america's prisons, dangerous, often deadly. there are 2 million people doing time. every day is a battle to survive and to maintain order. >> down on your feet! down! >> among the nation's toughest, california state prison corcoran. severely overcrowded and plagued by racial tension. we spent months inside where officers try to maintain order with an institution with a notoriously violent past. this is "lockup - corcoran: extended stay."

violence seems inevitable in prison. >> get down. get down! >> whether it stems from racial tension -- >> they took our tape. >> -- or dispute between cellmates -- >> he stabbed me with a cigarette lighter. >> being trapped in a cell with a big-ass cellie who's going to beat the hell out of you or chop you up. you don't know what a man is thinking in prison. >> it's the officers' job to prevent these attacks, and it's their lives on the line. >> get down! get down! >> let me see your hands, sally. put your hands up! corcoran's a maximum

security prison in the california state penal system. we house approximately 5,600 felons. >> this population includes infamous criminals like juan corona, sirhan sirhan, and manson. built to hold the most violent offenders in the state, corcoran has seen its share of brutality. today, a fresh group of inmates arrives at receiving and release, no doubt aware of this prison's reputation. >> when i get on the bus, they called your names out to come off the bus, and they're teary-eyed coming to corcoran. it's a shock to them. i guess they have heard a lot about corcoran. >> what do you know about corcoran? >> what i know? i know it ain't no joke. that's what i know. i know this is serious business. >> corcoran is a pretty rough

prison here. it's one of the rougher prisons. >> this is how serious it is. it's a life or death situation. it is like that. i don't care what they tell you. it is like that. okay? it is hardcore like that. >> corcoran's general population inmates are split into three main yards. the level one yard consists mainly of low security inmates, many of whom are in on parole violations. "b" yard holds the level three inmates, and "a" yard is home to the maximum security level four inmates who are serving time for more violent crimes. but first they have to get past sergeant rangel. >> i'm currently assigned as a receiving and release and i'm responsible for testify yo all operations of the intake of tin mates and >> hands behind your back and go on in. >> -- and of the outgoing departure of the inmates that are paroling, transferring to another institution. we'll get them processed,

i.d.ed. what's your number? >> date of birth? >> 4/3/81. >> how old are you? >> 26. >> how much do you weigh? >> i weigh about 150. >> how tall are you? >> about 6'2". >> how many times have you been coming back, in and out? >> this is my sixth time in prison. >> sixth? >> can you fill up with anybody on the yard? i can, but i prefer to be with -- you know the politics. >> okay. we're going to find you a bunk -- in the low tear bottom bunk. first tier. he's ready to go. >> all right. let's go. >> when i interviewed him earlier, he could only be housed with his same race, which is white. he wouldn't house with any other ethnic groups. >> given the potential for cell

violence, this inmate's request for same race arrangement is not uncommon. >> people just stay with their own race. it's just been like that. >> that's how the politics are right now. you either stay with your own or suffer some consequences later. >> our producers saw these consequences firsthand on "a" yard. corcoran's maximum security population. >> it looks like right now we had an attempted homicide between two inmates. we have a crime scene and the security squad out there collecting evidence. >> because of the severity of the incident, our cameras are not allowed past the perimeter fence. >> we did locate a weapon, and the victim had some pretty serious injuries, so at this point we don't want anybody that's not on yard to be on the yard because it's a crime scene. this is an investigation, and we want to make sure that we do everything right. >> we definitely identified the

suspect. it's going to tame some interrogation, some interviewing to find out exactly what happened and what happened. so at this point i don't really want to comment on the suspect or the motive. >> as the investigation continues, one suspect turns into three. the suspects are individually escorted to separate holding cells for further questioning and examination. >> we're stripping out this suspect that was involved out here on a fight on the facility. >> okay. can you grab me some swabs and if you have any distilled water? we like to swab any body fluids, blood, semen, whatever may be on our suspect.

