's a big deal. >> yeah. that's a lot to lose. i feel stupid for doing it. >> what, are you depressed? you look a little out of it. >> i'm really depressed. i'm going to the hole. i have to explain to my wife that i can't have no visitation or nothing because i punched somebody in the face, and get yelled at and my kids will act for the next week and a half till i get on home and put her through hell. it's a lot of unwanted stress that shouldn't have been caused. >> moments later the sergeant enters the holding cell to take coleman's state. coleman must choose the version he thinks is in his best interest. >> coleman, i'm sergeant jim. what's your side of the story? >> we were goofing off and he

took off and slid across the floor. which i did it first, i solid across the floor and fell and hit my head. when he did it his tennis shoes grip and when it did he fell face first into the cart that we put the towels and jump suits in and he hit the middle of his forehead and it cut him open. >> you weren't fighting? >> we weren't fighting or wrestling. there was no physical altercation at all. >> i believe they got in a fight. they probably had some words. these people are housed together. you know, they're with each other every minute, so they might have had words a couple days ago and it turned into something today. they said they slipped and fell but their stories don't match up. >> yes, sir. >> he will talk to disciplinary officer in the morning. >> coming up -- >> where's coleman? >> donald discovers that horseplay in the county jail usually doesn't mean fun and games. and -- >> don't mind my partner. we 20 cents short from a dollar. >> the friendship forged inside the wreck cages in one of

florida's toughest prisons. >> he came through my commode one time and i wondered who he one time and i wondered who he was, just walked out of nowhere. to quite a few family gatherings. heck, i saved judith here a fortune with discounts like safe driver, multi-car, paperless. you make a mighty fine missus, m'lady. i'm not saying mark's thrifty. let's just say, i saved him $519, and it certainly didn't go toward that ring. am i right? [ laughs ] [ dance music playing ] so visit progressive.com today. i call this one "the robox."

for some inmates the santa rosa correctional institute is the end of the line and the end of hope for a better life. >> santa rosa has the reputation of being one of the toughest, if not the toughest, prison in all of florida. it's where other institutions send inmates that can't really get along in that institution. so, the majority of population in santa rosa is on lockdown. >> being on lockdown means 23-hour day confinement in a one or two-person cell. >> belly flops. >> when weather permits one hour of rec time can be spent outdoors in enclosed rec cages to prevent inmates from fighting. it was in this difficult environment that we met two inmates who forged a friendship based on laughter. a sound that was hard to come by

in santa rosa. >> don't mind my partner. he's 20 cent short from a dollar. >> he's on written. >> very short. >> a couple of adhd, attention deficit disorder. >> 24-year-old tavarus was serving 20 years for robbery. joseph arnold was 25 and serving an eight-year sentence for robbery and aggravated assault. >> the first time we encountered them was out in the rec pens. i was out there shooting "b" roll and our associate producer said, hey, have you to meet these guys. >> just have fun. >> it's too much chocolate in the system. >> i was walking up and down the different aisles of cages just stopping and talking to people and just meeting people at the very beginning and these two guys stood out right away. these two guys just stood out right away. they were funny and joking about the horrible glasses they had to wear from the doc. >> i call them gangster nerds. it's for people just like my kind, you know, you put them on. that's okay.

that's all right. >> lee told us that after prison he intended to brand and market the glasses. >> this is a sneak preview. just a consistent consent of what i'm going to be dealing with and showing the world. this is what i'm going to be wearing around. i'm going to have them in black, brown, green, red, all tropical colors. >> he will call them chain gang louis. >> i came up with chain gang louis. >> be careful. >> they so unique. >> this is going to be my ceo. we going to come out with our own version of everything. we want nbc -- that's that they msnbc -- >> msnbc. >> msnbc to do the first cast of these gangster nerds. >> you got to put them on.

