Episodes
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Today Professor Beck and Producer Brit are joined by criminal justice grad student Madison Rodriques to talk about corn dogs, slapping therapy in prison, anti-women laws, pathways to prison for women, higher rates of mental illness in women’s prison populations, The Bangkok Rules, imprisoning children, state sexual assault, the First Step Act, menstrual products, inducing labor against will, forced sterilization, protecting women prisoners from sexual violence, and Prison of the Psychotic Damned (2006).
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Professor Bronson is out of the office! So Producer Brit steps in with Host Professor Beck Strah to talk about a $5.6 million dollar payout to the victim of an invasive search and the closure of a women’s prison, The Office, the Lucasville Prison Riot from 1993 including the incident that lead to a prolonged lockdown, Warden “King” Arthur Tate, harsh realities, outside protests, inmate unions, the prisoner’s demands, not killing COs, and the final settlement, and Ghostlight (2024).
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Missing episodes?
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Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss weather control machines, presidential diet coke buttons, contraband drones, robots in prison, and CECOT Terrorism Confinement Center in El Salvador, including: the reasons for the prison, the prison population, the policies behind the prison, the successes of the prison, the failures of the prison, the architecture of the prison, the hooded guards, the food, and the future of the prison. Producer Brit watches Get the Gringo (2012) for Movie Minute.
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We have guests! Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah interview students Caroline, Daniel, Emma, Pete about their visit to the Prison Rodeo at the Louisiana State Correctional Facility at Angola. They also discuss smuggling meth into prison, Beck spilling Gumbo on his pants, the ethics of the prison rodeo, Hurricanes, the rodeo fair, trustees, the violence of the rodeo, prison cats, and Condemned to Hell (1984).
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Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss their upcoming trip to the Prison Rodeo at Angola, 19 executions so far this year, bringing back the gas chamber, closure as a concept invented by media, leasing prisoners to private business, the Red Hat unit, inmates as guards, notable wardens, notable former inmates, record solitary confinement stays, Homelessness is a Housing Problem by Clayton Page Aldern and Gregg Colburn, new malls, Cain’s Redemption by Dennis Shere, and The Farm: Angola, USA (1998)
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Professor Beck Strah and a healthy and returning Professor Eric Bronson discuss podcast tattoos, a stabbing incident at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center, correctional staff assaults, Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola (also known as “The Farm”), “Natural Life”, the electric chair, Utah’s death sentence options, Georgia bringing back the guillotine, Angola’s structure and layout, prison labor at Angola, the Angola prison magazine, Angola’s religious services, Angola-made coffins, the Angola Prison Rodeo, Gang Leader for a Day by Sudhir Venkatesh, God of the Rodeo by Daniel Bergner, and Death Row (2006).
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Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit talk about Beck’s various jobs, Derek Chauvin news, and then they review the first episode of Prison Break from 2005 in which they discuss prison stores, murdering the vice president’s brother, conjugal visits, Stacy Keach, trash fires, gifts made with prison labor, dated effects, and Alien: Romulus (2024)
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Professor Beck Strah and Producer Brit ask is Eric the meat of our sandwich?, the fish sloppy joe challenge, the Stateville Correctional Center getting depopulated due to bad conditions, swimming the Alcatraz escape route, the big weird time out, the would-be escapees of the Battle of Alcatraz, The Battle of Alcatraz: the escape attempt, the officer resistance, and what went wrong. They also discuss the show Prison Break and Sharkansas Women’s Prison Massacre (2016) and doing your prison break in the most ethical way possible.
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Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss energy drinks, Warheads, cruel and unusual lack of air conditioning in Texas prisons, the Birdman of Alcatraz, Al Capone, Machine Gun Kelly, Charles Manson’s Music, Doc Barker, Creepy Karpis, felons in marketing, The Jail: Managing the Underclass in American Society by John Keith Irwin, and The Haunting of Alcatraz (2020).
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Professors Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss an update to the story of Christopher Dunn, convicting the right person vs. convicting some person, the Alcatraz lighthouse, the discovery of Alcatraz, Millard [Mallard] Fillmore, the problems with making a wooden prison, Alcatraz’s relatively small capacity, the prison’s conditions and privileges, the economics of Alcatraz, the 1969 Indigenous Alcatraz Protests, Jack LaLanne’s handcuffed swim, and The Birdman of Alcatraz (1962)
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Today Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss a Missouri prison ignoring a court order to release a wrongly-convicted inmate, the story of the Mecklenburg Six; six death row inmates who escaped a Virginia prison, keeping snakes as pets, prison control rooms, eating your way to a better sentence, bombs as escape mechanisms, Life as a Jailer: Through the Officers Eyes by Capt. Joe DeFranco and K9 Officer Tom Duncan, and Deathrow Gameshow (1987).
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Today Professors Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss a Wisconsin warden charged with the deaths of inmates, incarcerated former LEOs and COs, therapy through magic, interrupting division via magic, the limitations of magic in real life interventions, magic as an introduction to cognitive behavioral therapy, Magic the Gathering in prison, magician criminals, and Derek DelGuado’s In and Of Itself (2020).
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Profs Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss Trump’s First Step Act, halfway houses and home confinement, prison magic in media, Harry Houdini and why there’s no movie about him, Criss Angel, David Blaine, magic as rehabilitation, the question magicians get most from inmates, OG (2018) and Madeline Sackler.
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Profs Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss wrongful incarceration compensation, the Pennsylvania Model, solitary and recidivism, solitary and incapacitation, alternative options for solitary, solitary as a means of gang separation, individual inmate experiences in solitary, virtual reality in solitary, and Ricky Stanicky (2024).
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Profs Eric Bronson and Beck Strah interview Lt. Joshua Kennedy of West Warwick Police Department and formerly of Rhode Island Department of Corrections. Also discussed are Prison Land: Mapping Carceral Power across Neoliberal America by Brett Story (2019) and Madea Goes to Jail (2009).
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Profs Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss Abiding Citizen (2009) and Bronson (2008) with Producer Brit.
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Profs Eric Bronson and Beck Strah discuss Cool Hand Luke (1967) and Life (1999) with Producer Brit.
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Profs Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss harmful chemicals in prison water, foam parties, Charles Bronson, the cost of solitary confinement, access to services in solitary, international views on solitary, racial disparities in solitary, staffing for solitary, therapy for solitary individuals, euphemisms, mental health and solitary, and Ernest Goes to Jail (1990).
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Profs Beck Strah and Eric Bronson discuss Groundhog Day, Law Abiding Citizen (2009), cruise reviews, the state incentives behind pay to stay jails, the two-tiered system of criminal justice, reward structures in prison, jail as rehabilitation vs jail as punishment, justification for pay to stay, pay to stay jail advertising, Mike Lindell, pivoting away from pay to stay, unemployment rates and incarceration, and Milli Vanilli (2023)
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Profs Bronson and Strah discuss an Australian manhunt for a man released on error, Crocodile Dundee, IHOP pancake eating contests, international felon disenfranchisement, disenfranchisement and white privilege, recidivism and re-enfranchisement, million dollar blocks, permanent disenfranchisement, and How to Be a Serial Killer (2008).
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