obviously this individual doesn't have any type of injuries, so i would say 100% chance it was from the victim. that's why we swab. >> we're going back to our office. we're going to process all the evidence that we collected, process the photographs. some items were discovered during the search of the victim while he was getting medical aid. we are going to see what is inside and just start processing all our evidence and start writing reports. so that's where the real work happens. >> this is prison 101 stuff. this is just prison politics. we'll get this thing cleaned up and we'll move on. >> all three suspects have been charged with attempted murder. when inmates commit acts of

violence against other inmates or staff, they're sent to the security housing unit or shu, which is essentially a prison within a prison. inmates like jeremy spend the majority of their time in an 8 x 12 cell. >> the first words i ever heard from another inmate was welcome to hell. it was a zoo for men. >> our producers were granted an interview with jeremy towner under strict supervision of the officers because of his violent history. >> ten days was the orientation top stay in the cell, i guess, and then after the ten days were up, we were allowed to go to the yard and we met other inmates who told us there was a structure to live in. whites live with white, hang out with the whites on the yard. you don't deal with any other race. the fact we were lifers, we were probably going to have to stab people.

first thing that got into my head was we better get some knives. living on the street, you learn one thing. you survive by any means necessary. you do whatever it takes to get out of a situation like that. so if that means i have to become an accomplice, so be it. i'm not going to die. you know, i'm just too young. it became -- it came from there. and they said i was to go on a mission. my mission was to stab a man who came from another yard who was supposedly no good because they wouldn't have jump off in a riot after they got attacked. the woods in the riot were no good because they wouldn't attack the blacks after they got attacked. i stabbed this man three times and i got away with it. i walked off into the middle of the yard before the buzzer went off on the yard before everybody to get off. i had blood all over my hands. i was trying to get it off, so i licked the blood off my hands to get away with the crime.

>> that brutal assault was not his last. jeremy is currently held in the security housing unit for yet another violent attack. >> there was a man off a level three for beating up a child molester. the story was the child molester was going to get stabbed the next day and he let the child molester off easy by beating him up. so i was sent to stab him. so we went out to the outside concrete yard, and i had a six-inch knife brought out there through the security and all that. we knew how to get past the cop security, and i stabbed him multiple times, and he died within five minutes. that's why i'm here in the shu, so -- for murder. >> how are you getting the knives around? >> it's easy.

anybody who's got a sewing needle can make a knife. a sewing needle is made out of stainless steel. and stainless steel will cut this metal that they use. so over a period of time, you can shape a knife out of your toilet as long as the cops don't find the pattern cut in your toilet. there's many things you can do to make weapons back here. it's not that hard. usually we got them out when we did haircuts because they haircut they pull us out of the cell and take us to the concrete yard to cut hair. that's when we would drop the knife off. and when they came to search for us for yard, they didn't find anything. we went out to the yard and found the knife we stashed previously, and that's how we got it out. some inmates choose to do it a little immorally. they put it in places where the sun don't shine, and they carry it out in the yard. that's how they get their knives out. i wasn't about to da that. >> jeremy's weapon smuggling days may be over now that he's locked up in the shu.

but the officers deal with other inmates who know the same tricks and can be just as dangerous. next on "lockup: extended stay," jeremy reveals to our producers the events that led him to a life of violence in prison. >> they kept beating this guy and beating this guy, and blood was going everywhere. and later, suspicious activity on "b" yard triggers a shakedown. >> we're out here showing force, maybe get some intel. nineteen years ago, we thought, "wow, how is there no way to tell the good from the bad?" so we gave people the power of the review. and now angie's list is revolutionizing local service again.