>> just hold on. don't rush me. you have to be quiet. they want to see this in a quiet place. >> go ahead. >> it's commercial. that's how they look right there. just like that. do it like that there. i mean, what's up? >> it's a really sad environment and it's hard to make relationships, but these two guys, i guess they were put in the cage next to each other and they were able to create some laughter, which i'm sure was really needed. >> look up his dc number. he's desperate for a pen pal. anybody, somebody, anybody but a dead body, please write this young man because he's desperate for a pen pal. my friend is very desperate. >> their banter seemed at a different level, like they had been old friends. i think i even asked the question to them. >> have you known each other since being in here on the street? >> i wish i never entered a conversation with this young man. >> he came through my commode one time and i wondered who this was. just popped out of nowhere. i tried to flush him back down

where he came from, but turd sticks sometimes, you know, people? >> joseph got a bright head on his shoulder. you know, we might joke a lot and, you know, just pass time because, you know, sometimes people don't like to be miserable all their lives, so we just make each other laugh. >> that's my son. that's my friend. that is my child, you know, i adopted that boy. i put him under my wing, you hear me. i ain't come back here looking for no friends but that's just one dude, you know -- >> silly [ bleep ]. >> joseph helped me out. we help each other. it's like, if i see joseph don't have soap, i break him a piece of mine and give it to him. if i see joseph needs stamps to write his people, i give him some of my stamps i may have got and it's vice versa. everything that i do it comes from my heart.

>> let's go there, entrepreneur. >> entrepreneur. >> i won't leave him in here for dead. he got 20 years. i got eight. i'm going to keep it 100 with him, you with me. 100 i'll be till i d-i-e. >> a view weeks later joseph was transferred to another prison, leaving lee in santa rosa. >> certainly there was some pain and sadness when they were separated. it's understandable. you don't have a lot. it's got to make the days easier when you find somebody that you bond with, i mean, that's really sometimes all you can have, especially santa rosa, because that was just a lockdown facility >> i miss him. miss him a lot. real true friend. >> has it been hard here without him?

>> you know, in life we all got to accept that we got to move on with things, so you just cope with what you got in front of you and move, you know. >> despite the loss of his friend and business partner, lee is not given up on his dream of one day of selling chain gang louis. in fact, he already planned an expansion to his prison eyewear line, modeled by his cell mate, christopher walker. >> say hi to the camera, chris. he blushing. look at him. >> what do you want to call those glasses? >> pretty boy swaggers. he turn like a chile pepper. he blushing. coming up -- >> robert wolford is my brother from my dad's side. >> ya! >> me and bobby have the same mom and the same dad. >> the saga of the wolford family. and later, the spectacular story about what really happened to the teenaged girl robert wolford allegedly confessed to killing.

while shooting our "extended stay" series inside cuyahoga county correction center, we met robert wolford. the circumstances surrounded him that he was brought back to the jail from prison because he had allegedly written a letter to authorities saying he had killed and buried a teenage girl who had gone missing nine years

earlier were intriguing. >> i didn't write that letter. >> who wrote that letter? >> another inmate. >> when he denied writing the letter and telling authorities anything about the case, we decided not to pursue the story any further. but then robert mentioned something unusual about his family. >> what's your brother's name? >> robert wolford. >> your brother? you have the same name as your brother? >> and i got a brother named bobby wolford. >> why would all three you have have the same name? >> that's what my mom wanted. robby, bobby and robert. bobby wolford. i don't know if you met him yet. yeah, he's here too. >> robert wolford had a brother in the jail named bobby wolford. that was somewhat intriguing. bob y robert. so, we went off to meet bobby wolford. >> i know where you're going. >> 24-year-old bobby wolford was

awaiting trial on charges of aggravated robbery and burglary. to which he had pled not guilty. >> well, my brother robert, he's related because we got the same father. >> bobby was housed in a different unit from bob y but they had recently had a chance encounter in one of the jail's common areas. >> i never seen robert a day in my life. i was getting mop water because i was on clean-up and he just popped up out of nowhere and he was like, you know you're my brother, right? i said, i heard i had a brother named robert. good to meet you. now i got to meet you. it was good to meet my brother but not a good place i met him in. we just said, hi, how you doing, love you, and we had to go back to our pods. not much of a meeting but it was something. >> bobby wolford was quite a bit different than his brother robert. >> yeah! big bob's back! >> he had a much more carefree lackadaisical attitude. he was much more light hearted

and much more of a jokester. >> what you want? what you want? >> bobby the white boy. give me some that, boy. >> you know. >> y'all know how to do it. give it up, bobby. >> soon, this new angle to the wolford story was about to expand even further because robert and bobby were not alone. >> they got my sister bobby here and sister andrea here. >> turns the out their sister andrea is also in the same jail. >> it's weird how [ bleep ] happens. i mean -- >> robert wolford is my brother from my dad's side. we have the same dad but we have different moms. me and bobby have the same mom and the same dad. >> unlike her older brothers who had been in and out of jail over the years, this was 19-year-old andrea's first time in jail. >> there's times where you have your down days and other times where you're just like, well, you can't do nothing about it.

