Cook’s tour of hell

“The guards brought another tour in today.  This happens every month or so.  Sometimes they bring in a group of teenagers they want to scare into submission.  The kids stand around shuffling their feet as the guards tell them that if they continue living the way they are now, then sooner or later they’ll wind up here.  They always say that Death Row is the worst.  They tell the tourists that in this barracks are the people who would murder their children and rape their grandmothers.  In truth, the people who commit the most heinous crimes aren’t on Death Row.  They’re out in the general prison population with much lighter sentences.  Most of the people on Death Row are here for no other reason than that their case got more publicity than others.  The difference between a man receiving a prison sentence and a man receiving a death sentence could be decided by nothing more than a slow news day.” – Damien Echols, Life After Death