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yard, different racial groups, which is an indication there is problems that are brewing. we're just kind of out here showing force, maybe get intel of why it's going on, why so many weapons. >> while we were talking with some northern hispanic-american inmates over here, i noticed the one in the middle was fidgeting his tongue around, and i could see cellophane underneath his tongue, and i asked him to spit it out, and he bent over and spit out a little thing wrapped in cellophane and that, a couple kites. >> sometimes you get the kites in cellophane, or they will put them in their anal cavity, and that's how they'll transport them from prison to prison or yard to yard. you have to take it to the office to see what they are talking about. it could be a yard report. northern hispanics are very,

very structured and they have positions and the whole biz. you know? they have positions. >> good find? >> yep. >> with the weapons still hidden somewhere on the yard, these kites may be the officers' key to their discovery. >> out in the yard. that way and that way. >> bring it out. here we go. another fine day, gents. >> yes, sir. >> keep moving, keep moving. >> here we go, come on out. >> clear! >> corcoran inmates self-segregate to protect themselves. no place is this more evident than on the yard.

>> it's a level three yard. generally all our whites hang out over here, and our asians on this side. and a lot of southern hispanics on the other side playing handball with the whites. and towards the tower, get a lot of northern hispanics and black hispanics over there. that is where they hang out over there. this is considered the west side of the yard. just on the other side of the yard, the east side of the yard is where all our southerners and whites work out at. in front of the building is where your blacks and your northerners generally hang out. >> they took our tables. >> we got no tables. we the only one that don't got no tables. >> they won't go to the urinals unless their race is only there. they've always got guys posted, two in the front, two in the back. it's so they don't get jumped. >> in the four months we spent

in corcoran, our crews witnessed plenty of inmate-on-inmate fights, this time an alarm sounds in the chow line at the sensitive needs yard. by the time we reached the yard, officers had separated the fight and questioned the suspects. >> i moved food off the chair and it almost hit the other gentleman, and he felt like i was disrespecting him on purpose, and we exchanged some words. and the next thing, we were fighting in the chow hall. >> he kicked somebody who was sitting on the seat, violently toward my way. >> violently. >> violently. he did it with a frown face, so, you know, i'm thinking, you going to say excuse me, sir? and he said, excuse me. and i left it at that. i thought it was over with. we all sat down, and he was still running his mouth. >> so you're at the same table? >> we're at the same table. >> was it a personal dispute or part of a larger thing? >> it was personal at that

moment. >> it was personal at that moment. >> there has been a fistfight between a hispanic and a black inmate, which is always a problem because the inmates tend to group along racial lines. i looked and found the combatants. the hispanic was bleeding from the head, not much, the black appeared to have no injuries. >> he said, we can talk about this outside, and i said, here we go. i said in my head, here we go. he started balling his fists and said nobody is going to tell me what to say and he said, i will get crazy and that is when i swung at him right there. >> that would have been bad. when you start fighting in the dining hall, there's tables and not a lot of room and people get hurt. >> i don't want to fight. i'm not a bad person. i walk around and mind my own business, and this guy, you know, he just disrespected me. >> a simple act of brushing food off of a seat, and it come close to hitting another person, you

know, obviously the level of being disrespected in here are quite different than, you know, people out in the real world. >> i have three staff members who corroborate other versions of the story, not yours. so it's yours, his, and three staff members. none of them saw that part. we have battery on an inmate. so you're going to go to ad seg. >> okay. >> i would imagine giving the circumstance he will be out in segregation 72 hours. get a little time-out. coming up -- >> be careful. use caution. >> -- the officers came up empty on the b yard shakedown. leaving them no option, but to hit the inmates where they sleep. plus -- >> some people -- >> what happens when cellmates aren't happy at home. >> i had a fight with my cell mate because i was tired of

living with him. one day, it started to rain. the house tried to keep out all the water, but water got inside and ruined everybody's everythings. the house thought she let the family down. they just didn't think it could happen. they told the house they would take better care of her... always. announcer: protect what matters. get flood insurance.