>> she's never even gotten in trouble a day in her life. she's never even been in the back of a cop car that i know of. >> but andrea wolford was facing very serious charges. several counts of child endangerment. they came about because her fiancee allegedly harmed some children they were babysitting. specifically, he is alleged to have struck two of the children five times each with a cloth belt, leaving bruises on their thighs and buttocks. a few weeks after we concluded our "extended stay "shoot in cleveland, andrea would be completely exonerated, found not guilty on all charges and released. but for now she was struggling to deal with the hardships of incarceration. >> i've cried about ten times since i've been here. a lot of fact due to missing the family. haven't been out there. i'm my grandmother's caregiver. i haven't been there to take care of her. >> andrea was different from both her brothers bobby and robert.

she was much more of an innocent. it was obvious that robert had done time. bobby had done time. andrea seemed a little like a fish out of water. very much just floating in this existence. >> a lot of times you wake up for court and they don't call you and you're like, wow, it just got canceled. in the end, they can't keep you forever. >> just when we thought there could be no more odd twists to the story, we were wrong. it turns out that andrea's fiancee and now co-defendant was housed in the jail as well. >> my co-defendant's name was sheldon hickman. we've been dating year and a half. it's a strong relationship between us. we don't plan on separating just because of the case that we have together. >> sheldon hickman was also facing child endangerment charges. and like andrea, he too pled not guilty. >> can you tell me what they said occurred? >> well, they said that i

whooped the kids and put bruises on them, which never happened. andrea was asleep. when i was watching the kids. she was there so they indicted her on my charges, i guess. make me feel worse because she's sitting down here for no reason at all. >> later on sheldon would agree to plead guilty. to only one count of child endangerment. he was sentenced to time already served in jail and released. but one of the new friends he made in his housing united was none other than the future brother-in-law he had never met. >> that's another one that you didn't see coming either. >> talking about bobby wolford, any relation? >> bobby, my little brother. i love him like family, like blood. he's actually a friend of my best friend and they knew each other since little kids and that even brought us closer even quicker. >> when they first met if jail,

bobby didn't even know who sheldon was. >> i diplomat know it was sheldon. i thought it was one of the funniest names i ever heard. to be honest with you. it sounds like something you would call a turtle. >> this family saga was about to take yet another turn. andrea had grown up with bobby but it had been a long time since she had seen her half brother, robert. >> the last time i seen robert i was about 7 years old. when i heard that he had went to prison for murder, i couldn't really bring myself to believe it, but at the same time, they pretty much grew up like us, i mean, the drug life, getting in trouble in school, run away from home. >> andrea hadn't seen her brother robert for many, many years. we carry around a photo to take i.d. photos so what we decided with permission from the jail staff, was to show andrea a picture of robert. >> you want to take a look? >> yes. >> okay.

>> so, this is -- this is robert. >> oh, my god. he looks just like us. >> yeah, you guys do look alike. when i saw your booking photo i knew you guys were brother and sister. oh, honey. you okay? what's making you emotional? because you haven't seen him in so long? when we did show her the picture her emotional reaction was big. she was really upset. and i comforted her in that situation because we're only human and it's hard when you stand in front of someone and they start breaking down over something and to just stand back, it is really hard to do that. we have to do it all the time, but for some reason in that moment i just wanted to comfort her and let her know that, you know, people care.

and understand that it's a hard situation to be without your family. >> it just hurts not being able to see him face-to-face and hang out and do something that a brother and sister would be together, have that family bond that families should have. >> here we have three siblings who although separated by units were were suddenly under the same roof for the first time in a long time and andrea was yearning for a relationship with her brother robert, so she started writing him letters. >> after so many years apart that family bond might not be so easily forged especially given andrea's relationship with sheldon. during his time in prison, robert joined the white supremacist gang, the aryan brotherhood. >> i don't believe i'm racist. it's just who i am. i don't sit here call the black dude "n" word. i don't believe white woman

messing with black man, i don't believe in inter-race. i believe we should all stick together as one kind. >> when robert learned of andrea's relationship he felt it would cause him big problems with his gang when he returned to prison. >> none of my family members aren't supposed to be dealing with blacks and come to find out my sister got one. >> in the prison world that's a very big deal. that actually puts robert in a certain amount of jeopardy. >> now i got a lot of explaining to do when i get down to prison. coming up, robert wolford makes a decision. and -- >> they wrote you up for fighting. don't know y'all was fighting or if y'all was horse playing. tell me what happened. >> as if things couldn't get worse for donald coleman, when we saw him a few weeks later things had taken a horrible turn for him. 

