tv Lockup Raw MSNBC October 4, 2014 2:00am-2:31am PDT
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>> 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." >> nestled at the base of majestic glaciers, the small coastal town of seward, alaska, is known for more than breath taking natural beauty. it's also home to the spring creek correctional facility, alaska's only maximum security prison.
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it's here that we encounter carl abel. it didn't take long for him to make clear his opinions of some of his fellow inmates. >> all of these inmates can say whatever they want to say. they're punks and the people that are in control know they are punks. >> able first came to spring creek in 2003, after he was convicted of murdering a co-worker. >> i caved his head in. caved it in totally. the biggest fragment of bone was about the size of a half dollar. i probably got a little out of hand later on i kept on hanging out and beating on him some more. there was -- interested in the gory stuff? yeah. well, i was interested in how the decomposition would be. it was pretty interesting. it was kind of twisted. >> the raw interview footage goes on to reveal perhaps the
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most grisly aspect of able's crime. >> so your whole sentence is what now? tell me. >> 70 years. i got six months, too, for cruelty to animals. >> for what? >> cruelty to animals. >> what happened? >> i nuked a guy's cat that he had. the cat was chewing on him so i nuked the cat. i intended to kill the cat but i guess i didn't do a good enough job. >> how do you nuke a cat? >> stuck him in the microwave and turned it on. 2 1/2 minutes wasn't long enough. so. i had a valid reason. i didn't do it for kicks. i did it because it was chewing on the dead guy so. >> three years later in august 2004, able killed again. this time the victim was his cellmate. >> the guy killed his mom which
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is disgusting. he was bragging about it. i killed mommy, i'm getting out in 20 years. blah, blah, blah. okay dude. i sit and listen to this garbage and i can't tell because if you tell you are a [ bleep ] rat. then someone is going to call me a [ bleep ] rat. no way. you call me a rat, put you in the ground. now what. >> while most of his fellow inmates infuriate him, able wanted our female producer to know he has nothing but respect for women and children. >> i have zero tolerance for certain behaviors in other men. they disrespect a woman, they try to take you know, sexually, i'm going to put them in the ground. there are certain people and certain criteria, rapeos, child molesters. you can't cure them. there is no cure for them. so you kill them. that's how you deal with the problem. there is no more problem then. >> able went on to give us this graphic account of how he murdered his cellmate. >> he was talking about how he's going to strangle this lady, so i tore up the sheet and wrapped
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it around his head and said no. you ain't doing nothing. you go say hi to mommy. >> how did he die? >> he kept on breathing, i thought i was doing it wrong because i didn't have a wire garrett. you can decapitate someone you wrap it around their neck and yank on it. you'll decapitate them. the sheet is hard, i think it was about five minutes of fighting around and i finally yarded on his neck, he hemorrhaged all over the place. that's when he stopped. then i shoved the hanker chief down his throat to shut him down. i'm the first guy that killed a man in this yard, i guess. they still run their mouth. got little punks that run their mouth to me. >> moments after able was placed back in his cell, he was in conflict with the inmate in the neighboring cell. >> i'm rolling. >> what's going on? >> this is what they call cell
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warriors. no one can get at each other so they try to stir each other up. >> able is expected to serve out the rest of his sentence, if not his life in the highly restricted single person cells of spring creek's max unit. he left our crew with these words. >> i try to think positive. there's always things getting worse. things can get worse. i hope they don't. >> when we travel to river bend maximum security institution in tennessee, we encountered a young inmate who was also driven to kill. and his story was absolutely
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chilling. >> i broke my hand with a butcher knife. i put on a hockey mask, brown cover alls, brown boots. they said i had bottled up anger, mad at my mom all my life because of the way she treated me. so i figured i'd kill her sister. i didn't want to kale my mom, but i figured if i'd kill her sister, it would slowly kill her emotionally. >> luis ramon was 15 at the time of the murder. when we met him six years later, he told our producer he relates with two notorious and fictional killers. >> i believe i become a killer like malcolm and jason voorhees on friday the 13th. i'm fascinated the way they work. i heard voices like jason. they told me how to kill people and when to do it. the devil, i was possessed with the devil for six years. >> how about now?