terry is a maximum security transgender inmate living on "a" yard. >> i'm in prison for prostitution with hiv/aids relations because i tested positive on one of my arrest cases. this building is medical, but it's for hiv, and it's been open for integration with non-hiv inmates on the yard. >> we first met terry while shooting "the lock-up: corcoran" episode in 2005. >> you going to get a job when you get out, reform yourself, or stay in the same pattern and you don't get out. >> in the three years since, terry's been involved in many fights with cellmates. >> it takes a special person on the yard to be my cellmate because of who i am. >> just days before this

interview, terry had another fight. >> i had a fight in my cell with my cellmate because i was tired of living with him. for like seven months, it's like being forced into a relationship that you don't want, so when i moved out, he attacked me in the kitchen, and i seen tears and i seen frustration, but i didn't care. i mean he stabbed me with a sig read lighter. he pulled out all my hair. it grew back since. i'm dealing with that. you know what i'm saying? but i'm dealing with that. >> if terry retaliates she runs the risk of going to the shu and possibly lengthening her sentence. with a parole date in sight, she's opting to remove herself from the situation. >> i feel like i'm a little bit better now than just to be everybody's piece of meat. so i try to pick a cellie that i can get along with. i talked to a home boy i went to school with. he could be more.

but i don't see it. he knew me when i was straight. i used to go to school with him, and he used to date my sister. >> if the prison approve as a transfer, he hopes it can keep him from being locked up. >> if staff allows it in this building us to have a non-hiv cellmate we have to go along and be compatible in the program. >> terry was having little issues, getting into fights because of all that, because of the transition he was going through. a lot of people don't accept it. we all grew up in compton. terry turned out kind of funny, but he was rough. he was out there fighting with us. he said, i'm compatible. so what i'm trying to do is i'm

compatible. trying to put us in a cell together. i understand all the things we went through. he can talk to me. >> some people understand me, some don't. >> we real close. i wouldn't let nothing happen to terry. i wouldn't let nothing happen to terry. my friends, the ones i'm close with from the streets know me and terry are homies. we're just friends. that's as far as it goes. >> you're the homey, man, you know you're the homey. >> i would like be known as more than a homey or a friend. someone who is sincere and nice, that can be there to talk to them, you know, just as a person, instead of the situation as it was. >> talk about putting somebody on the spot. >> what? >> talk about putting somebody on the spot. wow. >> with terry's future possibly hanging in the balance, terry and clarence will have to wait to find out if their request to live together is granted. coming up on "lockup:

extended stay" will these potential cellmates become soul mates? >> when you see somebody acting just like a woman, there's always going to be some type of temptation. plus, officers give these inmates a surprise wake-up call. but a lot of us leave our identities unprotected. nearly half a million cars were stolen in 2012, but for every car stolen, 34 people had their identities stolen. identity thieves can steal your money, damage your credit, and wreak havoc on your life. why risk it when you can help protect yourself from identity theft with one call to lifelock, the leader in identity-theft protection? lifelock actively patrols your sensitive, personal information every second of every day, helping to guard your social security number, your bank accounts and credit, even the equity in your home -- your valuable personal assets. look. your bank may alert you to suspicious activity on your credit or debit card. but that still may leave you vulnerable to big losses

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we operate here, you know, so it's like this here. i just charged it out. you know, the first -- we still want to try looking at presentable as possible. >> you know what i mean. we want to get business-like here. a lot of times you don't know when they're coming, so in case you might want to take a picture, you know, you look your best. appreciate it, junior. >> the compound on "b" yard brought the officers no closer to weapons. investigating the stabbing, the igi plans an early morning raid, this time hitting the inmates while they sleep.