inside the louisville metro democrat of correction jail, donald coleman was within two weeks of going home. that's when he got into a fight with another inmate. though coleman said the injuries were due to horseplay. >> you got a knot right here. >> he told us something else. >> he called me a bitch and i split his head open. >> where's coleman? you coleman? >> yeah. >> come o man. you got disciplinary hearing. >> the next morning coleman had a hearing with officer hale who would determine whether he could get time in segregation. and if so, how much. since the other inmate asked to be anonymous, his name will be bleeped from the conversation. >> this is being recorded for the record. state your name. >> donald coleman. >> i'll read the writeup to you. narration states inmate was a work aide in laundry when he was in a physical altercation with inmate [ bleep ]. they wrote you up for fighting. i don't know if you were fighting or horseplaying.

so, tell me what happened. >> i went in there, kids having a bad day at the house. i went in there with [ bleep ] tried to trip me. we were goofing around. i hit the side of my head and hit my head. he had tennis shoes on and i had shower shoes on. he slip. he went into the cart and busted his head open. you know, it's still considered horse playing so i take responsibility for that 37 and i know, you know, that's still considered hole time, but i'm going to leave in ten days, so regardless i know what i did was wrong, so i take responsibility for it. >> if you ask me, i doubt they was horse playing. the way the other dude has a cut to his head. they always say it was horseplay. but i know better. >> the other inmate had his hearing a short time before. now it was time to hear officer hale's decision. >> i'm going to do the same thing i did to him with you. i'm going to give you ten days. so, you'll probably be out

before you even serve the ten days. you only got eight days left? >> it didn't go the way i wanted to. they said something about moving me to a single cell. but, you know, it's ten days for fighting, which i said it was horse playing but i still got wrote up for fighting. >> could have been worse than that? >> yeah. i could have got an assault charge where it was split open. it could have been an outside charge and carried a longer sentence than what i have now. >> it's rare that inmates or jail officials file criminal charges for fights in which there are no serious injuries. during a week-long break in our shooting schedule, coleman was supposed to have been released, but he was still there when we returned. >> what's going on with you? >> i got an extra 60 days for the fight for assault three. i get out june 16th. i just finally told them. no point in hiding it. they know. they ain't stupid. dude told anyways. he signed a statement. he signed a statement to go back

to the laundry. in other words, after he did his ten days in the hole, they told him if he wanted his work aide status back, he ended up pressing assault three. that's what i say about rats in jail. they're everywhere. you can't help it. >> while the fight cost coleman another 60 days in jail, the 60 days cost him something else. >> as if things couldn't get worse for donald coleman, when we saw him a few weeks later, things had taken a horrible turn for him. >> me and the wife are getting divorced because of me having to stay in here longer. i did it to myself. i can't blame nobody else. >> this is something we see all the time. loved ones on the outside can only sustain a relationship for so long. i'm sure it's very difficult to have a relationship with somebody who is incarcerated but when they continue to mess up while they're inside, it only throws more strain on the family outside. >> now i done lost my family, my kids and everything just from coming in and out of jail.

it's not worth it. being in here is not worth it. in the past three years i've destroyed everything that's took me 20 years to build. it's that fast. my wife told me i got the letters. it's not -- it's not good. it says i want you to know how much you let me down. you could not even do the one thing i asked you to stay out of trouble and now you will be in there longer. now i'm sitting here alone with no electric, no money because the shop is in your name. so, thank you for not loving me. thank you for all the fake [ bleep ] and everything you ever said to me was a lie. i can't read the rest of it. look, and she sent all my letters back. that's what i'm saying, you got kids and a family, best thing is to take care of them the best way you can. i let her down by being in here instead of taking care of my family. coming up, robert wolford chooses between his gang and his sister.

and then the stunning truth about the young girl he allegedly confessed to killing.

incarcerated at the cuyahoga county correctional center, robert wolford seemed to have plenty of problems. >> tuck shirt in. come on out. >> he already had a 26-year sentence for involuntary manslaughter for killing a man during a drug deal. now he was facing a new charge for obstruction of justice after he allegedly told authorities that he killed and buried a local teenage girl who had gone missing nine years earlier. investigators dug up the lot they say wolford led them to and found nothing. they concluded he was just trying to get out of prison for a while in order to avoid a conflict with other inmates. >> a letter from my brother robert. hey, bro, how are you doing in here?