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>> i hear a demon outside my window right now. jim. he lives outside my window. >> what does he tell you? >> most time he just sings or hums. he aggravates me and i can't sleep. >> when our producer noticed his scarred arms, she learned that sometimes ramon directs violence at himself as well. >> what are these scars? >> i cut my vain open about three times. twice with a spoon and once with a razor blade. just to watch the blood come out. i do it sometimes just for the hell of it. took 15 years of bottled up anger to do what i did on the streets. if i keep bottled up again i'll end up doing something like that again. >> he's not going to get that chance any time soon. ramon is not eligible for parole until 2057. >> if i can go back in time, if i knew i would do all this time, i would escape when i had the answer, or at least took out 30 people before -- had a little
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fun whul r while i was out there. >> our interview ended with ramon's chilling outlook on his life. >> i figure if that's what i was put on earth for, to be a serial killer. that's my job. if i do get a chance to get out, maybe i'll do that. since i ain't got no chance of getting out might as well carry out my plan. >> which is? >> to kill as many people as i can before i die. >> i've been told i'm pretty hard core. >> next, on "lockup raw." >> i start to turn off the camera, slowly as i inch my way backwards out of the cell. >> a lock-up producer has a close call with one of the most dangerous inmates in kentucky. >> took a knife and i stabbed him with it three or four times. then i butchered him with it.
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at virtually every prison we profiled, we met inmates who spent the majority of their lives behind bars and are never getting out. in many cases, these lifers committed their crimes as teenagers, and with each passing decade have slowly adjusted to the strict rules and rigorous demands of prison life. still, there are those inmates like alex bennett at the kentucky state penitentiary who don't always agree with or abide by the rules. >> i'm a person that's been in the joint all my life, i've been told i'm pretty hard core. and i need a certain type of environment. >> you got something you want to say to me now we can get it on national tv here. >> everything about alex's
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mannerisms, his appearance, and the words that he spoke said convict. alex just embodied that. >> bennett was 54 when we met him. and had spent 33 of those years behind bars for armed robbery, kidnapping, and murder. >> the system today isn't like the system that i came into 36 years ago. the system today has the majority of their inmates programmed to do what they are told when they are told to do it. and so they get to the point where they expect that from everybody. well, there's still a few old dogs around who like to do things their own way.
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>> bennett's way of doing things has had horrifying results. after adapting to life 18 single person cell here he was transferred to a lower security prison in 1998. he had more privileges there, but also had to share a cell. that's when things began to go very wrong. >> i'm not going to live with child molesters, i'm not going to live with punks, i'm not going to live with rats. i need my privacy. that's the most important thing to me and i was determined to get that and i got it. >> after his request to return to his single maximum security cell at kentucky state was denied, bennett took matters into his own hands and at the expense of his new cellmate. >> i took a knife and i stabbed him with it three or four times, till he was dead. and then i butchered him with it. i cut him up into little pieces because it's like i told the warden down there, you know, this is what i left you. now you'll give me a transfer or
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one of you all will be next. i meant what i said. i have a choice because i have nothing to lose. you see my point. i don't have nothing to lose. >> usually i hang out right here. this is my spot. i used to stay over there but the child killers took it over and they can have it. i don't argue with nobody about spots. i feel like the whole joint belongs to me since i killed to get here to get it. a whole lot of guys think that i'm an insane psychopathic murderer. it don't bother me. >> later bennett revealed he did care what the lockup audience would think of him. >> deputy warden nancy doom took me to meet alex at his cell so i could get a few extra sots of him. he was taking this long pull off a cigarette. i could start to see the gears turning in alex's mind a little bit. and he said to me, why do you
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need all of this footage, i just don't get it. why do you need all this footage about me? >> doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. >> what's that? >> just sitting here looking goofy. >> he was upset. and it was like a switch. he went from being terribly cooperative to not being happy about this situation and there was a really, really discernible shift in his demeanor. >> you know what i think? >> i'm just filming you. whatever you wanted to do. i wanted to get a shot of you in your cell. >> i'm thinking that you all are going through all of these here prisons, talking to all of these people such as myself you know. people who's never getting out. this ain't recording this. >> i start to turn off the camera, and i stand up and i begin reasoning with alex, slowly as i inch my way
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backwards out of the cell. alex, it's important that we tell this story. we want to hear your voice. i don't know if i was getting through to alex but i do know that i was getting closer to that entrance of that cell. and we turned and we started walking down the cell tier. we get to the entrance of the cell block. and nancy is white. and she says to me, i don't know if you realize how lucky you are right now. >> hale might have been lucky. he made it out knowing that' lex bennett never will but bennett has accepted that. >> i never think about the outside world anymore. never ever. i don't dream about the outside world, i don't read about the outside -- i'm 100% prison. i'm 100% this is my life. >> coming up on "lockup raw" a prolific prison killer reflects on his crimes on the inside.