>> we're looking for weapons, dope, tobacco. we've got to be real careful with these guys. the last time we did this in june with the same facility, the northerners will flush -- make sure they get to the toilets and flush as soon as they can. the southerners we found a lot of weapons. metal stock in recent months. quite a bit of it. it's coming out of the dining halls. they're fashioning them into bone crushers. be careful. use caution. we do suspect the south siders of having weapons in their cell. >> grab a mask. >> we've got a cell phone going off. >> with weapons hidden somewhere on "b" yard, time is of the essence. this raid is a last chance for officers to find the weapons before they are used. >> get down! get down!

get down! >> the element of surprise is key as it will hopefully give them an extra step on any inmate hurrying to flush contraband. >> get on the ground, now! get on the ground, now! cellie on top. >> it was early because my eyes could barely open. i was asleep. i was dreaming about ashanti and sleeping. >> i was sleeping and suddenly i heard the door pop and heard yelling, get down, get down. so i froze and they informed us to get out and backed up in the cells and backed up and cuffed us and brought us into the shower and proceeded to search the cell. >> well, if you run the flashlight through the back of the bottle, you will see if there's any sort of weapon or contraband.

you seal see the outline or silhouette of a weapon. >> a lot of flushing going on in 107. >> the sound of flushing toilets leads officers to a stash of inmate-made wine or pruno. >> they make pruno. they grab apples and they let it ferment for a couple of days and smash them up, put them in the bag and put heat over it. a bunch of covers. they use a lot of blankets. it was under a lot of blankets in the corner, and they let it stay until it becomes sort of like wine. >> usually typically what happens if it's found in a cell in a common area where inmates have access to it, which is obviously anywhere in the cell, they will both be charged for the box of inmate-manufactured alcohol. >> no weapons are found, but the search does turn up an important clue. >> we just found some kites up

here. >> we found more. >> what did you find? >> we haven't opened it up yet. wrapped with cellophane and tied with string. >> any time officers find kites, there's a potential wealth of information. after completing their search, the isu and igi teams head back to headquarters to decode the message in hopes of learning more about the hidden weapons. >> the kites, they just take a pen, and sharpen it down and write as small as they can. they write a lot of these kites. for us, we're not used to reading small like that. so we take them, blow them up, and we're able to read them a lot better. a lot easier. from the one kite i read already, it's about weapons on the yard. >> officers finally have the information they have been seeking, the location of the weapons on the "b" yard.

this intel may be the only way to prevent future attacks like the ones carried out by jeremy. >> i licked the blood off my hands to get away with the crime. >> but jeremy's brush with violence didn't start with prison. it was a brutal crime that brought him to corcoran in the first place. >> i have been in prison since the end of '99. i was originally arrested for murder in boulder creek next to santa cruz. before that i was living on the streets for approximately two years since i was 13 years old. just, you know, trying to survive on the streets and hanging out with the wrong people. we were downtown santa cruz at a youth shelter, and i was looking for a place to sleep, and i met somebody there by the name of 48. that was his street name. and my street name was storm. he said he had a dry place to sleep in boulder creek. so all we needed to do was find somebody with a car. and we found two people who had a car. it was a woman and her boyfriend.

and her boyfriend was a chronic heroin user, and he had a gun on him. he was trying to sell it for heroin or for money. they needed a place to stay as well. as soon as we got there, there were people already in the house by the name of eddie munster and brush. somebody got the idea in their head to borrow the gun from this man, eric, who was in the car who provided the ride up there, and take the gun and rob a mountain store. he said no and that was that. i was fine with it. and when i walked through the door, i was pushed. somebody was behind the door. i think it was eddie. he started beating him upside the head with the bat. and i was just in shock. i didn't know what to do, so i backed up, and i sat on the bed, and they kept beating this guy and beating this guy. his blood was going everywhere. just bits of skull and brain going all over the walls. and i remember getting blood in my mouth and on my face and on my clothes, and i was just

frozen. i didn't know what to do. i could hear him screaming, "help me!" and there was nothing i could do. they beat him for a good half hour. they beat him, they cut him. they cut hit throat. they did everything imaginable that you could do to destroy one man. and when they were done, they looked at me, and they asked me to help them. and i wasn't going to say no after what i just witnessed. i was not going to say no. i helped them carry the body downstairs, and you could hear the air coming out of his throat. i guess eddie thought he was still alive, so he took a cinderblock and dropped it, and i lost my lunch. i lost the liquor i drank and the food i ate. i told the authority everything that happened. just like a normal occurrence.

