facility also houses richard ramirez, better known as the night stalker, and richard allen davis, polly klaas' killer. the prison is more than 150 years old. the walls are crumbling. and the institution is outdated, contributing to an overwhelming increase in both the number and severity of brutal assaults by inmates. during the next hour, you will witness life inside san quentin, including a look inside california's vicious death row. >> san quentin opened in 1852 and today, seems physically trapped in the century in which it was conceived. old and decrepit, san quentin is riddled with shadowy alcoves and blind spots. there are no electrified, lethal fences. the towers around the perimeter must still be staffed where, incredibly, there are fewer surveillance cameras than a single convenience store. and worse yet, a lack of modernization has put officers in constant risk of inmate attack. >> every day i walk through those gates, the thought crosses my mind. is today going to be the last? >> the grounds are a sprawling 432 acres located on the shores of beautiful san francisco bay. >> customer

california's most heinous criminals, such as the 1980s night stalker richard ramirez, the man who killed polly klaasvis, whose crime led to california's three strikes law, and scott peterson, convicted of murdering his pregnant wife. >> the bottom line is, we don't allow filming in condemned row simply because it's department policy. >> though denied access to condemned row, our producers found an inmate who lived there for nearly 20 years. >> when i arrived on death row, it was in the winter of '91. i remember because it was real cold, there was icicles on the ground. my condition for the death penalty was the double felony, the murder then the robbery, but you know, if you move a person from one spot to another so many feet, it's kidnapping. so they claimed it was kidnapping, threw another felony on there. during that time, i was young. i was wild. i was angry. the jury verdict was it wasn't something i didn't expect. so, you know, at that time, and point, i wanted the death penalty, to be honest with you. because i wanted to come up here and, you know, hang out until i was executed. but then that