Publisher’s Note: The publisher has had no role in editing this column, which is published as the writer submitted it with the intention of publication in BEACONS.
By Ashley St John
In John Hackworth and Brian Gleason’s 2016 Pulitzer Prize winning editorial series, they go in depth of the alarming number of deaths in prisons at the hands of guards and how they’re covered up. Hackworth and Gleason cover the deaths of inmates Matthew Walker and Robert Peterkin at Charlotte Correctional Institute that happened. Walker was reported dead in 2014 after he was reportedly beaten to death by multiple prison guards. He suffered a crushed and swollen larynx, along with blunt force trauma to his head, neck and torso; according to his autopsy report, Walker suffered from at least 11 traumas. A year later, Robert Peterkin was found hanging and was eventually taken off of life support by his family. According to his sister, a month before he died, Peterkin told her that if anything happened to him to go after them and that “nothing will be like it appears to be.” Unfortunately, all of Walker and Peterkin’s killers were not charged due to evidence being destroyed and prison officials denying that they had witnessed anything. Of the eight guards that continued to work at the prison after the trials, three left the prison a year later and five were just reassigned different jobs within the prison. It’s clear that Hackworth and Gleason are angry about this massive issue and want to shed light on it. In the cover letter for these pieces, Chris Porter, the executive editor of The Sun, talks about how the few months after these stories came out made a huge change in the prison administration and the turnover of guards; eight of the original ten guards had been either fired or quit.
This set of articles was really interesting to read and gave insight on how broken the prison system is. It’s shocking to see how the prison and the state clearly didn’t care about the inmates or getting justice for their deaths. It took until these articles were published and gaining a lot of attention that action was taken against the corrupt guards. I’m glad Hackworth and Gleason included the names of the guards involved in these crimes to hold them accountable. It’s our job as journalists to present the truth and facts to the public and to hold people accountable when it’s necessary. They made a good choice including the details of both Walker and Peterkin’s deaths, it gave more insight and also made it more personal. Reading all the details on Walker’s death can be too much for some people, but it’s important to show the length that these guards went to to hurt and eventually kill Walker. One of the points that they made was that the medical examiner revealed Walker’s head was bashed into the point that there were imprints from the correction’s officer’s radios and that his head “felt like Jell-O.” This was appalling to read but it also puts into perspective how aggressive these guards were over such a small issue. The issue they had was that during a bed check, which is against the prison policy, Walker didn’t put away a cup and/or a magazine to clean up his cell. It was also very effective to have a quote from Peterkin’s sister regarding his death. ““My brother had said to me and my eldest sister that if anything should ever happen to him that we should go after them,” his sister Cecelia Martin told the Bradenton Herald on Thursday. “He said nothing will be like it appears to be.”” Adding this quote shows that Peterkin already knew about some of the things happening and really shows his fear that he was unsafe. Prisoners are still human and deserve basic human rights. While those who do commit awful crimes should be in jail and serving time, they don’t deserve to be brutally killed.
This is a great set of articles and is very informative about the types of issues many prisons face. If you’re someone who is into prison reform, or even if you aren’t, I highly recommend reading these pieces. Each of the eight articles isn’t very long and won’t take much time to read. Understanding what is happening and being aware is a big step in the direction of prison reform. These articles are interesting because they bring these issues to life by talking about two specific cases that happened. It can be one thing to just talk about the common issues that prisons have, but it takes it to a whole new level when you read in depth about what happens.
Comentários