you know, [ bleep ] happens. >> jeremy's confession to his friend is what led to his arrest weeks later when 48 ran into trouble of his own. >> he testified to get out of a drug warrant in oklahoma city. he turned himself in to testify against us because i told him what happened that night. that's how i got caught, just like that, you know? every attorney said i had no chance. they postponed my sentencing until after i was 18. and county jail was where i started learning about prison. what to come, you know. all the stabbings and the fights and the riots. the drugs. everything that was going to come my way. >> being isolated in a single cell has prevented jeremy from further violence. but solitary confinement won't last forever.

coming up, he gets a cellmate, but will it be his last? >> you don't know what another man is thinking in prison. he'll wait until you're asleep, and he'll cut your throat. >> later, can authorities get to the weapons on "b" yard before they are used. >> it looks like it's made out of aluminum. it will ruin your day.

on corcoran's "a" yard, after weeks of waiting, inmates clarence and terry receive approval to be cellies. >> you've got to have a good cellie. you're doing time. from the places i have been, hot spots, for the past 15 years,

all violence. every day, lockdown. fighting. so i was very tense. and i was really ready -- say anything wrong -- violence. violence, i knew was violence. violence was my answer to everything. 18 months when i turned 7 1/2. >> that's all you knew? >> that's all i knew. i start getting a hold of myself, checking myself out inside. now that i'm here with terry, i feel like a whole lot of tension eased. >> as their relationship evolves within the cell, clarence and terry discuss their future outside the prison walls. >> if you have a problem, are you going to say, okay, i'm going to deal with this problem? i'm not going to use this as an excuse to prostitute. society is against people like you. straight up, society is against you. those are the programs.

the programs will get you a job. the program will put you into a bind to where it's a working environment. >> it's possible. >> it's a positive environment, and it's up to you to stay positive. it's up to you to stay in that environment. can't nobody bring you down but you. let's say you're downtown. i'm terry, i'm downtown. i know i'm downtown. it's up to me to better myself. it's up to me to be myself. just because i'm downtown doesn't mean i don't got to act like downtown. it's all up here, mental. >> it's been different because people look at me different. they don't talk to me as brass as they used to. >> i'm usually playing a lot. like grown-ups like to horseplay in prison. this is prison. if you horseplay to a certain degree, you get into a fight. i don't get that too much. snoop it sounds like a protection. like you're a protection to her. >> no. >> that's what it sounds like.

>> out of respect it is, out of respect for you. because its consequences whenever -- feel what's going on inside the cell. so they respect you. >> if you put it like that. a lot of people don't agree with homosexuality. >> what about this decor, all these woman with distinct breasts? i am all hormones, and i need that inspiration. i try to make that be what a focus. >> the women, these are all you? >> i want to attain some of the attitudes and composure and degrees of endearment with me as a female impersonator. i want to become fully in part in my mind this is me every day. it's a part of my fantasy. >> it blows my mind sometimes, some of the things he puts on. >> it is like living with a woman? >> exactly.

it's like living -- everything terry do is as a woman. and you start asking yourself. damn, what am i saying? you basically start research yourself, and if i do go this way, if i do, maybe like this, right, would that be giving me up as a man? you know what i'm saying? would i turn, like, feminine or gar, or can i still stay terry and still be a man? >> how about romantically? >> it's "a" plus. he is very dominant as far as being romantic. >> you got to -- >> you are! >> you got to dominate. >> there's a line we have as far as -- as far as -- his privacy as far as him being to a certain degree of an aggressive lover. he has a standpoint, which is a

barrier which we work on, but like i said, it's prison, he's here, he has a life outside of me. >> that's it right there. home sweet home, huh? >> huh? >> home sweet home, huh? >> you going to hug me? >> no. >> okay. >> on "b" yard, officers are using the intel obtained in the cellblock raid in hopes of finding the hidden weapons. >> it looks like it's made out of aluminum. some type of cloth fashioned into a handle. this could ruin your day.