i hope you're doing good in here. i know it sucks being in here and you never really got a chance to bond with me. >> now wolford had become pen pals with his estranged sister who was also in the jail. >> "lockup" came and interviewed me a couple of times. they showed me your picture and i broke down. i honestly didn't know i would do that but for some reason it hit me hard when i seen your picture. >> rekindling his relationship with his sister might seem like good news but in prison he had become a member of the white supremacist gang, the aryan brotherhood, and andrea was engaged to a co-defendant, sheldon hickman. >> we're family no matter what choices we make or no matter how many times we mess up. >> a white supremacist has a sister who's engaged to a black man. in the prison world, that's not acceptable. >> did you know your brother was in the aryan brotherhood? >> no. i didn't know robert was in aryan brotherhood at all. everyone has their beliefs.

i don't discriminate against him. he grew up differently than i did. >> i'm going to have hard decision to make when i get down there. >> down where? >> down in prison. i'm going to have to stop being an aryan or throw my family to the side. >> why do you have to stop? >> we're not allowed to have black in my family. if she's dating black then they ain't going to allow it. >> robert was now facing a big dilemma, but there was this bond, this familial bond, that was very present and very important to him. >> and later, robert did reach a decision. he wrote back to andrea to let her know what it was. >> i have to be what i am and do what i got to do for my family, i will. it's a hard decision to make but i'm going to do what's right for me. >> you willing to give up aryan brotherhood for your sister? >> yes. >> what's that mean for you though?

>> i look at this like this. my family will be here more for me than they will. >> since inmate mail takes several days to process, robert gave us permission to convey his decision to andrea the next time we saw her. >> also "lockup" told me you you wrote me telling me you was giving it up for me because of the circumstances of interracial dating and because you believe family is more important. i want to thank you for doing that for me. and it touched me when they told me that. just know that i am very blessed to have you do that just for me and with the consequences of leaving the gang, i'll do my best to keep your protected. i love you and i will write you later. i do want to thank him for that. i mean, family does mean everything. and with that being said, i definitely will come and visit him and be there for him since he ain't going to have the gang behind his back to be there for him or anything anymore.

>> though the robert wolford story evolved from one of a false report about a long missing girl to one of choosing his blood family over his gang family, there was still one chapter yet to be written. whatever did become of that missing 16-year-old girl named amanda? >> months after we left the cleveland jail, we were filming in tulsa county jail and suddenly this huge story broke. and this teenage girl, who had been the focus of robert wolford's story at the beginning, suddenly became international news. >> good evening. it came down to frantic 911 call. that was the start of it. soon after the world would learn three missing feared dead had been inside a cleveland, ohio, home were as long as a decade and was now free. >> this girl was amanda berry. the girl with two other girls had been held captive by ariel castro for ten years and we were all just shocked.

we were completely shocked. >> amanda berry alive with her family. a picture some never thought they would see. finally safe but only after a harrowing escape and call to 911. >> help me. i'm amanda berry. >> do you need police, fire or ambulance. >> i need police. >> okay. and what's going on there? >> i've been kidnapped and i've been missing for ten years. i'm here. i'm free now. >> we're sending them, okay? >> dozens of friends and even strangers who have followed the disappearance for ten years, gathered there late last night, cheering and crying in amazement of the news. >> here is the thing about working on "lockup." the real things that occur you wouldn't necessarily believe in fiction. so, when we heard the story that amanda berry and the two other girls were found alive, we were all in a state of shock. we couldn't believe it. >> for amanda's family, for gina's family, for michelle's family, prayers have finally

been answered. the nightmare is over. >> police arrested ariel castro and charged him with 977 counts including kidnapping, rape and attempted murder. he was immediately booked into the cuyahoga county correction center. the very jail in which we met robert wolford. castro was eventually convicted and sentenced to life, plus 1,000 years in a state prison. one month later, he was found dead in his prison cell from an apparent suicide by hanging.

it's a housing unit with a reputation. >> it's a party. it's a party. >> it can get pretty wild here in "g" dorm. >> it's like a big sorority house, but with a bunch of friggin' gay people in jail. >> and "g" dorm is about to turn one new inmate's life upside down. >> i'm just scared. i'm scared to death. i just want my mom.