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inmates are really kind of the true life hannibal lecters. they require extra security, shackles, three, four correctional officers at a time. it really puts our crews on a one-on-one basis with some of the most dangerous inmates in america and in many cases the interview process has to happen through glass. >> such was the case when the lockup production team first encounters 38-year-old steven hughley at the bruschi mountain correctional complex in eastern tennessee. when we met hum, hughley had been in prison for more than 20
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years, and was scheduled to be executed the following month. >> shot my mother and threw her off a bridge. we had had problems for years and it just finally reached a head. a girl that i had a date with call there. when i answered the phone my mother come out of her bedroom coming down the hallway, screamed is that another one of your little whores calling here. it's like i snapped. i told the girl i had a date with, i'll be out there to get you in a little bit. i said i'm fixing to kill this bitch. i got a rifle and shot her. and then i carried her dumped her in the river and went on my date. i felt a great deal of contempt for her because of the way she belittled my father and was constantly putting him down. and after a few years of that it
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just made me to what i really didn't feel anything toward her. >> throughout the hour-long interview, huguely rarely displayed emotion. except when recalling how his mother broke the news of his father's death when he was 12 years old. >> she hung up the phone and turned around and said ronny's dead. they found him dead in his car. he committed suicide. i'll put you on a bus and send you to michigan for the funeral. and that was it. and that made me hate her. because from that day forward i knew i was going to kill her eventually. >> hughley was sentenced to life in prison for killing his mother. but it wouldn't be the last time he'd commit murder. five years later while
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incarcerated at a different prison, he stabbed an inmate 67 times after the man and two friends allegedly threatened him. >> all three of them come up to my cell which was a single cell, and i slaughtered him, went after them two, and they took off running and hid. but i was going to kill them all three. >> after receiving an additional life sentence for killing the inmate, 13 years later huguely murdered again. in this unedited footage, huguely describes how and why he killed a prison counselor. >> the plan was to kill him, get the death penalty, use the state of tennessee's legal injection as a means of suicide since i didn't have the guts to do it myself. and then in january i killed him. and the first thing i did is said i want the death penalty, i want to be executed. and so here we are. >> how did you kill him? >> i stabbed him 36 times.
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i wanted to put so many holes in him that there was no chance that he could survive. my philosophy has always been if you put enough holes in them they can't plug them all and the chances are they are going to die because i've seen people stabbed 17, 18 times and get up and walk away. >> that's incredibly graphic and horrible. >> i agree. >> it's horrible. i mean -- >> i agree. i never lost a minute of sleep over anything i've ever done. if somebody who commits premeditated first-degree murder tells you they have remorse they are a liar. it's impossible to commit premeditated first-degree murder and then turn around and say you have remorse for it. how are you going to be remorseful about something you intended to do? >> huguely was sentenced to
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death for killing the counselor and was transferred to tennessee's death row located at the riverbend maximum security institution more than 100 miles away. lockup cameras were there as huguely left brushy mountain. >> my life fits in two bags. >> see you later. >> days after this footage was shot, huguely reinstated his appeal of the death sentence because the prison would not grant him a contact visit with his daughter. he was granted a stay of execution and returned to brushy mountain. ah!
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come on! let's hide in the attic. no. in the basement. why can't we just get in the running car? are you crazy? let's hide behind the chainsaws. smart. yeah. ok. if you're in a horror movie, you make poor decisions. it's what you do. this was a good idea. shhhh. be quiet. i'm being quiet. you're breathing on me! if you want to save fifteen percent or more on car insurance, you switch to geico. it's what you do. head for the cemetery! today, more and more people with type 2 diabetes are learning about long-acting levemir®, an injectable insulin that can give you blood sugar control for up to 24 hours. and levemir® helps lower your a1c. levemir® is now available in flextouch® - the only prefilled insulin pen
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