>> so far we found nine in an hour and a half span and we're about two-thirds done with this yard. >> this looks like it's aluminum, probably something made out of the kitchen, probably an aluminum part. and a spike, from a fence or some kind of tie down. and this is aluminum from a food cartwright here. the handles are usually made out of cloth, like this one here. that's made out of a sheet wrapped with tape. some of these inmates here, part of the code is to always have something on them to protect themselves, whether it's on them themselves or the yard. whatever area you're in as far as your race or gang affiliation, you have something there to protect yourself with. >> these officers may have prevented another attack by successfully recovering the hidden weapons. they weren't the first and won't be the last made. >> we're not done yet.

we just got started on the west side now. >> help! next on "lockup: extended stay" another day in corcoran. another victim of the politics.

just days after removing weapons from the yard, a fight breaks out. >> an observer -- witnessed it, put the yard down. stopped fighting. we were coming from the unit. we respond. make sure no one gets up. if they do, we respond and assist.

>> it appears to be an isolated incident. >> it being just one on one, more like it was just a disagreement between those two. now the yard resumes program, and we'll just go back in the unit. >> meanwhile back in the security housing unit, inmate jeremy towner is nearing the end of his time in solitary confinement, and while he's scheduled to return to the general population, jeremy has requested placement in sny for fear of prison politics. >> if i go to sny, if i go back to the regular mainline, you know, daisies are going to be growing out of the ground real soon.

they've got my name on a little tiny list. the list is the "no good" list. inmates have them. they carry them around. when they get letters from the mainline, they check to see if that person's name is on the list, and if it is, they send a secret message back to the main line saying go ahead and destroy him, he's no good, and i'll probably get stabbed in the back soon. because i'm sny. because i don't want to stab anybody more. i don't want to be their prison bitch. >> in order to be moved to an sny yard, jeremy must first prove he can interact nonviolently with other inmates. >> the only thing that's changed so far is going out in the yard with 20 other inmates and going out there and seeing if i can get along with them. we only get yard, like, three times a week. it lasts from 9:00 or 12:00 or 12:30. usually right before i go out, i get panic attacks because i don't know if i'm coming back in.

you don't know what's going to happen here, you know. >> as another part of his gradual transition to an sny population, jeremy is no longer in a solitary cell. >> it's been about three years since i had a cellie. as soon as i got to the shu, they made me single cell because i had too much violence. i knew i was going to have to take a cellie, and i was worried about it. over here men tend to act a little more aggressive, chaotic, you know, a little more uncontrolled of their own emotions. but -- >> what did you fear? >> being trapped in a cell with a big ass cellie who's going to beat the hell out of you or chop you up, wait until you're asleep, and cut your throat. you don't know what another man is thinking in prison. you could be asleep, and then all of a sudden, you know, you ain't going to wake up.

one of the ceos wanted to cell me up with a black man. i'm not really a racist person, but i am afraid of their politics. i wasn't going to take that chance. so i asked the inmates on the yard, you know, is there anybody who needs a cellie. yeah, there's a dude upstairs. he's leaving in november. i moved in with ian. he's a little crazy at times, but if you go with it, he's all right, you know? >> he is a pretty nice guy. he is really religious. he likes his catholic religion. he's doing quite well, i think. >> the rules in the cell are pretty much don't piss the other guy off. that's the only rule. >> the stress of living with a cellmate may subside, but the realities of jeremy's sentence still loom over him. >> you got stuck with thoughts and everything, and you start thinking why am i stuck in a life sentence? all i'm doing is waiting to die. it's the world's longest waiting room.

it's depressing sometimes. the list is the no-good list inmates have on them. 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." 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.